Researchers at the University of Leeds and the Institute of Cancer Research in London, both in the United Kingdom, found that the naturally occurring virus was able to cross the blood-brain barrier in all who took part in the study.
These findings are significant because it was previously thought that the only way to use the virus to treat brain cancer was to inject it directly into brain tissue. But this approach is limited; it cannot be repeated very often and does not suit all patients.
Reporting in the journal Science Translational Medicine, the researchers explain how the virus — a member of the reovirus family — not only infected cancer cells without affecting healthy cells, but it also helped the immune system to find and attack the cancer cells.
They believe that their study shows how reoviruses might enhance a type of immunotherapy called checkpoint therapy for cancers that start in the brain or spread to the brain from another part of the body.