Potential cure for Glioblastomas with the use of Newly Formed Drugs Called PROTACs
School Name
South Carolina Governor's School for Science and Mathematics
Grade Level
12th Grade
Presentation Topic
Cell and Molecular Biology
Presentation Type
Mentored
Abstract
Glioblastomas are one of the most aggressive and fast growing brain tumors with currently no cure. Treating Glioblastomas with chemotherapy often leads to the rise of dormant cells, resistance to treatment in the future, and, eventually, a relapse of the tumor. This research focused on an alternative treatment for this type of cancer by using drugs called PROTACs. Benefits of these drugs include being used in lower doses and providing tumor sensitivity to drugs. During an earlier study in this lab, GPD1 was found to be an important regulatory protein in Glioblastomas, but targeting and degrading GPD1 proved to be extremely difficult to execute. Our next plan of action was to target instead the nuclear receptor of GPD1, named GR, which in turn prevents the GPD1 from carrying out its job and thus does not allow the tumor cells to continue to function. We studied this by caring for HeLa cells through cell culture and then live imaging the cells after PEI transfection and drug insertion. To solidify our research, we also carried out multiple Western blots using 20 different PROTACs along with the negative controls to ones that held particular promises. We found PROTACs DKFZ 932 and DKFZ 924 to be extremely promising in the degradation of GR and, thus, the disabling of important regulatory mechanisms that keep cancer thriving and prominent. Finding a cure for Glioblastomas is incredibly important, and PROTACs could very well be the solution to this urgent question.
Recommended Citation
Kiley, Anna, "Potential cure for Glioblastomas with the use of Newly Formed Drugs Called PROTACs" (2023). South Carolina Junior Academy of Science. 13.
https://scholarexchange.furman.edu/scjas/2023/all/13
Location
ECL 104
Start Date
3-25-2023 10:00 AM
Presentation Format
Oral Only
Group Project
No
Potential cure for Glioblastomas with the use of Newly Formed Drugs Called PROTACs
ECL 104
Glioblastomas are one of the most aggressive and fast growing brain tumors with currently no cure. Treating Glioblastomas with chemotherapy often leads to the rise of dormant cells, resistance to treatment in the future, and, eventually, a relapse of the tumor. This research focused on an alternative treatment for this type of cancer by using drugs called PROTACs. Benefits of these drugs include being used in lower doses and providing tumor sensitivity to drugs. During an earlier study in this lab, GPD1 was found to be an important regulatory protein in Glioblastomas, but targeting and degrading GPD1 proved to be extremely difficult to execute. Our next plan of action was to target instead the nuclear receptor of GPD1, named GR, which in turn prevents the GPD1 from carrying out its job and thus does not allow the tumor cells to continue to function. We studied this by caring for HeLa cells through cell culture and then live imaging the cells after PEI transfection and drug insertion. To solidify our research, we also carried out multiple Western blots using 20 different PROTACs along with the negative controls to ones that held particular promises. We found PROTACs DKFZ 932 and DKFZ 924 to be extremely promising in the degradation of GR and, thus, the disabling of important regulatory mechanisms that keep cancer thriving and prominent. Finding a cure for Glioblastomas is incredibly important, and PROTACs could very well be the solution to this urgent question.
