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Researchers Use 'Decoy' Molecule to Treat Cancer
Jerry Rivers writes "The Globe and Mail is reporting that scientists in British Columbia have successfully used a 'decoy' molecule to shrink advanced prostate tumors. Citing a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the the Globe story explains how the researchers are the first to find a way to block the process of androgen reception in cells and prevent, a key trigger in the onset of prostate cancer."
I lost a couple of close relatives to prostate cancer, from whom I learned a lot and who always had time for me.
These things are always too late for someone we loved, but hopefully in time for others.
Steve
Sad thing is that *if* a treatment ever makes it to the market, it won't be until 5 or 10 years from now.
This seems to be a trend; the most exciting oncology news I've recently seen came out of Alberta.
Is cancer research a major industry in Canada, or is this an abnormally productive period for their universities? It seems like a lot of recent discoveries in that field have come from my Frozen Northern Neighbor.
Tags != Comments, and -1 (Troll) != -1 (I Would Respond Angrily To This Poster So They Must Be Trolling)
"the the Globe story explains"
I thought it was impossible to stutter when typing. Once again, Slashdot has taught me something new.
Here's a link to the abstract from the original paper:
3 1
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/104/4/13
We had X-Prize for getting into space. Can we not get C-Prize started to find a cure for cancer? With all the hacking skills in the tech world I am certain we could nip cancer in the bud if that talent was applied to hacking the disease.
They used a truncated portion of the steroid receptor that makes the cells divide, it would competitively inhibit the real receptors from triggering cell division.
They managed to test against human tumors which had been xenografted into mice, they packaged their new therapeutic transgene into a modified lentivirus then injected the virus directly into the tumor site.
While this result is promising, it suffers from the same drawbacks as many gene therapies: we can figure out what to put into the cell to fix it, but the big problem is finding a very effective vehicle (virus) to target a high proportion of the required cells.
All new methods of interfering with cancer are welcome news; only the significance varies.
a) This is a mouse study. A required early step for a cancer treatment, but by no means indicative of significance. We have many, many treatments that cure cancer pretty well in lab mice.
b) The line of attack here is interfering with a growth factor. Unfortunately, cancer is generally good at mutating and "learning about" new growth factors. Hence, the saying "prostate cancer doesn't kill people -- prostate cancer metastasis kills people." It would be unsurprising if this technique joined the (already swollen) ranks of treatments that can successfully lower PSA without actually significantly reducing the number of patients who die, or significantly extending their lives.
c) On the plus side, keep in mind that prostate cancer is a rather indolent cancer (compared to, say, breast cancer). If you ain't got it, the tedious and ancient prescription of eating your vegetables, exercising, and not getting fat are a really good bet for decreasing the odds you'll ever die from it. We now overdetect prostate cancer (find/treat lots of cases that were never going to actually kill anyone), so don't get too anxious about the statistics that say you're pretty likely to get it in your lifetime. You're way more likely to get thyroid cancer -- without ever knowing it or suffering any ill effects from it.