A collaboration with the Faculty of Science led to the discovery of a new chemical weapon against cancer

Multipolar melanoma cells stained for centrosomes (gamma-tubulin in red, centrin in green) and DNA (DAPI in blue). Scale bar represents 5 µm. © UNIGE

The fight against cancer involves eradicating cancer cells but current treatments inevitably have negative consequences on healthy cells. Patients often develop a resistance to the drugs and suffer from side effects due to the doses used in the treatments.

Testing new formulas simultaneously

In their study published in Cancers, researchers from the Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences of Western Switzerland (Prof. Patrycja Nowak-Sliwinska) and from the department of Cell Physiology and Metabolism (Prof. Patrick Meraldi) have studied ten substances used to fight cancer, testing in vitro some 200 possible combinations and running numerous computer simulations. These simultaneous tests on both cancer cells and healthy cells are based a new method developed at Geneva University.

Highly promising new cancer treatment

The most effective combination with the fewest side effects is C2. Composed of four products (tubacin, C1-994, erlotinib and dasatinib), C2 exploits a highly promising mechanism of action by targeting organelles involved in cell division, centrosomes, which are present in excess only in tumor cells. The next step is to test the treatment in vivo on mice.

Posted by: Véronique Rosset

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