Cancer drug 49 times more potent than Cisplatin

Tests have shown that a new cancer drug, FY26, is 49 times more potent than the clinically used treatment Cisplatin. Based on a compound of the rare precious metal osmium and developed by researchers at the University of Warwick's Department of Chemistry and the Warwick Cancer Research Unit, FY26 is able to shut down a cancer cell by exploiting weaknesses inherent in their energy generation.

The researchers argue that the drug could be cheaper to produce, less harmful to healthy cells than existing treatments and has been shown to be active against cancer cells which have become resistant to platinum-based drugs. The experiments conducted by the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute comprising 809 cancer cell lines found that FY26 was 49 times more potent than cisplatin. Similar results were obtained by the National Cancer Institute USA in tests conducted on 60 cell lines.
The new drug works by forcing cancer cells to use their mitochondria, the 'power house' of a cell, to generate the energy necessary to function. While healthy cells use mitochondria to generate energy, cancer cells contain defective mitochondria which are incapable of sustaining the cell's energy requirements.
In the absence of FY26, cancer cells switch from using their defective mitochondria to using metabolic activity in their cytoplasm to generate energy. By stopping this switch of energy source, the drug causes the cancer cell to die.