Shout out to Drs. Nelson and Subbiah for their astutely written reply to the Conley et al. editorial on the “adscopal effect” in the high-impact journal, Molecular Cancer Therapeutics. Read it here: https://bit.ly/3SqI55Y
An “abscopal effect” classically refers to the regression of distant tumors outside the treatment field of radiation therapy. By contrast, the “adscopal effect," a term coined by Conley et al. describes the shrinkage of distant, noninjected visceral lesions mediated by the oncolytic adenovirus, AdAPT-001.
As Nelson and Subbiah point out, what differentiates oncolytic adenoviruses like AdAPT-001 from other oncolytic viruses is that they “piggyback” on lymphocytes and erythrocytes, which are thought to shield them from the presence of neutralizing antibodies so that these adenoviruses reach and transduce non-injected tumors.
Our expectation is that if AdAPT-001 continues to make waves in hard-to-treat tumors like sarcomas, the novel term “adscopal effect” will become conventionalized and formally enter the clinical lexicon.
In a just-published editorial from the impactful journal, Molecular Cancer Therapeutics, Anthony Conley et al. define a new term, “adscopal effect,” that refers to the immune-mediated action-at-a-distance activity with the EpicentRx oncolytic adenovirus, AdAPT-001, that expresses a TGF-β trap. Read here: https://bit.ly/3vZx0B7
Danielle, this is exactly what one division of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) is studying. When I was at ORNL, one researcher provided a PowerPoint slideshow on how they were able to take a molecule that would target specific cancers and they added a radionuclide to it. So the radiocompound would target the cancer cells and deliver a dose from the radionuclide right at the tumor site. No healthy tissue was killed as the radionuclide was at the target cancer site, bonding with the other half of the target molecule. ORNL makes the specific radionuclides and produces alpha emitters and beta emitters with a relatively short half life to give their dose to the tumor, and then pass out of the body as waste through the urine and digestive system. Congratulations!