Myc's cancer-causing joy ride more reckless than previousl...( cyclin D can not only accelerate growth...),Health

While Land says it's too early to know the implications of the work for cancer treatment, the findings mark another step in scientists' journey to unravel the amazing cell-signaling network that underlies our body's ability to produce cancer cells. That process is the focus of more than 100 scientists just joining the Center for Cancer Biology, a new effort begun by the University this year to study how faulty cell signals can conspire to cause cancer.

"Unraveling cell signaling is more or less like looking at a chess board and trying to figure out how the game is being played. What are the important rules? Who are the key players?" asks Land, who is the Robert and Dorothy Markin Professor of Cancer Biology.

"We're scratching the surface of a complexity that five years ago, nobody even dreamed about. The full texture of the biochemical circuitry of cells is just beginning to emerge, and that's exciting. Information like this helps us to understand how to manipulate cancer cells and ultimately should help us treat cancer in new and unexpected ways."

Land was one of the first to realize the immensity of the signaling network inside a cell, discovering in the early 1980s that multiple genetic changes are necessary for a cell to become cancerous. Much of his work has been done at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund in London, where Land did research before coming to the University this year.

Also contributing to the project research were Soo-Hyun Kim and Beatrice Griffiths of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund; Ignacio Perez-Roger, now at the Instituto de Biomedicina in Valencia, Spain; and Andreas Sewing, now with Smithkline Beecham Pharmaceuticals. The work was funded by the Imperial Cancer Research Fund and the European Community.

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Contact: Tom Rickey
trickey@admin.rochester.edu
716-275-7954
University of Rochester
7-Oct-1999