discovered_01_2015 - Lego Tackles Cancer

FOCUS// THE HZDR RESEARCH MAGAZINE WWW.HZDR.DE 18 19 At 28, Claudia Arndt is still a young woman, but a bit too old to be playing with Legos every day. Yet that is exactly what the biologist has been doing for the past four years of her dissertation completed at the Institute of Immunology at the University Hospital Dresden and the Department of Tumor Immunology at the University Cancer Center (UCC) Dresden. Well, that is if you take her literally when she explains her research project – bispecific antibodies for cancer therapy: ‘A bispecific antibody basically works like a Lego brick,’ says Arndt. One end fits nicely on the surface of a cancer cell, the other one onto membrane structures of certain immune cells, which are called T-cells. ‘That way, cancer and T-cell are connected. The T-cell is activated and can destroy the tumor cell.’ // The mission of the radioimmunology group at HZDR is to develop universal drugs that utilize the body’s own immune system to destroy cancer cells. _TEXT . Sascha Karberg LEGO TACKLES CANCER TOP AND BOTTOM: Claudia Arndt makes antibodies click. Photo: André Forner

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