In:
eLife, eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd, Vol. 2 ( 2013-11-05)
Abstract:
Over 50% of melanomas, a highly lethal form of skin cancer, carry mutations in a gene called BRAF. The BRAF gene encodes an enzyme that helps to regulate the proliferation of cells, but mutations in this gene lead to the excessive proliferation that is seen in cancer. Clinical trials have shown that a drug called vemurafenib can be used to treat patients who carry the mutated BRAF genes and go on to develop melanoma, but around one fifth of these patients developed another type of skin cancer called cSCC (cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma). The cSCC tumors often develop in areas where the sun has damaged the patient’s skin, and it is thought that their growth is then accelerated by vemurafenib activating another enzyme, ERK, which causes the excessive proliferation of skin cells. Vin et al. have now found that vemurafenib might also cause cSCC tumors by blocking another signaling pathway. The experiments were performed in human cells and also in mice, and the results were then verified in human cSCC samples. Cells that are exposed to UV radiation usually die, but when treated with vemurafenib, some 70% of the cells that would have died instead survived. The stress from the UV radiation activates the JNK signaling pathway, which causes the irradiated cells to die. However, Vin et al. found that cSCC cells had very low levels of JNK signaling because treatment with vemurafenib had the unintended effect of inhibiting three enzymes that are needed to fully activate the JNK signaling pathway. Vin et al. estimate that suppression of JNK signaling and cell death is responsible for about 17.6 to 40% of the effect on cSCC growth seen in melanoma patients, with activation of the ERK pathway accounting for the rest. These unexpected findings suggest that combining vemurafenib treatment with radiation or chemotherapy should be done with caution as these effects could affect their efficacy. It also suggests that future drugs should be designed in a way that avoids these types of effects by making sure they do not inhibit important ‘off-target’ enzymes.
Type of Medium:
Online Resource
ISSN:
2050-084X
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.001
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.002
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.003
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.004
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.005
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.006
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.007
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.008
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.009
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.010
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.011
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.012
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.013
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.014
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.015
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.016
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.017
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.018
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.019
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.020
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.021
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.022
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.023
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.024
DOI:
10.7554/eLife.00969.025
Language:
English
Publisher:
eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd
Publication Date:
2013
detail.hit.zdb_id:
2687154-3
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