Oxford: Cancer biomarker and drug target available for licensing

Licensing opportunity

Researchers at Oxford University, UK, have discovered a novel cancer biomarker after hypothesising that the activity of a particular protein previously thought to be unrelated to cancer may play a direct role in the regulation of tumour cell proliferation and progression.

Subsequent investigation of levels of expression of the protein in human tumour samples using immunohistochemical staining confirmed that, compared with normal tissues, the protein is expressed excessively in tissues from patients with lung, breast, colon, head and neck cancers as well as lymphomas.

It was subsequently shown that over-expression of the protein promotes cell proliferation by activating cell survival signalling and that disruption of this signalling or down-regulation of expression of the protein leads to decreased cell migration

Further studies are underway to evaluate the effects in cancer models of a known ligand, and to screen libraries in order to identify new compounds effective against this target.