Ball cancer cells cause metastases

Written by Dr. H. P. Bustami

Thursday, 19 July 2007

Melanom - small and dangerous black dots on the skin. Signals of a agressive form of skin cancer

Round and agressiv, that is the way in which cancer cells attack healthy tissues to initiate metastases. Scientists of the university of Heidelberg, Germany, now published new insights in cancer cell proliferation in "Genes and Development". Similar to the mechanisms in stem cells it is known that cancer cells can change their form by switching on genes. Thanks to the protein "Diaphanous1" (Dia1) cancer cells can modulate their cell skeleton to a round form. The cell skeleton of cancer cells is extremely flexible and smooth similar to human muscle cells.

The workgroup of Dr. Robert Grosse, who is the head of the scientists, showed that Dia1 coordinates the actin filaments which are integral part of the cell skeleton thus providing the form change when necessary. The study was conducted in cancer cells of the agressive skin cancer, the melanom.

Likewise this new study could reveal better therapie for cancer metastases and the development of new pharmaceuticals which target the activity of the Dia1-Protein or the expression of the underlying genes.

Source:

Thomas M. Kitzing, Arul S. Sahadevan, Dominique T. Brandt, Helga Knieling, Sebastian Hannemann, Oliver T. Fackler, Jörg Großhans, and Robert Grosse: Positive feedback between Dia1, LARG, and RhoA regulates cell morphology and invasion. Genes & Dev., Jun 2007; 21: 1478 - 1483 ; doi:10.1101/gad.424807

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