Targeted therapies for cancer
Whilst traditional cancer treatments such as chemotherapy are in some cases effective at reducing the tumour size, their indiscriminate approach means that healthy cells are affected too. And in many cancers, such as prostate cancer, they offer on average only an extra three months because of the resistance the cancer cells acquire. Because of this a chemotherapy patient suffers with the side effects of the treatment and the higher, more effective dose of the drugs cannot be given.
However a new generation of cancer drugs, based on recent research, holds hope for a more focused approach to treatment. They aim to treat only the specific proteins that are known to be involved in the tumour development.
These targeted therapies are the holy grail of cancer treatments, offering the possibility of better survival rates without affecting the quality of life. Dr Dmitry Pshezhetskiy, a research fellow from the Department of Oncology, leads the Tumour Microenvironment and Chemotherapy group in investigating targeted therapies.
The group are looking at several kinases, the enzymes that regulate virtually all processes inside the cell and are known to be involved in cancer development and chemotherapy resistance. In healthy cells the activity of these kinases is tightly regulated, but in diseased cells it’s not.
The lipid sphingosine kinase 1 (SK1) that Dr Pshezhetskiy’s team is focused on is known to be deregulated in cancer and is linked to the growth and spread of cancer cells as well as patient mortality.
SK1 is therefore a good candidate to develop a specific inhibitor for especially as it has been shown to mediate cancer cell resistance to chemotherapy. It is also known to be involved in sepsis, an inflammatory response where the immune system attacks the body. Imperial’s researchers have shown that using targeted therapies for SK1 effectively stops sepsis.
Dr Pshezhetskiy has worked with a number of pharmaceutical companies on screening and testing their potential kinase inhibitors.
“Once you’ve found a good target and developed your inhibitors, the next step is to take it to animal models” explains Dmitry. “From that proof of concept study you can take it to phase I human clinical trials.”
Imperial’s expertise on the fundamental research, animal modelling and clinical side means that a comprehensive service for all aspects of drug development can be provided. And our academics are enthusiastic about working with industry: “You want to change the way things are – the basic science is of course key but to really change things you need good industrial links.”
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