Cancers, Vol. 12, Pages 478: Bone and Soft-Tissue Sarcoma: A New Target for Telomerase-Specific Oncolytic Virotherapy

Cancers, Vol. 12, Pages 478: Bone and Soft-Tissue Sarcoma: A New Target for Telomerase-Specific Oncolytic Virotherapy Cancers doi: 10.3390/cancers12020478 Authors: Hiroshi Tazawa Joe Hasei Shuya Yano Shunsuke Kagawa Toshifumi Ozaki Toshiyoshi Fujiwara Adenovirus serotype 5 (Ad5) is widely and frequently used as a virus vector in cancer gene therapy and oncolytic virotherapy. Oncolytic virotherapy is a novel antitumor treatment for inducing lytic cell death in tumor cells without affecting normal cells. Based on the Ad5 genome, we have generated three types of telomerase-specific replication-competent oncolytic adenoviruses: OBP-301 (Telomelysin), green fluorescent protein (GFP)-expressing OBP-401 (TelomeScan), and tumor suppressor p53-armed OBP-702. These viruses drive the expression of the adenoviral E1A and E1B genes under the control of the hTERT (human telomerase reverse transcriptase-encoding gene) promoter, providing tumor-specific virus replication. This review focuses on the therapeutic potential of three hTERT promoter-driven oncolytic adenoviruses against bone and soft-tissue sarcoma cells with telomerase activity. OBP-301 induces the antitumor effect in monotherapy or combination therapy with chemotherapeutic drugs via induction of autophagy and apoptosis. OBP-401 enables visualization of sarcoma cells within normal tissues by serving as a tumor-specific labeling reagent for fluorescence-guided surgery via induction of GFP expression. OBP-702 exhi...
Source: Cancers - Category: Cancer & Oncology Authors: Tags: Review Source Type: research