HEALTH

Ask a Doc: TGen uses 'Moonshot' to fight cancer that killed Beau Biden

Recent studies show how glioblastomas, like the one that killed Biden, quickly evolve, and point to a promising type of therapy

Dr. Michael Berens
Special for The Republic | azcentral.com
Dr. Michael Berens

Question: The death of Delaware Attorney General Beau Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden, was the impetus of bipartisan support for the National Cancer Institute’s research push known as the “Cancer Moonshot.” But what exactly did he die of, and what is being done to thwart his type of cancer?

Answer: Beau Biden died of glioblastoma multiforme, or GBM, the most common and aggressive form of primary brain tumor.

Typically, survival following diagnosis of this cancer is a bleak 15 months, and survival statistics have not significantly improved over the past three decades. An estimated 17,000 Americans will die this year of brain and other nervous system cancers.

However, recent back-to-back studies by the Phoenix-based nonprofit Translational Genomics Research Institute, or TGen, with the University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, show how glioblastomas quickly evolve, and point to a promising type of therapy.

One of the studies showed that genetic mutations affect how cancer starts in specific brain cells that provide support and insulation for neurons and how those mutations affect the way cancer evolves.

The other study showed how a combination of drugs at increased potency could prove an effective therapy against glioblastoma by inhibiting two biochemical enzymes in cancer cells.

The studies' results help us paint a more defined picture of how glioblastoma starts, evolves and kills, and how we might find a way to slow it down and eventually stop it.

Initial treatment of glioblastoma consists of surgical removal of the tumor, radiation and chemotherapy using the drug temozolomide, or TMZ.

However, glioblastoma shows relentless drive to invade adjacent brain tissue, which prevents the surgical removal of all tumor cells. Plus, invasive glioblastoma cells show resistance to TMZ. 

One study shows how these tumors continue to rapidly evolve as they become more malignant.

The other study shows how drugs targeting the two biochemical enzymes could represent promising candidates for glioblastoma therapy.

Our findings suggest that combination therapies with highly potent, brain-penetrant kinase inhibitors will be required to improve patient outcomes.

Dr. Michael Berens is TGen’s Deputy Director, head of the institute’s Glioma Research Lab, and Director of its Cancer and Cell Biology Division. He can be reached at mberens@tgen.org.

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