New progress made in childhood cancer research

A study published in the journal Cancer Cell has shown progress in the research of childhood cancer type neuroblastoma.

Netherlands Cancer Institute’s research group, led by Wouter Moolenaar has made an important discovery linked to the common infant cancer type, neuroblastoma. The discovery was made in collaboration with the Amsterdam Medical Centre led by professor Rogier Versteeg.

Neuroblastoma is a tumour of the sympathetic nervous system and usually grows within the abdomen. The tumour occurs when primitive nerve cells fail to develop correctly. Remarkably, the tumour can occasionally disappear by itself, although it is not known why this happens.

The exact causes of neuroblastoma are still unknown but Moolenaar and Versteeg have made progress towards the disease. A protein called GDE2, produced from neuroblastoma cells, was discovered to play a positive role in the outlook for patients with the disease.   

The group figured out that the GDE2 protein functions to create another protein glypican-6 (GPC6). A resulting alteration in gene expression then causes the tumour cells to differentiate. The GDE2 protein was also found to inhibit neurite retraction and to reduce the motility of tumour cells. This means that cells are less likely to spread and form metastases.

About the progress Moolenaar said: “We now understand a lot about GDE2, but not everything. It appears that GDE2 activates a transmembrane effector through cleavage of GPC6. Depletion of GPC6 in neuroblastoma cells had the same effect as high GDE2 levels.  We haven’t identified the effector protein yet, although we have our suspicions. Identifying this effector signalling system isn’t just important for our basal knowledge about neuroblastoma, it may also motivate the future development of new drugs. And there is an urgent need for new treatment options for this aggressive type of childhood cancer.”