Giving Compass' Take:

• Fred Hutch News Service reports on researchers discovering a human antibody that can block Epstein-Barr, a virus associated with 200,000 cancer cases per year.

• Cancer organizations should take note of any breakthroughs like this one to see what progress is being made for possible future treatments. Is enough funding being devoted to large-scale research projects?

• If you're looking for cancer charities with impact, click here.

Researchers from Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of Washington have discovered a human antibody that in laboratory tests blocks infection by the Epstein-Barr virus, or EBV.

The finding of the antibody — along with the site it targets — opens a new path to developing an effective vaccine against a virus best known in the United States for causing mononucleosis, or mono, but which is globally associated with about 200,000 cancer cases a year, including some Burkitt and Hodgkin lymphomas, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and stomach and nasopharyngeal cancers. EBV infection also may activate genes associated with autoimmune diseases such as lupus and multiple sclerosis.

Dr. Andrew McGuire of Fred Hutch’s Vaccine and Infectious Disease Division is the senior author of the paper published today in the journal Immunity. He initiated the study after working on human antibodies against HIV and deciding to apply some of what has been learned there to a different virus. The antibody he found, known as AMM01, is the first human antibody shown to block EBV infection in cells in the lab. Prior to this study, only mouse antibodies had been identified against the virus.

Read the full article about the human antibody found to block Epstein-Barr by Mary Engel at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.