GRAND RAPIDS ? Scientific Investigator Cindy Miranti, Ph.D. and her team in the Laboratory of Integrin Signaling and Tumorigenesis at Van Andel Research Institute have discovered that an enzyme that prostate cancer cells are dependent on for survival is not necessary in normal prostate cells. This finding validates the therapeutic potential of targeting this enzyme in the treatment of prostate cancer.
?Other research has suggested that prostate cancer cells need this enzyme to survive,? said Miranti. ?But our study confirms the therapeutic potential by proving that the enzyme isn?t needed for survival in normal prostate cells.?
The enzyme is called PI-3K. The study appears in the July issue of Molecular Biology of the Cell.
The study focuses on the different ways in which normal and tumor cells manage to survive. Chain reactions within the cell called signaling pathways play a major role, and Miranti says there seem to be several survival pathways that ?back each other up,? meaning that if one pathway is blocked or lost, another one can keep the cell alive.
?The key is to find the differences in the mechanisms of survival between normal and tumor cells,? said Miranti. ?PI-3K is important because we now know that therapeutics that target this enzyme could kill tumor cells without having a negative affect on normal cells.?
The study also reveals several survival pathways for normal prostate cells. Miranti says that the next step for her lab is to find how these pathways are similar to or different from those in tumor cells and why.
Beatrice Knusden, M.D., Ph.D., of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, provided the prostate cells that VARI scientists used in the study.
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