Eli Lilly and GE Global Research have achieved a significant advancement in cancer research, which could enable faster drug development at less cost.
Through the companies’ collaboration formed in October 2007, Lilly and GE research teams have developed tissue-based biomarker technology that for the first time can simultaneously map more than 25 proteins in tumours at the sub-cellular level.
This represents an important step in the development of personalised and more effective cancer treatments.
Currently, a diagnosis of cancer and the decision of which therapy to prescribe are based on the histology of the tumour and, in some cases, the expression of just one or two biomarkers inside the patient’s tumour.
With the new molecular pathology technology, researchers can now look at a visual map of the tissue sample, seeing a cancer cell’s comprehensive biomarker signalling pathway, and the interplay of signalling networks inside the tumour. The new technology has been tested successfully on colon and prostate cancer tissue samples and is believed to be applicable to all types of cancer.
“This new approach to molecular pathology unlocks information that has been hidden from doctors,” said Mark Little, Senior Vice President and Director, GE Global Research. “It was just two years ago that researchers at GE and Lilly set out to discover key protein biomarkers that would predict the likelihood that a medication would be effective in treating certain cancers. Our new mapping technology is designed to bring new therapies to market faster and to make sure that the right patients get the right medicines.”
Mapping a tumour’s complex biomarker network could allow researchers involved in drug discovery and the clinicians making treatment decisions to identify the most effective cancer therapies for patients, while avoiding those that are not as effective, saving time, money and providing a better patient experience.
“In cancer treatment, information is one of the most powerful tools that a doctor has at his disposal,” explained Dr Richard Gaynor, Vice President, Cancer Research and Clinical Investigation, Lilly Research Laboratories. “By identifying multiple biomarkers on a cell by cell basis, physicians will be able to make more informed choices on therapies to prescribe, as well as therapies to avoid, based on a patient’s specific type of cancer.
“Additionally, we believe that GE’s technology, advanced as a result of this collaboration, may lead to the ability to identify the stem cells within a tumour that we believe control the cancer. In doing so, we may be able to discover even more innovative, targeted therapies for the treatment of patients with cancer.”