| Natalie Raso - Weapons of Targeted Destruction: Using Viruses to Kill Cancer | Abstract |
| Project
Information Abstract Project Summary Background Purpose Scientific Thought Hypotheses Apparatus and Materials Genetically Engineered KM110red Herpesvirus Methodology Procedure for Cell-Line Splitting Procedure for KM110r Infection Procedure for Immunofluorescent Microscopy Imaging Statistical Analyses Proliferation Assay Analyzed Data Major Results Graphed Results Discussion of Statistics Controls and Variables Conclusions Discussion Discussion of KM110r Efficacy Successes and Failures Sources of Error and Data Limitations Future Research Applications Glossary Bibliography Acknowledgements |
The resistance of cancers to conventional therapies has inspired the search for novel strategies. Consequently oncolytic virus therapy is being tested in limited clinical trials around the world. This experiment was conducted to determine whether a double mutant Herpes Simplex Virus type I, KM110red (KM110r), is an effective and safe oncolytic virus therapy by exploring its effects on osteosarcoma (U2OS) and human fetal osteoblast (hFOB) cells and to determine whether induced genetic differentiation alters the permissiveness of hFOB cells to KM110r. U2OS cells, hFOB cells and co-cultures were infected and fluorescent microscopy was employed to conduct proliferation assays over the course of 4 time periods. One thousand (1000) images were taken over the course of experimentation. The cells in each image were counted and morphologically and statistically analyzed to interpret the data. The data showed that at 34°C and 37°C, KM110r could successfully eradicate all of the cancerous U2OS cells within the experimentation period, but not at 39°C. The significant practical application of this discovery is that as a cancer therapy, use of KM110r is optimal when administered at 37°C — or physiological body temperature. hFOB cells grew at almost identical rates regardless of incubation temperature or status of infection and were not permissive to KM110r at any point during experimentation which suggests that KM110r ignores these non-cancerous cells despite differentiation. The results confirm that KM110r is selectively oncolytic and is an effective and safe oncolytic virus therapy under normal conditions of cell growth and differentiation. |