New lung cancer discovery ‘could aid efforts to prevent the spread of disease’

New research has highlighted a promising new means of preventing the spread of lung cancer to other parts of the body.

Scientists at the Universities of York and Texas have found that a component of cancer cells called the Golgi apparatus plays a key role in repackaging proteins in order to transport them to other parts of the cell, or to deliver them to areas outside the cell.

A protein called PAQR11 inside the Golgi was shown to receive signals from another protein, Zeb1, to prompt the transport of membrane sacks that alter the perimeter of the cancer cells, allowing them to detach from the lung and travel to other areas of the body.

Preventing cancer cells from transitioning from a fixed shape attached to an organ to a less stable one that can move freely may be an effective approach of preventing cancer metastasis, the researchers believe.

The team is now hoping that a drug could be developed to disrupt communication and prevents the Golgi apparatus from facilitating the movement of the membrane sacks, thus inhibiting the spread of lung cancer.

Dr Daniel Ungar from the University of York's department of biology said: "The next stage of this study will be to look at how we target this process without interrupting normal cellular functions of non-cancerous cells."

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