DUBAI // Tiny particles produced by the white blood cells of a male camel in the emirate could improve the treatment of breast cancer.
Research by a team of Belgian scientists is still in progress, but they expect to eventually create a test capable of increasing the precision of breast-cancer treatment, allowing doctors to know in advance whether a key method of treatment is likely to work or not. The test would allow patients to avoid expensive drug treatments and their side effects when they will not produce results.
The groundwork for the research was done at the Central Veterinary Research Laboratory in Dubai, which treated the camel so it produced the microscopic particles needed for the research.
Developing the concept and proving it works in laboratory animals has taken three years and €1 million (Dh5.3m), said Prof Serge Muyldermans, a team member from Vrije Universiteit Brussel.
"It is not something you do on a Saturday afternoon," he joked.
Human trials are expected to begin by this autumn. The goal, said Prof Muyldermans, is to have a product capable of predicting how effective a breast-cancer treatment will be before it has even begun.
The research applies to a treatment option involving a substance called trastuzumab. The medicine, said Prof Muyldermans, is effective in only 30 per cent of breast cancer cases. Though it can help cure some people, the drug is expensive and has side effects such as potential heart problems.
"You only want to give it to the right patients," he said.
Currently, doctors have no way of telling in advance whether the drug will work or not. But the test that the Belgian team is conducting will be able to do this. Cancerous cells release proteins that interfere with the body's normal functions. The medicine is only effective in breast cancers that express a certain type of protein, known as HER-2.
From the blood of the Dubai camel, Prof Muyldermans has extracted small particles, known as nanobodies, that are capable of showing the presence of the HER-2 marker.
"The idea is to inject the nanobody into the patient," he said. "Normally, within one hour everything is eliminated by the body unless you have a tumour expressing the HER-2 marker."
In these cases, the particles stick to the tumour, clearly showing doctors where it is. Traditional scans also show the presence of tumours, but cannot tell doctors whether or not the tumours will respond to trastuzumab.
The three-year-old camel that produced the blood necessary for the research is alive and well in Dubai, said Dr Ulrich Wernery, the scientific director of the veterinary research laboratory in Dubai. The camel has only a small lump on its neck as a result of the six-week treatment doctors gave it about three years ago.
To produce the material needed by the Belgian researchers, the Dubai scientists had to inject the camel with small amounts of protein, produced by breast-cancer tumours that had the HER-2 marker. Each week, the animal was injected with 1ml of a mixture containing the protein.
"It was one or two drops only," Dr Wernery said.
The injections induced the camel's immune system to produce antibodies, which are proteins that fight foreign objects such as viruses, bacteria and other substances. After six weeks, the camel had enough antibodies in its blood for the experiment.
Over three years, the Belgian scientists isolated 38 antibodies that can recognise the cancer tumour marker. One of the antibodies was deemed the most suitable for use in humans.
Dr Wernery explained that only camels, llamas and sharks are capable of producing antibodies that are suitable for this type of treatment. Their main advantage is that they are very similar to the antibodies produced by humans, making them more likely to be accepted by the human body.
The Dubai research laboratory is also collaborating with the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine in the United Kingdom, using camel antibodies to produce anti-venin against some of the world's most poisonous snakes.
Besides snake bites, camel antibodies can be useful in fighting diseases such as polio, tuberculosis, malaria and even HIV, said Dr Wernery.
The Belgian team still needs time to complete its research. By this autumn, the test will have been in trials on at least 20 breast- cancer patients in Belgium.
However, before it can be accepted as a viable option, it must be tested on a much larger and more diverse group, with people from different ethnic groups being subjected to testing, said Prof Muyldermans.
"This is still in an exploratory phase," he said.
