Attaching Detectors to Cancer Cells

[Marcus Williams]

For many years in medical science cancer has been one of the many banes of existence. Chemotherapy in some cases is very successful, but sometimes the administration of this agent comes at a heavy price. What if there was a way to administer chemo or some other eliminating agent that was engineered to only kill cancerous cells. Could there possibly be a way to detect them chemically. Is there a growth hormone we can target? Can we solve the problem by designing microscopic technology that will attach onto a cancer cell? I do not know if any of this is at all possible, but I would be interested in hearing all of your opinions! I am a biochemisty undergrad and I want to develop a research project for this very topic!

[CharonY]

What you describe is basically what gazillions of groups try to do (except attaching stuff to a cell, which does not precisely make sense to me). Basic issue is that cancer cells are a part of us, hence anything that harms it, also harms us. There will only be quantitative rather than qualitative traits that we can exploit.

[Marcus Williams]

What you describe is basically what gazillions of groups try to do (except attaching stuff to a cell, which does not precisely make sense to me). Basic issue is that cancer cells are a part of us, hence anything that harms it, also harms us. There will only be quantitative rather than qualitative traits that we can exploit.

 

 

Thank you for your honest reply. I know that this topic is very popular in medical science. I am just curious to know if there is something even the smallest aspect that differientiates cancer cells from normal cells. If we could somehow discover this one small detail we could utilize it to our advantage. Hope this does not sound unintelligent I just want to explore new ideas!

[CharonY]

There are dozens of details. Mostly (as I mentioned) quantitative in nature. Certain proteins are, on average, higher expressed. Other lower. Cytoskeleton is different. They become motile again, etc. Unfortunately there is only a graduate difference, which can also be found in, say, different cell types within our body.

[Marcus Williams]

There are dozens of details. Mostly (as I mentioned) quantitative in nature. Certain proteins are, on average, higher expressed. Other lower. Cytoskeleton is different. They become motile again, etc. Unfortunately there is only a graduate difference, which can also be found in, say, different cell types within our body.

 

 

That is interesting! Do you think it would be possible to scan through the body and locate these differences so that we might gain an advantage over the multiplication of cancer cells?

[Mikael]

Hi, as charon is saying, this i easier said than done, mainly because the differences aren't black and white - cancerous and normal cells are still very similar, and the differences are gradual in nature.

 

There are, however, a few compounds that have been used for this, because they seem to be doing stuff to cancer cells while leaving normal cells alone. Butyric acid kills colon cancer cells, but increases viability of normal colonocytes, sulphoraphane (from brocolli) kills cancer cells, lycopene (tomatoes) appear to be doing something to prostate cancer cells and on and on we go. Most of them, i imagine, work by modifiying the structure of DNA so that 'anti-cancer' genes can do their work (Histone deacetylase inhibition if that rings a bell), which means they target one of the differences between normal and cancer cells.

 

Obviously there are many other routes of action: differential expression of surface proteins, elevated metabolism, increased vascularity in/around tumor and so on. Many, many billions are being used by many, many different researchers right now.

 

A nice way to detect how compounds act on cancer cells, is simply just to incubate them with the compound and see how they survive. Include normal cells if possible, and make sure concentrations are realistic. Some compounds work in mysterious ways - some antioxidants, i imagine, will produce toxic hydrogen peroxide by reaction with iron in the media and then there isn't really anything magical about the compound.

[Marcus Williams]

Hi, as charon is saying, this i easier said than done, mainly because the differences aren't black and white - cancerous and normal cells are still very similar, and the differences are gradual in nature.

 

There are, however, a few compounds that have been used for this, because they seem to be doing stuff to cancer cells while leaving normal cells alone. Butyric acid kills colon cancer cells, but increases viability of normal colonocytes, sulphoraphane (from brocolli) kills cancer cells, lycopene (tomatoes) appear to be doing something to prostate cancer cells and on and on we go. Most of them, i imagine, work by modifiying the structure of DNA so that 'anti-cancer' genes can do their work (Histone deacetylase inhibition if that rings a bell), which means they target one of the differences between normal and cancer cells.

 

Obviously there are many other routes of action: differential expression of surface proteins, elevated metabolism, increased vascularity in/around tumor and so on. Many, many billions are being used by many, many different researchers right now.

 

A nice way to detect how compounds act on cancer cells, is simply just to incubate them with the compound and see how they survive. Include normal cells if possible, and make sure concentrations are realistic. Some compounds work in mysterious ways - some antioxidants, i imagine, will produce toxic hydrogen peroxide by reaction with iron in the media and then there isn't really anything magical about the compound.

Thank you very much! I will try to convince my lab professor to make this one of our research projects. The results should be interesting!!!!

[Marcus Williams]

Has anyone recently read about the genomic switches that were once thought to be irrelevant junk in DNA? But that they could actually present some imperative information.

[CharonY]

I think the thought that they are junk has been abandoned around ten years ago. I think the main differences is that more and more functions are being elucidated on a larger scale.