With around 25 to 35% women suffering from breast cancer, there has been a significant increase in the treatment and research related to cancer in women. And one such latest discovery sheds light on drug resistance in breast cancer patients.
How is it related?
HER2 membrane proteins play a special role in certain types of breast cancer: amplified levels of HER2 drive unrestricted cell growth. HER2-tailored antibody-based therapeutics aims to prevent cancer cell growth, but two-thirds of HER2 positive breast cancer patients develop resistance against HER2-targeting drugs. The reason for this is not yet understood.
What did the study indicate?
Researchers now found out, that HER2 dimers appeared to be absent from a small sub-population of resting SKBR3 breast cancer cells. This small subpopulation may have self-renewing properties that are resistant to HER2-antibody therapy and thus able to seed new tumor growth.
How was the study carried out?
The INM – Leibniz-Institute for New Materials, Saarbrucken and the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg researchers used a new electron microscopy method called Liquid STEM. It allows nanoscale studies of intact cells in their native liquid environment.
What were the results?
Niels de Jonge, head of the Innovative Electron Microscopy group, said that they found out that HER2 dimers appeared to be absent from a small sub-population of resting SKBR3 cells. Jonge noted ‘could such cells survive the therapy and then develop into drug-resistant cancer at a later stage?’ adding that it thus seems to be of key significance to study this subpopulation of cells with exceptional phenotype.
Their novel findings were obtained as a direct consequence of the high spatial resolution of Liquid STEM combined with its capability to study many intact cells in liquid, says de Jonge. The study is published in Science Advances.
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