Published On:Sunday, 26 October 2014

SRINAGAR -- A Kashmir-born US scientist has created a flutter in the field of cancer research by successfully using stem cells as killing machines to fight brain cancer. Although the experiments have been limited to mice, the stem cells that were genetically engineered to produce and secrete toxins which kill brain tumours, without killing normal cells or themselves, are expected to pave way for a breakthrough in the fight against cancer.

Dr Khalid Shah, lead author and director of the molecular neurotherapy and imaging lab at
Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, told the BBC that the results were very positive.

"After doing all of the molecular analysis and imaging to track the inhibition of protein synthesis within brain tumours, we do see the
toxins kill the cancer cells. Cancer-killing toxins have been used with great success in a variety of blood cancers, but they don't work
as well in solid tumours because the cancers aren't as accessible and the toxins have a short half-life. But genetically engineering stem cells has changed all that," he said.

"Now, we have toxin-resistant stem cells that can make and release cancer-killing drugs."

Born in Kashmir, Dr Shah recently delivered a lecture on stem cells at University of Kashmir. For many years, he and a team of scientists had been researching a stem-cell-based therapy for cancer, which would kill only tumour cells and no
others.

They said the next stage was to test the procedure in humans.

Dr Shah says he will test the technique using a number of different therapies on mice with
glioblastoma, the most common brain tumour in human adults.