LONDON British scientists announced the discovery of a treatment that can seek and destroy leukemia cells and which could lead to a new way of treating cancer, AFP reported.

Researchers at the Hammersmith Hospital and Imperial College School of Medicine in London have spent six years investigating the disease.

Their work identified a gene, labeled WT-1, which is present in cells that cause leukemia.

Tracing the gene allowed the researchers to identify the cells responsible for the disease.

The discovery, detailed in the publication ***Hammersmith Research***, has led scientists to use the principle in developing immune cells that can recognize a WT-1 "label" on cancer cells and destroy them.

Results have shown the specially engineered immune cells will destroy leukemia cells and ignore normal cells of the same type.

Clinical trials among leukemia patients will now be carried out within two years.

Hans Stauss, of Imperial College, said: "The principle we have developed can be applied to almost all forms of leukemia and could signal a huge step forward in how we treat the disease.

"What makes this work even more exciting is that our findings can also be applied to solid cancers, such as breast or lung cancer, where there is similar over-expression of WT-1.

"The possibilities for new treatments are enormous."

David Grant, scientific director for the Leukemia Research Fund, which helped pay for the research, said: "This could well be the chink in the armor cancer doctors have been looking for.

"We look forward to the results of this trial and introducing a whole new range of therapies to patients."

Around 18,000 people are diagnosed with leukemia or one of the related cancers of the blood in Britain every year.