When you hear the terms "suicide molecule," "stealth," "going rogue," and "Casper the ghost," you might think they refer to some kind of modern warfare tactic. Well you're not that far off. Modern medicine is coming up with some pretty covert and creative ways to wage war on disease.
Recently, a researcher from Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine has cooked up a clever way to stop and even reverse rheumatoid arthritis. He's created a molecule that masquerades as a "suicide molecule." It can penetrate overactive immune cells, causing them to self-destruct.
Rheumatoid arthritis, a disease that affects approximately 1.5 million adults, involves immune cells that refuse to die after attacking an invading virus or bacteria. These stubborn cells, called macrophages, then "go rogue," moving throughout the blood, joints, cartilage, and bone where they build up. So far, the medical community has not been able to find a non-toxic and effective way to prevent this phenomenon.
Harris Perlman, associate professor of medicine at Feinberg thinks his new molecule, which he affectionately calls "Casper the Ghost," could be the solution doctor's have been looking for. He discovered that the overactive immune cells that cause rheumatoid arthritis are deficient in a molecule called Bim, which would normally give them the signal to self-destruct. Perlman created his "ghost" molecule as an imitation of a Bim, designed to correct this shortage. In tests on mice, the treatment worked 75% of the time, and it did so without the dangerous side effects of current treatments.
Perlman is hopeful about the future of his technique. "The best part was we didn't see any toxicity. This has a lot of potential for creating an entirely new treatment for rheumatoid arthritis." Doctors currently treat the disease with low-level chemotherapy and steroids, which are frequently accompanied by severe side effects. Other recent treatments have proven inconsistent and also cause side effects.
