Scientists report landmark “evolutionary double-bind” strategy to overcome treatment resistance in prostate cancer
Trinity College DublinPeer-Reviewed Publication
An international team of researchers from Trinity College Dublin and the Moffitt Cancer Center in the US has demonstrated a landmark “evolutionary double-bind” strategy to overcome treatment resistance in prostate cancer.
Many patients with metastatic cancers receive therapy that is initially highly effective, often resulting in complete remission. However, cancer cells have a remarkable capacity to evolve resistance to currently available therapies. As a result, resistant cells eventually proliferate causing the tumour to recur, leading to treatment failure and ultimately patient death.
In other words, increasingly the proximate cause of death in cancer patients is evolution, which sees the cancer cells adapt and overcome even highly effective treatments.
The new work found that when cancer cells successfully evolve resistance to DNA damaging treatments, they expose a critical weakness that makes them highly vulnerable to immunotherapy. This represents an “evolutionary double-bind” in which the cancer cell adaptation to one therapy makes them more vulnerable to another therapy and vice-versa.
- Funder
- National Cancer Institute via the Cancer Systems Biology Consortium, Physical Sciences Oncology Network, Moffitt Center of Excellence for Evolutionary Therapy, Health Research Board, Trinity St. JamesTrinity St James’s Cancer Institute—Cancer Immunology Stimulus Award, Research Ireland