Several days following the Federal Drug Administration’s approval of a new cancer drug, Erik Nelson (ACPP) was still processing the news.
“It hasn’t sunk in yet that this is actually happening,” he said from his breast cancer research lab in Burrill Hall. “This is why I get up every morning: to hopefully impact a patient's life.”
Less than 20% of diagnosed breast cancers are designated “triple-negative,” meaning that the affected tissues lack three types of receptors often found in other breast cancer types, but TNBCs are often aggressive with a higher risk of recurrence, metastasis and mortality.
A new study by Zeynep Madak-Erdogan (CGD/EIRH/GSP) Associate Professor of Food Science and Human Nutrition and Cancer Center at Illinois Education Program Leader, and her team have found a new mechanism of endocrine resistance in breast cancers metastasized to the liver.
Postmenopausal women have increased risk of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease due to loss of estrogen from metabolic changes. A high-fat diet further exacerbates the disease, which can progress to cirrhosis and liver failure. Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is an effective treatment, but it carries increased risk of breast cancer, uterine cancers, and cardiovascular disease.
Scientists have developed new drug compounds that thwart the pro-cancer activity of FOXM1, a transcription factor that regulates the activity of dozens of genes. The new compounds suppress tumor growth in human cells and in mouse models of several types of human breast cancer.
The researchers report their findings in the journal NPJ Breast Cancer.
