Shanghai Science and Technology Award: female scientists cure leukemia with arsenic

Source: surging news on May 19, 2015, at the Shanghai Science and technology award conference held on May 18, 2015, the project "Research on the pathogenesis and new targeted treatment of myeloid leukemia" led by Chen Saijuan won the special prize of natural science, which is 2012 The second special prize since the establishment of the special prize in Shanghai Science and technology award conference in, is also the first special prize in the natural science award Chen Saijuan is a academician of the Chinese Academy of engineering and a researcher of Ruijin Hospital Affiliated to the school of medicine of Shanghai Jiaotong University His team's research results have been widely used in many blood centers around the world, saving thousands of patients' lives, which is a successful model of cancer treatment history Thanks from Italian patients in 2009, Chen Saijuan went to Italy to attend an academic conference The president of the conference gave Chen Saijuan a thank you card in beautiful Chinese, which came from an Italian patient with acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) Leukaemia is a kind of malignant tumor of blood system that seriously endangers human health The mortality rate ranks the eighth in malignant tumors Among men under 40 years old and women under 20 years old, leukaemia has the highest mortality rate No matter children or adults, if they have APL, they have very good therapeutic effect "Without hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, the disease-free life span of 5 years can reach 90%, and the quality of life is as high as that of normal people." Chen Saijuan said that patients with APL preferred "coordinated targeted therapy" and that "this method enables patients to work normally, have no impact on fertility, and do not need to take immunosuppressants." For more than ten years, Chen Saijuan's team has been devoted to the research on the pathogenesis and targeted treatment of leukemia Its most outstanding research achievement is the first combination of arsenic (commonly known as arsenic) and all trans retinoic acid to target APL, making it the first basically curable acute myeloid leukemia His team published 57 SCI papers in academic journals, including Nature Genetics and science, and was selected into the top ten scientific advances in China in 2010 and 2012 This fundamentally changed the concept that malignant tumors are incurable, making the most dangerous APL The transformation from high mortality rate to high cure rate has been realized, which provides a good idea for the treatment of other types of leukemia and solid tumors, and further extends the idea of coordinated targeted treatment to other types of leukemia and solid tumors, and also provides a successful model for international translational medicine research Before the 1970s, the treatment of APL was mainly chemotherapy The mortality of APL was relatively high The 5-year disease-free survival period was about 30% reported abroad Due to the lack of effective support therapy in China, it could only reach about 10% Chen Saijuan told reporters that there is a kind of coagulant in this kind of promyelocytic leukemia cells Once chemotherapy is carried out, the cells will release the coagulant, which will cause disseminated intravascular coagulation, and then systemic hemorrhage Once the hemorrhage occurs in the brain, it will endanger life The cooperative targeted treatment method of Chen Saijuan's team in treating leukemia with arsenic is mainly to use all trans retinoic acid and arsenic trioxide, supplemented by chemotherapy The former is a derivative of vitamin A, without the side effects of chemotherapy, and the latter is often called "arsenic" Since the 1980s, all trans retinoic acid has been used in the Shanghai Institute of Hematology, where Chen is located "With this drug alone, the complete remission rate can reach 80% to 85%." Chen Saijuan explained that the so-called remission rate is that the number of primordial cells in the bone marrow of patients decreased by less than 5% after treatment, and the disease was relieved In the treatment of APL with all trans retinoic acid, the complete remission rate was significantly increased, and there was no side effect of chemotherapy But there is also a problem, the recurrence rate is high, often within one or two years Chen Saijuan said that in order to solve the problem of recurrence, chemotherapy was usually used at the same time National multi center clinical research shows that all trans retinoic acid plus chemotherapy not only increases the cure rate, but also reduces the recurrence rate, but also 40% - 50% of patients will relapse Therefore, in the 1990s, they cooperated with Harbin Medical University and found that the complete remission rate could reach more than 90% when arsenic trioxide was used in patients with recurrent APL resistant to tretinoin and / or chemotherapy The theory of traditional Chinese medicine is "attack poison with poison" According to Chen Saijuan, it has been confirmed from the molecular level that arsenic can degrade PML-RARA, the carcinogenic target protein of APL The combined targeted therapy strategy is that different drugs play a synergistic role in different ways of action, which is the basis for the therapeutic effect, making APL the first subtype of curable acute myeloid leukemia "A 7-year follow-up study of 85 patients with APL showed that the 5-year disease-free survival rate was more than 90%." According to Chen, the standard of "cure" refers to the disease-free survival rate of 5 years, i.e the recurrence of more than 5 years after stopping treatment is significantly reduced Chen's team's work has had a great influence in the world, which is called "Shanghai plan" by American blood circle The team was highly praised by blood, the leading blood magazine, when they were invited to write a review article The chief editor wrote: "for most patients, this disease, which was originally a rapid death, has become curable, almost entirely thanks to your team's work." The first National Center for translational medicine will be established in Shanghai in 2013 The national development and Reform Commission approved the establishment of the first National Center for translational medicine in Shanghai and made a nationwide layout The other four centers are respectively located in Beijing (two), Xi'an and Sichuan The first major national science and technology infrastructure for translational medicine will be located in Ruijin Hospital, affiliated to the school of medicine, Shanghai Jiaotong University Chen Saijuan is the director of the national translational medicine center (Shanghai) In order to accomplish this important task, she said, with the support of Shanghai Municipality, Shanghai Jiaotong University and medical college, she launched the cultivation and operation of the system biomedical collaborative innovation center With the innovative system and mechanism, she integrated the superior resources and scientific research teams in Shanghai Universities and national scientific research institutes, striving to enrich the connotation of precision medicine for the prevention and treatment of chronic complex diseases and promote me The development of China's translational medicine and the promotion of the level of pharmaceutical biotechnology industry have made significant contributions Chen Zhu, a hematologist at Shanghai Jiaotong University and former Minister of the Ministry of health of the people's Republic of China, is the director of the academic committee of the National Center for translational medicine (Shanghai) He hopes that the center will follow the spirit of the St Jude Children's research hospital in Memphis and closely integrate clinical and basic research He emphasizes that clinical trials will allow patients to be free and promote the faster and healthier development of translational medicine.