Reprogramming Cancer Cells to Undergo Cellular Death

 

Colorectal cancer is the second most common cancer. New treatments tend to be in high demand because current treatment options offer limited efficacy and can be ineffective in up to 70% of patients, in part due to genetic variation, rendering personalized medicine to be increasingly important.

Argonaut Therapeutics plans to reboot the cancer cell so that it undergoes the body’s natural cell death process, known as apoptosis. Essentially, their therapies will target a “switch” that prompts cells to grow and divide or to die. The switch, which in reality is a transcription factor binding to DNA, is controlled by the enzyme PRMT5. If the transcription factor gets a methyl group added to it by PRMT5, it will be in the proliferation mode and if it is inhibited it activates a “cell death mode.” Given the approach is based on the presence of absence of a methyl group, the team will be able to predict tumour response.

As Professor Nick La Thangue, founder of Argonaut Therapeutics, noted: “Our drug candidates target this transcription factor, with the aim of reinstating the body’s natural cell death processes, shrinking tumours naturally rather than causing general cytotoxicity, which is how many current cancer drugs work. We believe the combination of our approach and other new immunotherapies could mean physicians are able to tackle cancer in a different and potentially very powerful way.”

The group has designed a series of pre-clinical candidate compounds, which it will evaluate to identify lead compounds to take into clinical trials.

For more information, please visit: ox.ac.uk/

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