17 March 1998

University of Queensland researchers have found that a hormone they discovered years ago has the potential to treat some cancers, accelerate wound healing, prevent rejection of transplanted organs and control auto-immune disease.

Surgery Department senior research fellow Dr Halle Morton and chief professional officer Dr Alice Cavanagh found the hormone they named Early Pregnancy Factor (EPF) was released from cells within four to 24 hours after fertilisation.

In 1997-98, the project received a $320,000 Australian Research Council Collaborative Grant to explore the hormone's potential as a biopharmaceutical.

Using the state-of-the-art protein analysis and synthesis facilities at the University's Centre for Drug Design and Development and the input of the Centre's Deputy Director Associate Professor Paul Alewood, the team were able to manufacture enough hormone to allow intensive testing of potential drug applications.

Through UniQuest Limited, the University's technology transfer company, the hormone's many potential therapeutic and diagnostic applications have been patented worldwide.

The project has attracted more than $2 million in research grants from a variety of sources including the National Health and Medical Research Council, the Australian Research Council, the Queensland Cancer Fund and Melbourne-based pharmaceutical, biological and veterinary manufacturer CSL Limited (formerly the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories).

CSL Limited is currently developing partnerships with pharmaceutical companies across the world to develop drugs based on EPF.

Drs Morton and Cavanagh began investigating EPF almost 20 years ago on the basis that a mother's body must produce a substance or substances preventing her immune system from rejecting the embryo, which is foreign tissue.

The researchers found EPF levels rose very quickly in a mother's body within the first days following fertilisation and EPF was present for at least the first half of the pregnancy, in all cases disappearing before birth.

They then went on to show that EPF was essential to maintain normal pregnancy. After a series of complicated experiments, they identified and purified the hormone.

Dr Cavanagh said from their understanding of the hormone's properties, researchers believed it could have an application in drugs to suppress the body's rejection of organ transplants and to treat certain autoimmune diseases such as Multiple Sclerosis (MS).

'If EPF is able to diminish a mother's natural immune response to the foetus, it could diminish other inappropriate responses by the body such as the attack on spinal cord nerve cells occurring in MS,' Dr Cavanagh said.

The MS studies are being done with Medicine Department researcher Dr Pam McCombe.

The research team also showed that pregnancy was not the only time cells produced EPF - it was also released during tumour growth or normal tissue regeneration.

The hormone was required to maintain cell growth and this suggested other potential applications for EPF. Enhancing its effects could promote wound healing while diminishing its action might control the growth of cancer cells.

'We are now closer to understanding how the molecule works and what parts can be manipulated to create a drug to either enhance or suppress EPF's effects on the body,' Dr Cavanagh said.

'Other research is examining the gene controlling EPF. There could be a genetic link to some diseases or there may be a potential use in gene therapy.'

For more information, contact Dr Morton or Dr Cavanagh (telephone 07 3365 5191).