protein – Oral Cancer News

Could blocking or deleting a protein help prevent common oral cancers?

Source: www.eurekalert.org Author: Boston University The most common head and neck cancer—oral squamous cell carcinoma—often starts off, as many other cancers do, quite innocently. Perhaps as a little white patch in the mouth or a small red bump on the gums. Easy to ignore, to downplay. But then something changes, and the little blotch becomes more ominous, starts growing, burrowing into connective tissue. Patients who are lucky enough to see a dentist before things take a nasty turn have a shot at being able to prevent the lesions from turning cancerous—or can at least make sure treatment starts when it’s most effective. But for those who aren’t that lucky, the outlook can be bleak: the five-year survival rate of oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is around 66 percent. More than 10,000 Americans die of oral cancer every year; smokers and drinkers are hardest hit. Now, researchers at Boston University’s Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine have found that dialing back—or even genetically deleting—a protein that seems to spur the cancer’s growth might help limit a tumor’s development and spread. They say their findings make the protein, an enzyme called lysine-specific demethylase 1, a potential “druggable target”—something that doctors could aim chemo and immuno-oncology therapies at to take down a tumor. The study was published in February in Molecular Cancer Research. Given that at least one-third of Americans don’t visit a dentist regularly, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the discovery could be a future lifesaver for [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2022-04-26T12:24:48-07:00April, 2022|Oral Cancer News|

Bifunctional protein shows promise in HPV-related cancers

Source: www.medpagetoday.com Author: Charles Bankhead, Senior Editor, MedPage Today September A bifunctional fusion protein with immunotherapeutic activity proved active in advanced, difficult-to-treat cancers associated with human papillomavirus (HPV), according to pooled data from two prospective studies. Overall, 21 of 75 patients had confirmed responses with bintrafusp alfa, which inhibits tumor growth factor-beta (TGF-β) and PD-L1 interaction with its receptor. Responses were durable in many cases and occurred in patients with a variety of HPV-associated cancers. With a median follow-up of 33 months, the two cohorts had a median overall survival (OS) of 21.3 months, reported James Gulley, MD, PhD, of the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, during the virtual European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) meeting. "Overall survival appears to have a plateau of around 40-45% out to beyond 3 years," said Gulley. "The median survival compares favorably to the reported overall survival with PD-1 inhibitors of 8 to 12 months." "The need for effective treatment options in patients with HPV-associated malignancies is high," he added. "Therefore, these results showing efficacy of bintrafusp alfa across different HPV-related tumor types are of interest. Clinical trials of bintrafusp alfa in HPV-associated malignancies are ongoing." The frequency and durability of responses are "really remarkable in a quite difficult-to-treat patient population," said ESMO invited discussant Sebastian Kobold, MD, of Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. "It's especially stunning because we all know that cervical cancers in previous trials have shown rather disappointing results with PD-1-targeting single agents, indicating that's [the anti-PD-1 component of the [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2021-09-21T07:23:47-07:00September, 2021|Oral Cancer News|

RowanSOM researcher begins human trials for cancer treatment drug

Source: today.rowan.edu Author: news release Could a targeted therapy derived from a plant used medicinally in China for centuries offer the next breakthrough in cancer treatment? Dr. Gary Goldberg, associate professor in the Department of Molecular Biology at Rowan University School of Osteopathic Medicine (RowanSOM), is undertaking a human clinical trial to find out. Goldberg and his team are collaborating with a group at the Rutgers New Jersey Medical School headed by Dr. Mahnaz Fatazadeh, professor at Rutgers School of Dental Medicine, to test a new drug candidate called MASL. This novel compound has been trademarked and licensed from Rowan University by Sentrimed, a company founded by Goldberg. MASL is derived from Maackia amurensis, a legume tree native to the Amur River valley, which flows through parts of Russia and China. The MASL human trial marks a milestone for RowanSOM, Goldberg noted. “Coming up with a new drug and taking it to a clinical trial is an excellent example of investigator-initiated research from bench to bedside,” said Goldberg. “It has taken a lot of collaboration and work to get to this point.” The FDA considers MASL an investigational new drug. “This is a unique Phase I trial,” Goldberg said. “This study integrates investigation of patient safety, along with potential efficacy and proof of concept mechanistic studies.” Goldberg and his team began the ongoing human trial, involving 20 cancer patients, in fall 2020. While MASL has the potential to treat many kinds of cancer, this trial will test MASL’s effects on [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2021-07-01T08:33:12-07:00July, 2021|Oral Cancer News|

Study finds major anti-inflammatory immune activity that favors oral cancer tumors

Source: medicalxpress.com Author: Melisa Institute A collaborative research led by immunologist Estefania Nova-Lamperti from the Universidad de Concepción (Chile), with a branch of researchers from MELISA Institute and other international academic centers, made progress in the understanding of molecular mechanisms preventing an effective antitumor immune response in oral cancer; The latter due to the production of chemical mediators that induce an anti-inflammatory regulatory response that favors tumor development through the vitamin D signaling pathway. The study was published in Frontiers in Immunology on May 7, 2021. Oral cancer, 90% of which corresponds to the squamous cell type, is a neoplasm with a high mortality and morbidity rate, mainly because the diagnosis is made in late stages when metastases already exist, and where treatment produces serious physical and functional sequel among survivors. It is well known that the immune system plays a key role in the development of cancer, either by stimulating pathways that play an anti-tumor role or, conversely, by generating an anti-inflammatory environment that allows the tumor to grow and be spread. The main biological agents of the immune system are lymphocytes or T cells, which have different functions or phenotypes. In cancer, the presence of regulatory T cells (Tregs) and helper T cells type 2 (Th2) are associated with a worse prognosis, whereas the responses of helper T cells type 1 (Th1) within tumors, in general, show a better prognosis. Dr. Nova-Lamperti points out that a key question in oral cancer is how an anti-inflammatory microenvironment is induced, [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2021-06-02T06:14:11-07:00June, 2021|Oral Cancer News|

Head and neck cancer cells hijack nearby healthy tissue, promoting further invasion of cancer cells

Source: www.eurekalert.org Author: University of Michigan news release Up to half of patients with head and neck squamous cell carcinoma will experience tumor recurrence or new tumors--tumors that often spread and are difficult to treat. A team of scientists led by the University of Michigan School of Dentistry identified a mechanism by which head and neck cancer cells subvert adjacent normal tissue, allowing small clusters of cancer cells to burrow beneath the healthy tissue. The team decided to look at this particular mechanism in head and neck cancer because a specific gene, DMBT1, appeared on a screen of genes that are silenced during oral cancer, said principal investigator Nisha D'Silva, the Donald A. Kerr Endowed Collegiate Professor of Oral Pathology. Researchers from the D'Silva lab found that when DMBT1 was suppressed in head and neck cancer cells, it promoted aggressive invasion and metastasis in laboratory studies and was associated with metastasis in patients. They also found that two proteins secreted by head and neck cancer cells suppress DMBT1 in nearby healthy tissue, subverting it to promote invasion of a small amount of cancer cells, which burrow under healthy tissue. Researchers looked at this mechanism in mice, chick embryos and cultures of human cancer cells. "In the chick embryos, none of the tumors that overexpressed DMBT1 metastasized, whereas most of the control tumors that had low DMBT1 metastasized", D'Silva said. "The importance of this paper is that loss of DMBT1 in cancer cells and adjacent normal tissue benefits cancer cells, allowing [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2021-05-27T08:08:39-07:00May, 2021|Oral Cancer News|

Gene variant makes head and neck cancer more aggressive

Source: www.futurity.org Author: posted by National University of Singapore A genetic variant in a gene called MET is responsible for more aggressive growth of head and neck cancer, and lung cancer, according to a new study. A further probe into the finding reveals therapeutic strategies that could potentially target this genetic alteration and pave the way for better and more effective treatments. The MET gene encodes for a cancer promoting protein that relays growth, survival, and transmission of signals in cancer cells, researchers say. As reported in Nature Communications, researchers also identified a form of MET protein which showed ethnic preference with higher incidence among Asians, and associated with poorer prognosis in patients diagnosed with head and neck squamous cell carcinoma or lung squamous cell carcinoma. Even though the MET variant does not seem to predispose someone to head and neck cancer or lung cancer, it leads to more aggressive growth of cancers that have already developed. Unlike other MET mutants, existing MET-blocking drugs do not seem to inhibit this genetic variant, prompting researchers to conduct further investigation on the mechanism behind the genetic alteration. The team found that the single amino-acid change in the MET receptor from the genetic alteration leads to preferential strong binding to another cancer promoting protein, HER2. Both proteins then work together to drive cancer aggression and allow the cancer cells to survive therapies that involve MET-blocking drugs. “The mechanism of this MET variant is novel and unreported. This finding contributes to the growing evidence [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2020-04-09T11:47:21-07:00April, 2020|Oral Cancer News|

Okayama University Research: disrupting blood supply to tumors as a new strategy to treat oral cancer

Source: www.prnewswire.com Author: press release provided by Okayama University Researchers at Okayama University have recently published a study in Cells in which they reduced the size of oral cancer tumors by damaging the blood vessels surrounding the tumor cells. Cancer cells have ingenious mechanisms of survival within the body. One strategy they adopt is developing a network of blood vessels around themselves as a source of blood supply. Scientists have long been investigating ways to prevent this blood flow to cancer cells. CXCR4 is a protein known to be closely involved with tumor growth. However, its exact role in tumor progression is unclear. A research team led by Assistant Professor KAWAI Hotaka and YOSHIDA Saori (graduate student, D.D.S.), Assistant Professor EGUCHI Takanori at Okayama University has now shown that CXCR4 is the main culprit maintaining the arrangement of tumor blood vessels. Firstly they found, immunohistochemistry on human clinical specimens revealed that tumor vessels expressed CXCR4 in human oral cancer specimens. The next question to arise was whether the CXCR4-rich blood vessels were promoting tumor growth. In order to investigate this further, the oral cancer cells were transplanted into mice. Once the tumor grew in mice body, they were given AMD3100—a drug that antagonises CXCR4. When the tumors were subsequently observed under a microscope, several areas were found to necrotic. A characteristic pattern of necrosis was observed in which the tumor tissue that were at a distance away from the blood vessel was necrotic, leaving the tumor tissue close to the [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2020-03-17T08:22:26-07:00March, 2020|Oral Cancer News|

Aussie researchers discover way to reverse drug resistance in major cancer

Source: www.xinhuanet.com Author: staff Australia's University of Queensland researchers on Thursday said they have discovered a way to reverse drug resistance in skin and mouth cancers, by adding a new drug to an existing treatment. The squamous cell carcinoma form of skin and mouth cancer "was curable when diagnosed early but difficult to eradicate once the cancer spread," the university's Associate Professor Nicholas Saunders said in a statement. The cancer kills about 1,400 Australians each year, he said. "The drugs used to treat squamous cell carcinomas that have spread to other parts of the body only work for a small fraction of patients. "In our study, we successfully added a new drug to an existing treatment to make squamous cell carcinomas responsive to treatment," said Saunders. The researchers found that a particular protein was controlling drug resistance in the affected cells and by administering a drug that helps keep it in the relevant cell nucleus, the cancer cells would react to existing chemotherapeutic treatments, said Saunders.

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2018-06-28T07:58:55-07:00June, 2018|Oral Cancer News|

U-M scientists observe deadly dance between nerves and cancer cells

Source: ns.umich.edu Author: Laura Bailey In certain types of cancer, nerves and cancer cells enter an often lethal and intricate waltz where cancer cells and nerves move toward one another and eventually engage in such a way that the cancer cells enter the nerves. The fluorescence image shows the interaction between the nerve (red) and cancer (green). Image credit: Nisha D’Silva The findings, appearing in Nature Communications, challenge conventional wisdom about perineural invasion, which holds that cancer cells are marauders that invade nerves through the path of least resistance, said Nisha D'Silva, principal investigator and professor at the University of Michigan School of Dentistry. D'Silva's lab discovered that perineural invasion is actually a much more intricately choreographed biochemical give-and-take between the nerves and the cancer cells. "Once head and neck cancer invades the nerves, it is one of the worst things that can happen," said D'Silva, who also has a joint appointment at the U-M Medical School Department of Pathology and is a member of the U-M Cancer Center's Head and Neck Oncology program. "It is highly correlated with poor patient survival, and there is no targeted treatment for it because it is not known why some tumors do this and some don't." Perineural invasion is seen most in head and neck, pancreatic, stomach and colon cancers, and causes severe pain or numbness, tumor spread and recurrence, and loss of function, among other complications. D'Silva's lab found that perineural invasion begins when the nerve releases a stimulus that triggers a [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-04-29T13:13:53-07:00April, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

University of Michigan researchers find protein that fuels repair of treatment-resistant cancer cells

Source: http://www.dentistryiq.com/ Author: DentistryIQ Editors Imagine that you're fighting for your life, but no matter how hard you hit, your opponent won't go down. The same can be said of highly treatment-resistant cancers, such as head and neck cancer. During radiation and chemotherapy, some cancer cells repair themselves to survive and thrive. Head and neck cancer is the sixth most common cancer in the world, but the late detection and treatment resistance result in a high mortality rate. Now, University of Michigan researchers have found that a particular protein – TRIP13 – encourages those cancer cells to repair themselves, and they have identified an existing chemical that blocks this mechanism for cell repair. Left: Untreated head and neck cancer cells are tagged fluorescent green. Right: Shows cells treated with the chemical inhibitor that blocks TRIP13, which results in a dramatically smaller tumor. "This is a very significant advance because identifying the function of the protein that fuels the repair of cancer cells and having an existing chemical that blocks the process could speed the process of moving to clinical trials," said principal investigator Nisha D'Silva, University of Michigan professor of dentistry and associate professor of pathology. Typically, if scientists discover a promising drug therapy target, it takes years to develop drug compounds from scratch and move these into clinical trials. Top: Cancer cells with TRIP13, the protein that encourages cancer cells to repair themselves. Bottom: Cancer cells in which researchers have removed or decreased TRIP13, which results [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2014-08-02T10:57:10-07:00August, 2014|Oral Cancer News|