A new study from St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital has identified a previously unknown vulnerability in certain pediatric cancers, including rhabdoid tumors, fast-growing cancers that primarily affect infants and young children.
In short, scientists have identified what these cells need to survive and where treatment could one day intervene.
For the IronMatt community, this is exactly the kind of research that matters. It’s how cures get built — study by study, discovery by discovery, each one narrowing the distance between where we are and where we need to be.
The science behind the study
Inside every cell, there’s a system called SWI/SNF that acts as a protector. Its job is to make sure the right genes are turned on at the right time. It does this in part by keeping another process — called NuRD — in check. NuRD’s role is to silence genes. That’s not always a bad thing, but when NuRD runs unchecked, it silences genes that should be active, and cancer can take hold. SWI/SNF prevents that from happening.
In rhabdoid tumors, SWI/SNF is missing. And when it’s gone, researchers can’t simply restore it — so they asked a different question: without SWI/SNF, what is the cancer depending on to survive?
The answer is a protein called PHIP. With SWI/SNF absent, cancer cells recruit PHIP to keep NuRD from running unchecked. PHIP essentially takes over the job SWI/SNF can no longer do — and the cancer depends on it to keep growing. When St. Jude researchers removed PHIP, those cancer cells couldn’t sustain themselves. Without anything holding NuRD back, the cancer fell apart.
That’s the discovery: scientists have identified what these cancer cells need to survive. And that makes PHIP a target.
No drug exists yet that goes after PHIP. But this research gives scientists a clear rationale to develop one — and that’s exactly how progress in cancer treatment is made. First you find the vulnerability. Then you build toward something that can exploit it.
Why we fund groundbreaking research like this
Research like this exists because of you. Like us, you believe that children should be swimming, biking, and running until they’re seventy, not just seven. Your support allows scientists to keep asking hard questions until they find answers that change everything.
Please join us in the fight against pediatric brain tumors. Donate today.