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The drive to exploit the particular genetics of a patient's tumours to treat them is being complicated by a new study that found flaws in how such drugs are being screened.
Researchers led by computational biologist John Quackenbush at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, Massachusetts, compared data from two studies, published in Nature last year, which tested whether drugs were effective against different cancer cell lines grown in culture. Of all the combinations tested, 15 drugs and 471 cell lines were examined in both studies. Both studies also analysed the genetic characteristics of the cells, such as mutations in their DNA, and gene expression — a measurement of how much RNA corresponding to each gene was produced by the cells.
When they were published, the studies were hailed as an important step in the burgeoning field of targeted cancer medicine, which aims to find drugs that attack the precise genetic features of a tumour. This field has exploded during the past few years as drug companies have developed drugs tailored to these genetic features. For instance, vemurafenib, approved...
Researchers led by computational biologist John Quackenbush at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, Massachusetts, compared data from two studies, published in Nature last year, which tested whether drugs were effective against different cancer cell lines grown in culture. Of all the combinations tested, 15 drugs and 471 cell lines were examined in both studies. Both studies also analysed the genetic characteristics of the cells, such as mutations in their DNA, and gene expression — a measurement of how much RNA corresponding to each gene was produced by the cells.
When they were published, the studies were hailed as an important step in the burgeoning field of targeted cancer medicine, which aims to find drugs that attack the precise genetic features of a tumour. This field has exploded during the past few years as drug companies have developed drugs tailored to these genetic features. For instance, vemurafenib, approved...