Drug therapy takes the fight to cancer’s ‘Death Star’

LUNG cancer patients could live three months longer after scientists discovered a drug combination that tackles the “Death Star” protein implicated in some of the deadliest tumours.

The protein, found in mutated forms of the KRAS gene, acquired its moniker because it is spherical and impenetrable, essentially preventing drugs binding onto its surface and inhibiting it.

Previous drug trials tried to target several KRAS mutations but were unsuccessful because of severe side effects in patients.

New research, presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology’s annual meeting, has identified a combination that successfully curbs the protein, controls tumour growth and limits toxicity for patients.

The research, led by a team from the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR), London, and The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, could lead to a “new treatment paradigm” for tackling cancer’s “Death Star”, experts said.

Thousands of patients could benefit from the treatment, as some 40 per cent of lung cancers, 45 per cent of bowel cancers and 90 per cent of pancreatic cancers are driven by KRAS mutations.

Phase I of the ICR trial tested the drugs VS-6766 and everolimus in 30 patients with a range of KRAS mutations, including those with advanced lung, ovarian and thyroid cancer.

In a previous trial, VS-6766 in combination with another drug, defactinib, shrank tumours in half of patients with ovarian cancer.