iCancer: closing the net around cancer by getting the public involved | Stephen Curry

iCancer campaign used social media to raise funds for a Swedish laboratory to develop its new therapy, but it raises important questions about public participation in funding decisions

How should the public be involved in the decision to fund scientific research? Directly, this is the answer that offers a new campaign that aims to harness the power of social media to develop a treatment for cancer.

iCancer The campaign, created by the author Alexander Masters, aims to raise funds from the public for research on a new treatment for neuroendocrine tumors (NET) - The body of the gland cancer that release hormones under control of the nervous system. NET are difficult to treat because patients often have symptoms only after the cancer has reached a relatively late stage and began to spread to other parts of the body. Cancer that killed Steve Jobs, the charismatic founder and visionary of Apple, a year ago.

campaign not starting from scratch as a new type of therapy for NET is currently being developed in the laboratory of Professor Magnus Essand. iCancer specific objective is to help Swedish scientists go beyond what has hitherto been an insurmountable obstacle: the increase of £ 2m needed for clinical trials in human patients

In a multiple approach would surely win the admiration of Apple design chief Jonathan Ive research group Essand adenovirus intelligently redesigned itself a disease agent in the therapy. Your modified virus that normally causes colds, suggests rather NET cells for destruction.

litany of tricks design is impressive. Swedish researchers modified the surface of the virus particle to help drag beyond the patient's immune system and improve their ability to find and infect tumor cells. Other genetic changes suppressed viral replication in tumor cells and reproduction increased in tumor cells. Adenovirus infection disrupts tumor cells, a strategy to kill with a double whammy because the content published dead cells stimulate the immune system to bind to tumor cells.

Essand

modified virus was successful in mice, but is now dormant in your laboratory freezer for lack of funds to begin clinical trials.

This is where the Masters Author Alexander discovered. When he learned that his friend and publisher of Dido Davies had been diagnosed with the disease, control drag the Internet for information on networks and eventually found its way to the laboratory of Professor Essand. Horrified that promising therapy has been hampered by the lack of a relatively small amount of money, joined with friends and another patient, Dominic Nutt NET to launch a campaign on the Internet, hosted on iCancer.org.uk Essand provide the money needed to perform the first clinical trials on the safety and efficacy of viral therapy.

• is a bold ambition and commendable. But the journey a successful experience in a university laboratory for therapy practice is long and costly. As highlighted in the Economist Mariana Mazzucato
• state enterprise
• , private companies and venture capital firms are often reluctant to invest in technologies that n ' not have a clear path to a profitable product, preferring public sector to bear the risk of early stage of development. Most countries, the United Kingdom, including total lack of effective mechanisms for interim financing necessary to obtain a science lab up with investors. A particular problem is that the adenovirus Essand Swedish government does not fund human clinical trials.

campaign approach to solve this problem raises interesting questions at the interface between public research and scientific. Undoubtedly, it is mixed interest in the mechanisms of cancer research, and even stimulate dialogue, because the public is paying directly and may be more motivated to follow the results.

But how campaign sit with existing mechanisms for funding such research? Should be a free-for-all, with a building campaigns more organized and earn money? In Britain, cancer research is largely funded by the research councils and the charity Cancer Research UK. Funding mechanisms have the advantage that several applications are discussed in detail by scientific experts before taking decisions on how to allocate grants. Thus, a broader view can be taken and determine priorities with a certain detachment. But of course, the public is excluded.

iCancer approach appealed to the public, but despite the scientific arguments presented clearly and without hyperbole on the campaign website, do not necessarily have the details of a finance committee large field application required.

Where is the balance? E-mail exchange and my reading of the literature, it is clear that sniper Essand the teacher, but has used this funding mechanism for the extraordinary absence of an alternative mechanism for fundraising this scale clinical trials. The organizers obvious passion and the fate of patients with human sympathy call NET base. Who does not want the campaign to be a success?
Some of my learned colleagues preservatives may nod to the output of "protocol", but the experimenter in me a great interest in the campaign to achieve its objectives, the curiosity to see how they can disrupt funding landscape and the relationship between scientists and the general public. The organizers are also experimenting and discovering. The campaign is realistic about the prospects for success of the experimental therapy - is far from a given - but it also has a charming innocence.

Find best price for : --Jobs----Essand----Masters----Jonathan----Magnus----Apple----Steve----cancer----research----Alexander----iCancer--