REVIEW: Eukaryotic Expression Vectors and Immunoconjugates for Cancer Therapy

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E. M. Glinka^*, E. F. Edelweiss, and S. M. Deyev

Shemyakin and Ovchinnikov Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, Russian Academy of Sciences, ul. Miklukho-Maklaya 16/10, 117997 Moscow, Russia; fax: (495) 335-7103; E-mail: em_glinka@mail.ru

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed.

Received September 19, 2005; Revision received October 21, 2005

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This review considers ways to address specificity to therapeutic targeted anticancer agents. These include transcriptional activation of tissue- and tumor-specific promoters in eukaryotic expression vectors and use of antitumor-directed immunoconjugates. The review deals with analysis of strategies used for selection of targeted promoters and examples of antibody fusion proteins exhibiting antitumor activity. A new direction in antitumor treatment pooling together methods of gene therapy and antibody therapy has appeared. This direction is based on the development of vectors encoding secreted forms of immunoconjugates. After vector introduction into a cell, the latter is capable of synthesizing and secreting antibody fusion protein composed of a therapeutic anticancer agent and antibody specifically targeted to cancer cells.

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KEY WORDS: gene therapy, fusion protein, secreted protein, immunoconjugate, anticancer agent

DOI: 10.1134/S0006297906060022

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