A Teflon Coating For Tumor Cells

MOST CANCER PATIENTS DON'T die from their initial tumors. Usually, it's the cancers' metastases to other organs that prove fatal. Now, scientists in California have engineered a sticky protein molecule that may provide some defense. In experiments with mice, the molecule appears to patrol the bloodstream, attaching to migrating cancer cells and encapsulating them before they become implanted at new sites.

Researchers from the Burnham Institute--a cancer research lab in La Jolla--injected the molecule, which they call superfibronectin, into mice with virulent tumors that typically spread to the lungs and lymph nodes. In a report in Nature Medicine, the researchers say the cancers' spread to the lungs was reduced by two-thirds, while metastases to the lymphatic system were completely eliminated. There were no apparent side effects in the animals, says Dr. Edward A. Sausville, associate director of the National Cancer Institute's Developmental Therapeutics Program. The NCI program will now collaborate with the California team on tests against ovarian tumors in mice.