A new discovery could help solve one of the most frustrating challenges in treating lung cancer: Why do some patients initially respond to drug treatment, only for it to stop working 18 months later?
The researchers, led by Dhananjay Suresh, Anandhi Upendran, and Raghuraman Kannan at the University of Missouri’s School of Medicine, identified a hidden molecular “seesaw” involving two proteins inside cancer cells—AXL and FN14.
When investigators try to block one protein to stop the cancer, the other one takes over, helping the tumor survive.
Initially, scientists thought only blocking one protein—AXL—was the answer to stopping this problem. So, in 2019, Suresh, then a postdoctoral fellow at Mizzou, developed a treatment that focused on stopping it. The only problem? The tumor kept growing.
To fix this, Suresh, a research assistant professor of radiology, and colleagues have developed a new solution: a gelatin-based nanoparticle that can shut down both proteins at the same time.
So far, the results are promising: These nanoparticles deliver the treatment to the tumor site, and in early studies with mice, the tumors are responding to the dual-target treatment.
“If we can stop both sides of the seesaw from moving, we may finally be able to keep these drugs working,” Kannan, professor and chair in cancer research, says.
“Our study shows that the tumor is successfully responding to the treatment, so these results will provide us with a solid foundation for further investigations.”
According to the American Cancer Society, lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death in the United States—claiming more lives each year than colon, breast, and prostate cancers combined. The lifetime risk of developing lung cancer is about one in 17 for men and one in 18 for women. These sobering statistics underscore the significance of Kannan’s work, which focuses on advancing lung cancer research.
His research is particularly important for a subset of patients whose tumors carry a mutation in a certain gene that is present in approximately a quarter of cases. While these patients initially respond well to tyrosine kinase inhibitors—targeted drugs precisely engineered to block the gene—tumors can eventually adapt.
“The tumor becomes smart, evolving mechanisms to resist treatment and continue growing despite continued drug therapy,” Kannan says.
While the Mizzou team’s dual-target therapy isn’t ready for hospitals yet, it marks a major step forward in understanding how drug resistance forms—and how to fight it.
Future research will explore whether this molecular seesaw effect happens in other types of proteins and continue testing this new approach, Upendran says.
“This helps fill in a huge black hole in our understanding of drug resistance,” Kannan, who also has an appointment in Mizzou’s College of Engineering, says.
“It gives us a new path forward—and fresh hope that lung cancer can become a manageable, chronic disease instead of a life-threatening one.”
The research appears in the journal ACS Nano.
Source: University of Missouri
