Why do cancers often migrate to the lungs? A team from the Flemish Cancer Biology Research Institute (VIB Centrum voor Kankerbiologie) in Leuven has lifted a corner of the veil on this question by discovering a link with the availability of aspartic acid. The study was published in the British scientific journal Nature.
In more than half of people with metastatic cancer (a localized tumor that spreads to other parts of the body), these metastases spread to the lungs. Scientists have long wondered about this “privileged” link.
Professor Sarah-Maria Fendt (VIB-KU Leuven) and her team looked into this migration process by focusing on genetic translation. This term covers the process during which genes are used to make proteins. A change in this process can promote the growth of cancer cells.
Many proteins in our body can influence gene translation. Among them, we find the eIF5A protein, which initiates the process. However, in the cells of lung metastases, scientists discovered a modified form of eIF5A. It is this altered protein that they associate with increased aggressiveness of lung metastases.
This modified form of eIF5A is roughly, via a chain reaction, activated by aspartic acid, also discovered by the team of researchers from Leuven. Gene translation then allows cancer cells to spread more easily into the lungs.
-The scientists analyzed lung tumor cells from both mice and humans. They compared them to healthy cells of their fellows, but also to metastases lodged in other organs. Result: for cancer cells in lung metastases, the receptors on the cell surface always showed higher activity.
“Treatments targeting the mechanism that we have identified exist. Clinical application is therefore possible,” emphasizes Sarah-Maria Fendt.
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