University of Michigan. US: Targeting DNA repair pathways could provide new treatment options for children with high-risk cancer. Researchers at the University of Michigan’s C.S. Mott Children’s
Hospital have identified a promising new target for developing new
therapies for kids with high-risk neuroblastoma, according to a new
study published in Molecular Cancer Research.
The research,
led by Erika Newman, M.D. of C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital, found for
the first time that components of an alternative DNA repair pathway are
highly expressed in neuroblastoma tumors.
“We discovered that high-risk neuroblastoma cells preferentially use
an efficient but erroneous DNA repair pathway that gives these cells
survival advantage. Importantly, children with neuroblastoma tumors
harboring these alternative repair factors have worse overall survival
than children with tumors that have low expression,” says Newman, who is
assistant professor of pediatric surgery at the University of Michigan
Medical School and surgical director of the Mott Solid Tumor Oncology
Program (MSTOP).
Newman
“There is an urgent need to develop new therapies for children with high-risk neuroblastoma,” Newman says.
“Nearly half of patients present with tumors that have already spread. Despite current treatment, most with high-risk neuroblastoma don't survive. The primary focus of our lab is to develop new treatment approaches for children with high-risk disease.”
Neuroblastoma is the most common cancer infants and the most common solid tumor outside of the brain in all children, in which malignant cancer cells form in primitive nerve tissue called “ganglions” or in the adrenal glands.
“We are very excited that these findings have provided insight into
the mechanism by which neuroblastoma tumors overcome DNA damage. This
study provides evidence that an alternative repair mechanism is
functional in neuroblastoma and offers experimental support for further
preclinical investigation of DNA repair pathways as new therapeutic
targets in high-risk neuroblastoma,” says Newman.Journal citation: doi: 10.1158/1541-7786.MCR-14-0337
Additional authors: All of the University of Michigan: Fujia Lu, Daniela Bashilari, Li Wang, Anthony W. Opipari, M.D. and Valerie Castle, M.D..
Funding: Supported in part by funds from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation/Amos Medical Faculty Development Program, The Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute/Edith Briskin Emerging Scholar Program and the Section of Pediatric Surgery, The University of Michigan