A group of researchers from the National Oncological Research Center (CNIO) has discovered a mechanism involved that could face melanoma metastasis in the first moments of the disease.
The study, which will be published this week in the magazine 'Nature Cancer', has observed that there are some nanoparticles released by tumors, called exosomes, which manipulate the tumor microwow to favor mestastasis. These exosomes travel and stay at the sentinel ganglion from where they prepare the enabling environment at a distance to favor the disease. The novelty is that this research has recognized that the NGFR molecule directs all this process and its blockage drastically reduces metastases in animal models.
This reduction has been achieved by Thx-B molecule, which is being tested for the treatment of other pathologies, which will accelerate its possible use for the treatment of tumors. Also, scientists have proposed NFGR as a new biomarker of early melanoma metastasis to define groups of risk and anticipate metastasis.
"A greater number of metastatic cells expressing NGFR in the sentinel ganglion correlates with a worse prognosis of disease," said Susana García Silva, co-first author of the study.
The author of the study is Héctor Hairstyle, who has assured that "not only has to look inside the tumor but also" and it has augurated that if they are able to detect that a tumor is going to metastatize "it will be easier to treat it and stop it."
"We knew that melanoma cells that initiate metastasis increase NGFR's production, but nothing was known about NGFR's possible role in exosomes and their influence outside the tumor," he has held the author.
Once discovered the role of this molecule in the early development of melanoma metastasis, the team decided to study the consequences of their blockade in the expansion of tumor cells. For this, they used a genetic approach, in which they eliminated NGFR of the exosomes, and a pharmacological approach in which they used the NFGR inhibitor called THX-B. In both cases, the metastases were drastically reduced, which opens the way to a possible new treatment to combat them. This treatment would become one of the first to deal with metastasis in its most initial stages, when there are more possibilities to face it.
This research has been funded by the Ministry of Science and Innovation, the Carlos III Health Institute, the European Fund for Regional Development, the Spanish Association against Cancer, the Ramón Arekes Foundation, the Foundation 'La Caixa', constant and vital , an initiative of the Sixth and Foundation AXA, the Community of Madrid, the US National Institutes of Health, the Starr Cancer consortium, the Melanoma Research Alliance and the FELDSTEIN Foundation.
Date Of Update: 26 November 2021, 03:52
