Thesun 2009-06-30 Page10 Partial Recount In Iran

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theSun

| TUESDAY JUNE 30 2009

news without borders

SYDNEY: Australian scientists have developed a “trojan horse” therapy to combat cancer, using a bacterially-derived nano cell to penetrate and disarm the cancer cell before a second nano cell kills it with chemotherapy drugs. The “trojan horse” therapy has the potential to directly target cancer cells with chemotherapy, rather than the current treatment that sees chemotherapy drugs injected into a cancer patient and attacking both cancer and healthy cells. Sydney scientists Dr Jennifer MacDiarmid and Dr Himanshu Brahmbhatt, who formed EnGenelC Pty Ltd in 2001, said they had achieved 100% survival in mice with human cancer cells by using the “trojan horse” therapy in the past two years. The scientists plan to start human clinical trials in the coming months. Human trials of the cell delivery system will start next week at the Peter MacCullum Cancer Centre at the Royal Melbourne Hospital and The Austin at the University of Melbourne. The therapy, published in the latest Nature Biotechnology journal, sees mini-cells called EDVs (EnGenelC Delivery Vehicle) attach and enter the cancer cell. The first wave of mini-cells release ribonucleic acid molecules, called siRNA, which switch off the production of proteins that make the cancer cell resistant to chemotherapy. A second wave of EDV cells is then accepted by the cancer cell and releases chemotherapy drugs, killing the cancer cell. “The beauty is that our EDVs oper-

ate like ‘Trojan Horses’ They arrive at the gates of the affected cells and are always allowed in,” said MacDiarmid. “We are playing the rogue cells at their own game. They switch-on the gene to produce the protein to resist drugs, and we are switching-off the gene which, in turn, enables the drugs to enter.” RNA interference, or RNAi, is designed to silence genes responsible for producing disease-causing proteins and is one of the hottest areas of biotechnology research. RNA was the basis of the 2006 Nobel Prize in medicine. Dozens of biotechnology companies are looking for ways to manipulate RNA to block genes that produce disease-causing proteins involved in cancer, blindness or AIDS. Brahmbhatt said that after treatment with conventional drug therapy, a large number of cancer cells die but a small percentage of the cells can produce proteins that make cancer cells resistant to chemotherapeutic drugs. “Consequently, follow-up drug treatments can fail. The tumours thus become untreatable and continue to flourish, ultimately killing the patient,” said Brahmbhatt. “We want to be part of moving towards a time when cancers can be managed as a chronic disease rather than being regarded as a death sentence,” he said. The Nature report said the minicells were “well tolerated with no adverse side effects or deaths in any of the actively treated animals, despite repeated dosing”. – Reuters

AFPPIX

Aussie scientists kill cancer cells with ‘trojan horse’

IranianAmericans in Los Angeles protest against the government of Iran.

Partial recount in Iran TEHERAN: Iran held a partial recount yesterday of its disputed election won by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but one defeated reformist candidate said annulment of the poll was “the only way to regain the people’s trust”. In a sign that the process would not put into question Ahmadinejad’s victory, IRNA news agency said recounting so far in one Teheran district gave him more votes than in the June 12 poll that unleashed the worst unrest since the 1979 revolution. Iranian authorities said yesterday five out of nine detained British embassy local staff had been released, while four others were being held for questioning. Britain has rejected accusations that the embassy helped to foment the mass rallies. “We are deeply concerned at their arrest and their continued detention. These arrests are completely unacceptable and unjustifiable,” a Downing Street spokesman told reporters. Witnesses reported an increased police presence in some Teheran squares ahead of the expected announcement of the recount outcome today. One witness

said dozens of riot police vehicles were driving towards southern Teheran. Pro-reform cleric Mehdi Karoubi, fourth in the official count, reiterated his call for the vote to be annulled in a letter to Iran’s top legislative body, the Guardian Council, which is recounting a random 10% of the votes. “The election’s annulment is the only way to regain the people’s trust,” said Karoubi, in a position shared with defeated candidate Mirhossein Mousavi, who met on Sunday with a committee of the Council in a bid to resolve a political crisis that has exposed rifts in Iran’s ruling establishment. Iran’s state Press TV broadcast live from one Teheran district where a Guardian Council supervisor was quoted as saying the recount in this area showed no major irregularities. The official told Press TV that 34 ballot boxes, representing 10% of the total in the district, had been opened under “full and precise supervision”. “The results were positive, no irregularities in the results announced,” the official said. State media have said 20

people were killed in violence since the election won by the hardline president, and authorities have accused Mousavi of responsibility for the bloodshed. He says the government is to blame. The government, locked in a row with the West over its nuclear programme and which says the poll was fair, has blamed the trouble on foreign powers rather than popular anger. Ahmadinejad called for a judicial inquiry into what he called the “suspicious” shooting to death of music student Neda Agha-Soltan, who became a symbol of opposition protests after her death was broadcast on the Internet. Last week, Britain’s The Times newspaper identified one person captured on Internet videos helping Neda as a doctor who has since fled Iran. It quoted the man, 38-year-old Dr Arash Hejazi, as saying she was killed by a government militiaman. The president suggested that the opposition and Iran’s enemies abroad aimed to misuse her death “for their own political aims and also to distort the pure and clean image of the Islamic Republic in the world”. – Reuters

China filter software faces tough sell in digital bazaar BEIJING : China’s latest internet controls have been assailed by rights advocates and Washington, and yet the real challenge to its “Green Dam” plan may be the nation’s own computer market, an anarchic digital bazaar. Starting from today, the government has ordered that personal computers sold in China must leave manufacturers with Green Dam filter software intended to block obscene images and, critics say, deter political dissent. Such schemes sound easy enough for a one-party state, and this is just the latest Communist Party initiative to control the internet, which has about 300 million users in China, according to the China Internet Network Information Centre.

But a walk through Zhongguancun district Beijing, hub of the nation’s digital market, and the hurdles to such controls seem as numerous as the shops and hawkers selling computers, software and pornography. For all the domestic and international uproar about Green Dam, many retailers here who will be selling computers packaged with it were either oblivious or dismissive. “What’s Green Dam?,” said Wu Baobao, a woman in her 20s who was selling Dell laptops in the raucous Hailong electronics mall. “When you buy a computer after July 1 it will come with the software,” she added after asking a colleague. “But don’t worry ... we can take it

out easily.” Multi-nationals have for years fretted about the inability of the Chinese government to stamp out pirate software sold for a fraction of the cost of legitimate copies. Now that unruly market may also frustrate censors and ensure Green Dam ends up junked or ignored. “The Green Dam plan is a serious violation of market rules,” said Mao Shoulong, professor of public policy at Renmin University. “But in practice the impact will be limited,” said Mao. “It’s optional software, and you can’t easily control such a fragmented retail sector. Big companies will follow orders, but who can just order around thousands of small ones?” – Reuters