BMC SAS research that could improve breast cancer treatment was published in a prestigious journal
New findings on chemotherapy resistance in breast cancer, which could contribute to the development of more effective therapies, have been published by scientists from the Biomedical Research Center of the Slovak Academy of Sciences (BMC SAS) in the journal Drug Resistance Updates, one of the world’s most prestigious scientific journals in the field of pharmacology.
The article, whose first author is Dr Lenka Trnková, a young researcher from the Department of Molecular Oncology at BMC SAS, shows that tumour cells that become resistant to the chemotherapeutic drug paclitaxel undergo extensive changes in DNA methylation in addition to genetic alterations. These chemical modifications of DNA determine which genes are switched on and which are switched off. Altered methylation patterns can deactivate essential genes while activating others. In cancer cells, this may result in the production of proteins that help them survive treatment.
“Research focused on DNA methylation helps reveal how and why cancer cells become resistant to therapy. A better understanding of these mechanisms can enable earlier detection of treatment failure, more precise selection of therapies for individual patients, and, in the future, the development of new treatments that could overcome or even prevent resistance,” explains Dr Lenka Trnková.
Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women. More than 30,000 women in Slovakia are currently living with this disease, and approximately 1,000 die from it each year. One of the significant obstacles to successful treatment is the development of drug resistance. In practice, this means that a therapy that was initially effective gradually stops working because tumour cells adapt to it. This phenomenon is one of the main reasons why the disease may progress or return.
As part of the study, the researchers created a detailed molecular profile of resistant cells. They established cell lines resistant to the chemotherapeutic agents paclitaxel and doxorubicin and comprehensively characterised them in terms of functional changes, gene expression, mutations, copy number variations, and DNA methylation. The team collaborated with laboratories in France, Norway, and the Czech Republic. This collaboration enabled them to develop preclinical tumour models and to validate methylation profiles in clinical patient samples.
The journal Drug Resistance Updates, in which the study was published, focuses on drug resistance in infectious and oncological diseases, as well as on new therapeutic strategies to overcome it. The first author, Dr Lenka Trnková, a large part of the research team and the senior authors of the article, Dr Božena Smolková and Dr Verona Buociková, are from BMC SAS.
Link to the full scientific article
Source: Ela Rybárová, BMC SAS, p.r.i.
Photo: Ela Rybárová and Biorender.com