A new frontier in Cancer Treatment, kinder and gentler

Researchers at Oregon State University are pursuing a new concept in treatment of epithelial cancer, especially head and neck cancer, by using two promising "analogs" of an old compound that was once studied as a potent anti-tumor agent, but long ago abandoned because it was too toxic.
The analogs are more highly selective than the parent compound, Pactamycin, which originally was found to kill all cells, from bacteria to mammals, by inhibiting their protein synthesis.
The pactamycin analogs, which were developed with biosynthetic engineering, also offer a different approach toward cancer therapy, an effort to essentially put cancer cells to sleep, instead of killing them. If successful, this trend may herald a new future in "kinder and gentler" cancer treatments.
The effects of the pactamycin analogs, called TM-025 and TM-026, were characterized in head and neck cancer cell lines, which cause the eighth most common cancer in the world. But they may have applications to a wider range of cancers, the researchers said, particularly melanoma.
"A traditional view of chemotherapy is that you try to completely kill cancer cells and destroy tumors," said Arup Indra, an associate professor in the OSU College of Pharmacy and one of the lead authors on the study. "Sometimes this is effective, sometimes not as much. An alternative approach is to cause rapid cell aging and induce premature senescence, which we believe could become
The effects of the pactamycin analogs, called TM-025 and TM-026, were characterized in head and neck cancer cell lines, which cause the eighth most common cancer in the world. But they may have applications to a wider range of cancers, the researchers said, particularly melanoma.
"A traditional view of chemotherapy is that you try to completely kill cancer cells and destroy tumors," said Arup Indra, an associate professor in the OSU College of Pharmacy and one of the lead authors on the study. "Sometimes this is effective, sometimes not as much. An alternative approach is to cause rapid cell aging and induce premature senescence, which we believe could become a new frontier in cancer drug development."