Instant immunity from chemical vaccine.(Cancer)

A novel vaccination approach could one day allow people to be given instant immunity against a whole range of different vital and bacterial diseases, as well as cancer and even some toxins.

Researchers at the Scripps Research Institute, US, created chemically programmable antibodies using a system known as 'covalent immunisation'. With this technique they were able to elicit an immediate immune response in mice against two different types of tumour. They did this by injecting the mice with a keyhole limpet hemocyanin coupled to JW hapten (JW-KLH) to induce a 'universal' immune reaction. The universal immune response resulted in the production of antibodies that were …