Cancer Res: activate key proteins or effectively slow down the progression of metastatic breast cancer

February 7, 2020 / BIOON / -- metastasis is the main cause of cancer patients' death Currently, there is no effective treatment, so researchers urgently need to develop new treatments Recently, an international journal published in cancer research In the previous research report, scientists from the University of La Trobe and other institutions found that when a special protein named BMP4 (bone morphogenetic protein-4) was turned off, breast cancer It becomes more aggressive; during embryonic development, BMP4 is active, and it continues in some healthy organs until adulthood, such as breast tissue Source: Olivia Newton John Cancer Research Institute researchers hypothesize that restoring BMP4 activity can block the ability of breast cancer to metastasize, researcher Robin Anderson said: 'we found that the high level of BMP4 protein in breast cancer patients is directly related to the better prognosis and the reduced risk of metastatic cancer This study is very important because the mortality of metastatic breast cancer patients has not decreased in more than 20 years The level of BMP4 protein usually decreases in patients with advanced breast cancer, but when the level of BMP4 protein is restored in the preclinical model of metastatic breast cancer, it may be able to effectively block the metastasis of cancer to multiple organs at the distal end, such as lung and bone; the researchers show that in this study, we have revealed how BMP4 can activate special cellular pathways to block tumor cells The ability of metastasis, the key protein induced by BMP4, can block cancer metastasis by reducing the level of circulating tumor cells in the blood The ultimate goal of the researchers is to pass a new therapy through clinical trials When it comes to clinical practice, they will focus on finding new compounds that mimic the anti BMP4 transfer activity For researchers, the challenge is that the half-life of BMP4 protein in the body is only 15 minutes (or even less than 15 minutes) after it is injected into the body, so this may not be a long-term treatment Later researchers will continue to study further to find more Many methods can simulate the activity of BMP4, so as to effectively treat patients with metastatic breast cancer Original source: Bedrich L Eckhardt, Yuan Cao, Andrew D Redfern, et al Activation of classical bmp4-smad7 signaling suppresses burst cancer metastasis, cancer research (2020) Doi: 10.1158/0008-5472.can-19-0743