Patrick Hwu, President and CEO at Moffitt Cancer Center, shared a post on X about a paper by Jorge Luis Galeano Niño et al. published in Cancer Cell:
“Science Saturday
Can bacteria living inside tumors change how cancer grows and responds to treatment?
A new study in Cancer Cell shows that some tumors, especially colorectal and oral cancers, can contain bacteria living between cancer cells, not inside them.
- The researchers found that areas of tumors with lots of bacteria (especially Fusobacterium) look very different. Cancer cells are more spread out, grow more slowly, and enter a ‘resting’ state where they stop dividing.
- Why does this matter? Many cancer treatments, like chemotherapy, work best on fast-growing cells. When bacteria push cancer cells into this resting mode, the tumors can become more resistant to treatment.
- The good news: when bacterial levels were reduced in lab and animal models, cancer cells were able to start growing again, making them more vulnerable to therapy. This suggests that targeting tumor-associated bacteria could improve cancer treatment in the future.
Congratulations to senior author Susan Bullman and the outstanding research team for uncovering how the tumor microbiome can directly shape cancer behavior and treatment response. This work opens the door to new ways of thinking about cancer therapy by targeting not just the tumor, but the microbes around it.”
Title: Tumor-infiltrating bacteria disrupt cancer epithelial cell interactions and induce cell-cycle arrest
Authors: Jorge Luis Galeano Niño, Falk Ponath, Victor A. Ajisafe, Clara R. Becker, Andrew G. Kempchinsky, Martha A. Zepeda-Rivera, Javier A. Gomez, Hanrui Wu, Jessica G. Terrazas, Heather Bouzek, Elizabeth Cromwell, Pritha Chanana, Matthew Wong, Ashish Damania, Michael G. White, Y. Nancy You, Scott Kopetz, Nadim J. Ajami, Jennifer A. Wargo, Christopher D. Johnston, Susan Bullman
You can read the Full Article in Cancer Cell.
More posts featuring Patrick Hwu.
