Cancer treatment has no side effects

American experts have found a new way to destroy cancer cells without causing negative side effects like current therapies.

Dr. David A.Cheshesh and colleagues at Moores Cancer Center (University of California, San Diego) used a special chemical and biological method to design a new drug line that is able to block stool divided in nearly every tumor cell, by binding and changing the structure of an enzyme called RAF.

RAF has been studied for a long time, but exploring its role in cell division is a surprise. Current cancer drugs targeting enzymes like RAF often lack specificity, affecting many different targets."That means they can produce unwanted side effects and cause toxicity that limits the level of treatment ," Cheresh noted.

Cheresh's team pursued the development of a new type of RAF inhibitor that is not associated with enzyme activity regions, thus avoiding the side effects of existing drugs. The new drug, called the allosteric inhibitor , changes the shape of the target enzyme and in this way makes it inactive.

The experimental drug, called KG5 , removes RAF in growing cells but does not damage normal cells. In tumors, RAF cannot bind to the cell division to perform the division, thereby stopping the cycle leading to cell self-destruction. Similarly, KG5 effectively intervenes in the process of blood vessel formation. "This is an unusual discovery, really challenging current understandings ," Cheresh stressed.

KG5 produced similar results in tests on cancer cell lines, in animal models as well as in tissue biopsies from cancer patients. The team developed KG5 variants 100 times stronger than the original drug. They hope that one of these stronger compounds will soon be put to clinical trials at Moores Cancer Center. The results of the study by Cheresh and colleagues were published in the latest issue of Nature issue.