Cancer cells’ survival kit
Harvard-affiliated scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have discovered new details of how cancer cells escape from tumor suppression mechanisms that normally prevent these damaged cells from multiplying. They also demonstrated a potential link between this cell proliferation control mechanism and the cognitive deficits caused by Down syndrome. The findings add to a still-sparse understanding of how normal and cancerous cell growth is regulated and have potential implications for improved treatments, say the authors of a pair of articles in Genes & Development. James A. DeCaprio of Dana-Farber said the results may provide new targets both for blocking the progress of cancer and perhaps for facilitating the growth of neurons in the developing brains of infants with Down syndrome. DeCaprio, who is also an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School (HMS), is the senior author, and Larisa Litovchick of Dana-Farber and HMS is the first author of one of the papers. They...