Hunting a needle in a haystack: can we spot new targets for cures?
Cancer types:
General cancer research
Project period:
–
Research institute:
European Institute of Oncology (IEO)
Award amount:
£197,000
Location:
Italy
Curestarter Dr Paola Scaffidi and her team in Italy have come up with an ingenious new way to spot which genetic changes in cells actually drive cancer. It’s a bit like looking for a needle in a very messy haystack, but they know that this work has the potential to pave the way to new live-saving cancer treatments - and they aren’t going to give up.
Why is this research needed?
Revolutionary new targeted treatments are already helping people with cancer live longer than ever before. These treatments work by exploiting the genetic and molecular changes that are unique to cancer cells. But they aren’t yet available for everyone with cancer. Much more discovery work is needed to make this happen.
We still need to work out exactly which genetic changes might be a good target for new treatments. So Dr Paola Scaffidi and her team are using their Curestarter funding to drill down and find out. Excitingly, the team are specifically searching for targets that are important in all types of cancer. This means their work will open the door to better diagnosis and new cancer cures for all patients with cancer, including those who do not yet have the option of targeted treatments.
Thanks you to the Curestarters. You are not just supporting research; you are enabling curiosity, patience, and long-term thinking.
What is the science behind this project?
We know that cancer cells contain many genetic and molecular changes, but we don’t always know which changes actually drive cancer, and should be targeted by drugs.
Dr Scaffidi and her team are searching for some of the most widespread and important genetic changes that happen in cancer – by focussing on a gene called EP300. Hundreds of changes to this gene have already been reported in many different cancer types, but we don’t yet know which of these changes are the most important for cancer development.
If the team can pin down the most important targets in EP300, they can then focus on searching for new ways to drug these targets. In this project they are using CRISPR technology, a powerful molecular tool that can edit genetic changes into DNA. They will use CRISPR to introduce approximately 500 different genetic changes, one at a time, into the EP300 gene of healthy cells and see the impact this has.
These changes have all previously been identified in cancer cells in patients, and the team will painstakingly investigate exactly how each change might influence cancer development. They will then use these findings to identify which changes might make cancer cells more susceptible to new, and existing drugs- so we can find out more about which patients might respond to which treatments.
What difference could this project make to patients in the future?
Dr Scaffidi’s work has the huge potential to bring new hope for cancer patients around the world.
By giving us hugely valuable insights into the genetic landscape of early cancer, her work will lay the foundations for new personalised therapies, meaning patients would receive the treatment that would work best for their cancer.
The team also hope to find useful clues that could help with earlier diagnosis; doctors could potentially use this new information to spot important genetic changes in cancer cells sooner, and provide more optimal treatment at an earlier stage.
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