Optionen fur den einsatz einer gentherapie zur behandlung von knochentumoren

Current therapeutic modalities in bone tumors are surgical resection, chemotherapy, and/or radiotherapy. However, benificial effect is limited in some patients and locations. At present, scientific effort is made towards new therapeutic avenues on the basis of biochemistry, molecular biology, and gene therapy. One possible therapeutic approach might be integration and expression of genes encoding for inflammatory mediators. Thus, an increased immune reaction of the perifocal tissue might be triggered via peritumoral inflammatory reaction. Hence, better demarcation of affected tissue might improve surgical intervention. Results presented here demonstrate that retroviral and adenoviral transduction of human osteoblastic cells in vitro is possible and high expression of transgene products are shown. These experiments pave the way for new clinical approaches of gene therapy for bone tumors.