If the latest are so resistant to radiation, it is time to take advantage of this aspect to help cancer patients (human).
It is tiny, but there are those who say it is the most indestructible animal: the late resists high doses of radiation, extreme temperatures, to total drought, vacuum of space…
Can’t resist radiation so well, cannot it help in the fight against cancer? Namely helping cancer patients (human) resist the radiation of radiotherapy?
It was this that it focused on: finding ways of Protect healthy cells during treatment against cancer – Radiotherapy impairs DNA in healthy cells, leading to cellular death and mass inflammation, and unpleasant side effects of treatment (such as mouth wounds, inability to eat, weight loss or bleeding).
Researchers isolated this “superpower” of Tardigrado in the form of Messenger RNA, which, when injected into cells, protects them from radiation.
A Tardigrado can withstand about a thousand times the dose of ionizing radiation that would soon kill a human being, remembers the.
This is where the Dsup, A unique protein, which only exists in the Tardigrade. Dsup is an abbreviation of “damage suppressor”: reduce DNA damage induced by X -rays about 40%.
But Dsup needs to be inside the cell core to work. Placing this protein directly in each cell is not viable; Integrating DSUP genes directly into DNA is a risk.
“One of the strengths of our approach is that we are using a messenger RNA, which only temporarily expresses protein, so it is considered much more safe than something like DNA, which can be incorporated into the genome of cells, ”says Ameya Kirtane, Author of the study.
The team managed to enjoy the MRNA for cells created in the laboratory, where generated large amounts of DSUP before they disintegrate.
“We thought that, combining these two systems – polymers e Lipids – We could get the best of both worlds and get a highly powerful RNA. And that is essentially what we saw, ”Kirtane.
This “revenue”, this type of DSUP administration, also prevents the protective armor of Tardigrade invading cells that radiation supposedly should kill.
The team injected DSUP Coding MRNA in rats that, 6 hours later, received a radiation dose approximately equivalent to the one that could be administered to a human patient with cancer.
A group of rats received treatment with MRNA and radiation in the boca; The other group received the same treatment, but in challenge. And yet other rats received radiation who the protection of Dsup, For investigators has a comparison base.
The rectum group had about half Radiation -induced DNA breaks compared to those who did not receive DSUP protection.
The group of the mouth had about a third of the breaks. And MRNA treatment seemed to have no effect on tumor volume.
It was an important step in realizing that can take the mRNA safely into a cell – without helping cancer.
The authors of the study believe that, soon, DSUP can be useful in human resistance to radiationnot only in treatments anti-cancerbut also to spatial radiation e to radioactivity.
