Zika as Cancer Buster?

By infecting glioblastoma cells but not healthy brain tissue, some form of the virus could serve a therapeutic purpose.

Written byAmy Schleunes

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The paper
Z. Zhu et al., “Zika virus targets glioblastoma stem cells through a SOX2-integrin α_vβ₅ axis,” Cell Stem Cell, 26:187–204.E10, 2020.

In 2017, University of California, San Diego, regenerative medicine researcher Zhe Zhu and colleagues found that the Zika virus, which sparked a widespread epidemic in the Americas a few years ago and is known to cause microcephaly in fetuses by destroying neural stem cells, preferentially targets and kills glioblastoma stem cells. The researchers argued that a modified form of Zika could potentially be used as an oncolytic virus therapy against glioblastoma, an aggressive type of brain cancer.

Following up on that work, Zhu and collaborators set out to find “the unique property of this virus” that allows Zika to selectively target brain cancer stem cells while sparing adjacent tissues, says Zhu. Previous research has shown that a number of viruses use integrins, a group of ...

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Meet the Author

Amy Schleunes
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A former intern at The Scientist, Amy studied neurobiology at Cornell University and later earned her MFA in creative writing from the University of Iowa. She is a Los Angeles–based writer, editor, and communications strategist who collaborates on nonfiction books for Harper Collins and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and also teaches writing at Johns Hopkins University CTY. Her favorite projects involve sharing the insights of science and medicine.
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