Protein abuse causes certain thyroid cancers

According to researchers from UT Southwestern Medical Center, there`s a protein that can be found only in the brain and causes death from thyroid cancer and from other certain forms of this disease. Their goal is to stop the progression of these proteins. The research is published in Cancer Cell. The researchers discovered that the over-activation of this protein in the brain causes thyroid cancer in both mice and humans. Dr. Fiemu Nwariaku, Professor of Surgery and co-author of the paper reports that patients are coming in visits once or twice a month, but unfortunately, there isn`t a therapy for treating thyroid cancer so far. He is working in collaboration with Dr. James Bibb, Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Neurology and Neurotherapeutics and they together analyzed the Cdk5 protein. “We were surprised, but encouraged, by the finding because they link the human nervous system to disease processes that include the toughest of all foes, cancer”, said Dr. Bibb. “This research is ongoing, and we are now identifying precisely how Cdk5 causes the growth and spread of these forms of cancer with the goal of discovering new drugs, which we can test in our animal model”, he added.