Scientists have discovered how cancer spreads

by Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor
Last Updated: 2:37PM GMT 14 Dec 2008

Researchers in London said the breakthrough is 'exciting' and if a drug could be found to stop cancer spreading it would mean it would 'stop cancer killing people'.

The work is in the early stages but the team have found an enzyme that is necessary for breast cancer cells to spread around the body.

When the enzyme was blocked, the cancer could not spread.

Professor Marco Falasca and his team of researchers at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry have been investigating the role of an enzyme called PLCg1 in breast cancer.

They found that when they stopped breast cancer cells from making this enzyme it prevented metastasis – the ability of cancer cells to migrate from the original tumour to other parts of the body. This spreading around the body is what kills cancer patients as the internal organs become overcome by tumours.

Professor Falasca said: "Our work not only identifies a molecule that plays a crucial part in the spread of cancer; it also shows how this process might be halted. "We have discovered this using a model system: the next big challenge is to show that this also happens in patients."

The study was funded by the Association for International Cancer Research.

Scientific Adviser, Dr Mark Matfield said: "This is a really exciting piece of research. The simple fact is that if you stop metastasis, you stop cancer from killing people. We now need to focus on developing drugs that can block PLCg1."

The research was carried out in mice and the findings are published today in the journal Cancer Research.

It is likely that the results will take years to translate to humans and also a drug needs to be found that could be used safely in cancer patients to block the enyzme.

Dr Joanna Peak, Cancer Research UK's cancer information officer, said: "Tackling the spread of cancer remains one of the biggest challenges in successful treatment but this study may provide the key to unlock this complex process. Provided these promising lab results can be reproduced in human cancers, this knowledge could be used to develop drugs to block cancer spread in the future."

The team were able to stop breast cancer cells from migrating into the lungs of mice but it had little effect on the primary tumour.

Samples taken from human breast cancer patients showed that levels of PLCg1 were higher in their secondary tumours than in the primary breast tumour in 50 per cent of cases.

In the research paper Prof Falasca said: "In conclusion, our data strongly suggest that PLCg1 inhibitors may have potential therapeutic applications for the clinical

treatment of tumour metastasis. At present, no specific PLCg1 inhibitors are available, and therefore, there is a stringent need to develop novel-specific PLCg1 inhibitor