Team:ETH Zurich/Motivation

From 2012.igem.org

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Contents

Motivation of our Project E.colipse

E.colipse - intelligent sun protection aims to prevent sunburn and as a consequence of more protection ultimately reduce skin cancer incidence

Sun burn and skin damage from UV radiation are important issues when one exposes oneself to sun radiation for a tanning session without applying proper sun protection. Furthermore, UV radiation is always present on sunny days, but often no sun protection is applied before exposing oneself to sunlight. With our project E.colipse, intelligent sun protection, we want to create a sun protection where no one has to worry anymore if he is protected from sun or not since on exposure to sunlight, a protection molecule and a warning signal in form of a pigment are produced.

Skin Cancer protection

Among all cancers that, with the help of biological and clinical research, are better and better understood, melanoma has the highest increase in incidence rate (see figure on the left). Despite better prevention, treatment and detection melanoma is still one of the most abundant and dangerous cancers.
Our intelligent sun protection system aims to protect human skin from dangerous UV radiation, one of the major suspects in provoking DNA alteration in melanocytes that can lead to melanoma.

The Malignant Melanoma

Worldwide cancer incidence change in percent

Each year, approximately 160 000 new cases of malignant melanoma are diagnosed worldwide, of that 20-25 % finally lead to the death of the patient, making the malignant melanoma one of the most malignant existing cancers. It occurs more often in the light-skinned population of northern European countries as well as in highly UV–exposed regions such as Australia or New-Zealand. The incidence increased threefold over the last 30 years in Germany. The five year-survival rate is 90 % for women and 85 % for men. Another attribute of the malignant melanoma is its relatively early development at a mean age of 64 years for men and 58 years for women in Germany [Parkin2005]. The therapy of the malignant melanoma is usually surgical removing of the tumor in early stages, which requires an early detection of the melanoma. In later stages also removal of the sentinel lymph node is performed to avoid metastasis via the lymph system. Other forms of the therapy for higher stages are palliative chemotherapy with dimethyl triazeno imidazole carboxamide (DITC) and, since the malignant melanoma is immunogenic, immunotherapy [RKI2010]. Both therapies do not show a high success rate: stage four melanoma with distant metastasis to organs such as liver, lung, brain, bones and skin have an unfavorable prognosis and lead to the death of the patient within a median of six to twelve months [Parkin2005].



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