Researchers harness cancer resistance mutations to fight tumours

An international team of researchers has discovered a new method to fight cancers that no longer respond to treatmentThe team led by Israels Weizmann Institute of Science used mutations that make tumours drugresistant Xinhua news agency reportedOne of the biggest challenges in cancer care is when a therapy stops workingIn many metastatic cancers drugs that initially work lose their effect over time as cancer cells mutate and continue to growThe new study published in the journal Cancer Discovery proposed a new way to confront cancer resistance harnessing the very mutations that make tumours resistant in order to fight the cancerThe team introduced a computational tool called SpotNeoMetIt identifies therapyresistant mutations common to many patientsThese mutations produce tiny protein fragments called neoantigens which appear only on cancer cellsThese shared neoantigens may provide the basis for new immunotherapy approaches that prompt the immune system to selectively target cancer cellsOur research demonstrates a broad principle that may change the way we think about treatmentresistant cancer said Prof Yardena Samuels at the WeizmannThe same mutations that allow a tumour to evade a drug can through precise immunotherapy become the cancers weak point Unlike boutique immunotherapies that must be tailored to each individual patient these therapies could be suitable for large groups of patients Samuels addedThe researchers tested their approach on metastatic prostate cancer a disease where most patients eventually become resistant to standard treatmentsThey identified three neoantigens that showed promising results in lab experiments and in mouse modelsThe researchers said the approach differs from highly personalised therapies because it targets resistance mutations shared by many patients This allows the same treatment to be applied more broadly to people with treatmentresistant cancersThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever