Innovation & Job News

U-M researchers develop key protein in cancer fight

Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Ann Arbor

Could the cure for cancer be as simple as turning off a switch? Researchers at the University of Michigan are starting to think so.

A 5-person research team has discovered that a protein called RIP can play a significant role in activating the death process in cancer cells. The team is led by Yvonne Kapila, associate professor, Department of Periodontics and Oral Medicine at the School of Dentistry.

"There might be some central switch that tells a cell when to die," Kapila says.

U-M scientists believe this protein could be developed into a treatment that can target and execute cancer cells. This is significant because cancer cells don't follow the normal cell death process, creating things like tumors. An RIP treatment could theoritically stop those cells in their tracks before spreading to the rest of the body.

But like many cancer advances, this one is still a ways off from becoming a reality. University researchers still need to show the protein can be safely introduced to humans.

To get to this point, Kapila and her fellow researchers examined squamous cell carcinoma cells from head and neck tumors and also fibroblasts from mice. The RIP protein is expected to serve as the communicator to these cells, telling them when to begin dying. The theory is expected to apply to other cancer cells because the death process is the same.

Source: Yvonne Kapila, associate professor in the Department of Periodontics and Oral Medicine at the School of Dentistry at the University of Michigan
Writer: Jon Zemke

Innovation & Job News

U-M researchers develop key protein in cancer fight

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