Proceedings from the Melanoma Research Foundation Mucosal Melanoma Meeting (December 16, 2022, New York,USA)

Mucosal melanoma remains a rare cancer with high mortality and a paucity of therapeutic options. This is due in significant part to its low incidence leading to limited patient access to expert care and downstream clinical/basic science data for research interrogation. Clinical challenges such as delayed and at times inaccurate diagnoses, and lack of consensus tumor staging have added to the suboptimal outcomes for these patients. Clinical trials, while promising, have been difficult to activate and accrue. While individual institutions and investigators have attempted to seek solutions to such problems, international, national, and local partnership may provide the keys to more efficient and innovative paths forward. Furthermore, a mucosal melanoma coalition would provide a potential network for patients and caregivers to seek expert opinion and advice. The Melanoma Research Foundation Mucosal Melanoma Meeting (December 16, 2022, New York, USA) highlighted the current clinical challenges faced by patients, providers, and scientists, identified current and future clinical trial investigations in this rare disease space, and aimed to increase national and international collaboration among the mucosal melanoma community in an effort to improve patient outcomes. The included proceedings highlight the clinical challenges of mucosal melanoma, global clinical trial experience, basic science advances in mucosal melanoma, and future directions, including the creation of shared rare tumor registries and enhanced collaborations.     

Cloning,expression, and protective immunity in mice of a gene encoding the diagnostic antigen P-29 of Echinococcus granulosus

Taeniid tapeworm Echinococcus granulosus is the causative agent of Echinococcosis, an important zoonosis with worldwide distribution. In this study, a diagnostic antigen P-29 was cloned from E. granulosus and expressed in Escherichia coil Sequence analysis showed that EgP-29 contains 717-bp open reading frame and encodes a protein of 238 amino acid residues with a predicted molecular weight of 27.1 kDa. The recombinant EgP-29 （rEgP-29） could be recognized with antimice sera in Western blotting. The specific antibody was detected by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Mice vaccinated with rEgP-29 and challenged intrapero itoneally with E. granulosus protoscoleces revealed sig- nificant protective immunity of 96.6% （P〈0.05）, compared with the control group. Thus, rEgP-29 protein is a promising candidate for an effective vaccine to prevent secondary echinococcosis.