Sept. 8 – A new breakthrough development in the field of anti-cancer vaccines comes from Italy. Two researchers from the “Ugo Schiff” Department of Chemistry, Chemistry Professor Cristina Nativi and Chemistry Researcher Barbara Richichi announced that they developed a molecule capable of stimulating a specific immune response to the cells affected by cancer. It is a fully synthetic construct characterized by four saccharide mimetic residues of a specific breast cancer marker. The project was carried out via a multi-disciplinary international collaboration, and the results were published in the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition. The molecule obtained at the University of Florence was combined with a peptide platform developed by the research team led by Olivier Renaudet the University of Grenoble. Immunological studies were carried out in collaboration with Lbashir BenMohamed’s team at the Irvine Medical School of the University of California. The research was carried out thanks to funding received from AIRC (Italian Association for Cancer Research) and the Ente Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze.
