New research suggests that antibiotics could be potent anti-cancer agents

[orcinus 121]

A group at the Breakthrough Breast Cancer unit at Manchester U. have just published a paper in the open-access journal Oncotarget which shows that some common antibiotics have potent anti-cancer activity across a range of cell lines, but little or no toxicity to normal cells even at levels 10x higher than used to get up to 95% reduction of tumour cells.

The head of the unit, Prof Michael Lisanti, has been studying the role of mitochondria in cancer growth and metastasis. Mitochondria are small, rod-shaped organelles that oxidise sugars to CO2 while capturing the energy released in a small molecule, ATP. His group have shown that at least some cancer cells 'hijack' energy production for neighbouring cells such as fibroblasts. Mitochondria were once bacteria, so are susceptible to inhibition by antibiotics that target ribosomes (small structures that assemble amino acids into protein as they move along mRNA strands).

I shall be watching developments; amongst the potential targets are pancreatic cancer, lung cancer, and melanomas, all of which have a very poor prognosis.

Idea for the research came from Prof Lisanti & his wife discussing treating cancer cells with their 8-year old daughter Lisa, who said she would use antibiotics 'like she did for a sore throat'. From his extensive work on the role of mitochondria in cancer cells, Prof Lisanti realised that antibiotics that target mitochondrial protein synthesis might have a useful effect, and so it turned out. The antibiotics tested are all widely used for infections and generally very safe.

First time I have seen a scientific paper with an 8-year old amongst the authors!