Measles Virus: A Tool Against Multiple Myeloma?

Multiple myeloma is a cancer of the bone that currently has no cure.

In a new phase I clinical trial opened by Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, a bioengineered measles virus is being tested of its potential to kill cancer.

This the third of a series of molecular medicine studies in patients testing the potential of measles to kill cancer. Previous studies were on glioblastoma multiforme (a brain tumor) and recurrent ovarian cancer.

Many cancers, including multiple myeloma, overexpress a protein, CD46, which allows them to evade destruction by the immune system. Laboratory strains of measles virus seek out this protein and use it as a receptor by which to enter the cancer cells. Upon entry, the virus spreads, infecting nearby tumor cells and fusing them together, increasing cancer cell death.

In this study, the researchers are using a strain of measles virus which was engineered to carry an additional gene that codes for the sodium iodide symporter (NIS) protein and is administered intravenously to multiple myeloma patients (instead of directly to the tumor).

 Subject patients in this study should be adults with relapsed or refractory (that is, having had more than one type of treatment fail them) myeloma. They must not have had allogeneic (from another person) stem cell transplants and must either have had a prior measles infection or been vaccinated against it.

This multiple myeloma study is funded by the National Cancer Institute and the Harold W. Siebens Foundation.

Find more details from the full report.