Vaccines that protect against cancer have been proposed since before the 1910s. A growing sophistication of how cells age and die may hold the key to a cancer vaccine.

The nucleus of every cell has 23 pairs of chromosomes. And they contain DNA or the genetic material of the cell. A prime cause of aging is that every cell’s chromosomes are capped with a protein button called a telomere. As individuals age these telomeres wear out and fray. Normally cells divide about 75 times over a lifetime and afterwards the cell dies. Why then can cancer cells divide indefinitely, quickly forming lethal tumors?

Instead, cancer cells produce a special enzyme called telomerase, allowing a fountain of youth for the never-ending reproduction of cancer cells. This enzyme allows cells to divide uncontrollably. If part of this telomerase enzyme can be identified as an antigen by the body, then antibodies would be produced signaling an immune response that would destroy all cells bearing this enzyme, as in all cancer cells. Studies on humans have just begun as current opinion is that this would be at best a universal, but mild vaccine best combined with other developing anti-cancer vaccines.

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