Shutting off cancer's energy supply
Cancer types:
General cancer research
Project period:
–
Research institute:
Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona)
Award amount:
£199,253
Location:
Spain
Dr Angel Nebreda and his team aim to find out how cancer cells get their energy so that they can find ways to shut them down.
Meet the scientist
Angel Nebreda is a group leader at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine in Barcelona. His team study how cells communicate and how these signals can play a role in cancer.
The science
Cancer cells are known to obtain their energy through different mechanisms to normal cells so understanding how they do it could reveal new ways to develop targeted treatments.
The team are particularly interested in a protein called p38-alpha MAPK, which they have begun to show plays a central role in the survival of cancer cells. They now want to study in greater detail exactly how this protein helps cancer cells to produce the energy they need to grow and divide and what happens to cancer cells if they try and block it off.
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