Researchers at UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, including former Damon Runyon Fellow Hong Wu, MD, PhD, discovered that an experimental drug slows growth of ovarian cancer cells and increases survival in animal models.
In a two-year study, Wu and her colleagues found that the drug NVP-BEZ235 hinders growth by blocking two critical cancer cell signaling pathways. Remarkably, it also counteracts the resistance developed by many ovarian cancer cells to platinum chemotherapy. As platinum chemotherapy is a frontline treatment for ovarian cancer, eliminating cells’ resistance and enhancing the impact of the therapy would be a significant step in attacking the disease.
In an effort to develop new therapies for ovarian cancer, which affects about 22,000 American women each year, Dr. Wu and the team hope to test the drug in combination with platinum chemotherapy in a clinical trial soon.
Dr. Wu also led a recent study that shed light on how prostate cancer is able to evade some therapies.
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