Cancer genomics is playing a large role in the development of personalized therapies for cancer.  However, current research has shown that mutations in DNA are, by themselves, generally insufficient for identifying the drivers of tumor growth.  Moreover, pinpointing therapies towards a single gene product within a single cellular signaling pathway gives rise to drug-resistant tumors that have evolved alternate pathways that enable cancer cells to proliferate and spread.

CLP has integrated teams of engineers, physicists, chemists, life scientists, and oncologists in a National Cancer Institute-funded Physical Sciences-Oncology Center (PS-OC) to study the global changes involved in cells transitioning from healthy to tumor cells.  Our goal is to define the “epigenetic”, e.g. non-genetic, basis of cancer and develop fundamentally new targets for cancer treatment and advanced diagnostic methods that can detect cancer in its earliest and most vulnerable stage.

PS-OC investigators have made the startling discovery that changes in the shape of chromatin (DNA and proteins wound up in the nucleus of the cell) play a key role in transforming cells from a normal to malignant state and that these changes may be mediated by changes in the ionic environment of the cell. Others have shown that epigenetic changes are an important contributor to changes in the behavior and characteristics of distant and local metastases.

This work is already revolutionizing how we detect and treat cancer through:

  • Development of new, non-invasive methods to detect lung, colorectal, uterine and other cancers at the very earliest stages of growth. These methods are being commercialized by a new company, Preora Diagnostics, Inc.
  • Early stage research into use of established drugs that modify cell salt content to potentiate responses to standard chemotherapy.
  • Development of imaging agents that can visualize and target drugs directly to tumors, reducing side effects and increasing their power to knock out tumor cells.
  • New approaches to identifying therapeutics based on their ability to change DNA folding.