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New research sheds light on molecular pathways involved in resistance to chemotherapy in ovarian cancer cells


November 23, 2011

Research led by Dr. Benjamin Tsang is opening up new avenues to fight one of the greatest challenges in ovarian cancer: the development of resistance to the common chemotherapy cisplatin. It has long been known that dysregulation of a protein called p53 plays a key role in chemotherapy resistance, but Dr. Tsang’s new work reveals that another protein called PARC also plays a key role by controlling p53’s location and action inside cells. This research suggests that targeting PARC may offer a novel approach to prevent or reverse the development of chemotherapy resistance. See Journal of Biological Chemistry for details.

Another recent paper by Dr. Tsang’s group shows for the first time that a gene called PPM1D also plays a key role in chemotherapy resistance in ovarian cancer cells by disrupting the normal cell death pathway. See Oncogene for details.

This research was supported by the Canadian Institute of Health Research, the National Research Foundation of Korea and funded by the Korean Ministry of Education, Science and Technology. All research at OHRI is also supported by The Ottawa Hospital Foundation.