Biology and Mathematics: a strategic alliance against cancer through new anti-tumoral therapies
 
 
Description: 
Cancer remains one of the leading causes of death globally, affecting both sexes equally with an estimated 12.7 million cases around the world. This number is expected to increase to 21million by 2030, despite several curative strategies are offered to the patients. Therefore, new and promising approaches for the prevention and/or treatment of cancer are needed. It is well known that malignant tumors are able to grow and spread due to their ability to escape the immune system surveillance. Hence, immunotherapy, through the administration of vaccines, adjuvants or antibodies, is becoming a valid therapeutic alternative to investigate.  Immunogene therapy and genetic vaccination, based on vectors used to deliver tumor antigens and/or immunomodulatory molecules to stimulate the immune system response, represent a new frontier in this research field. In the last years, intramuscular gene transfer by non viral-vectors such as plasmid DNA is receiving considerable attention due to its safety, simplicity and low cost of production. However, because DNA plasmids show a low transfection efficiency and a poor transgenic expression, strategies to improve the DNA uptake into the nuclei of cells for its expression are required. A strategic alliance between mathematicians and experimental oncologists can help to develop new and more effective anticancer therapies based on gene transfer by plasmid DNA.
Date:  2016-04-20
Start Time:   14:30
Speaker:  Emanuela Signori (Univ. Rome, Italy)
Institution:  University of Rome
Place:  Room 5.5
Research Groups: -Numerical Analysis and Optimization
See more:   <Main>  
 
© Centre for Mathematics, University of Coimbra, funded by
Science and Technology Foundation
Powered by: rdOnWeb v1.4 | technical support