Long-term cancer research project honoured by journal
Dr Melanie McConnell from the University’s School of Biological Sciences has spent the last six years investigating the aggressive type of brain tumours known as glioblastoma.
“Glioblastoma tumours are extremely aggressive and resistant to therapy, and our research team is really interested in finding out why,” Dr McConnell says.
Glioblastoma is really difficult to treat as it doesn’t die after chemotherapy and radiation treatments, Dr McConnell says. While it is not as common as breast or prostate cancer, it does affect around 120-150 New Zealanders every year.
“These people are usually in the prime of their lives, and the diagnosis of glioblastoma is devastating—there is no cure. Surgery and radiation can give the average person about 15 months to live, but as this cancer can affect different regions of the brain it can cause loss in speech or movement or even significant personality changes, which can really affect the quality of life of the patient and the impact their diagnosis has on their family as well.”
After studying blood cancers as a postdoctoral researcher, Dr McConnell noticed a lot of similarities between glioblastoma and B cell lymphomas. On a bit of a hunch (and a brainstorm over a few beers at a conference), she decided to start researching a protein called BCL6, which is a protein that keeps B cell lymphomas alive when they should be dead, in a collaboration with Dr Ari Melnick at Weill Cornell Medical College in NYC, and Dr Tania Slatter and her colleagues at Otago University in Dunedin.
“We found that BCL6 was present in the tumour of people with glioblastoma, when it is never found in a healthy brain,” Dr McConnell says. “From there we were able to show, using the cancer cells grown in a dish, that if glioblastoma cells lost BCL6 they died, and that glioblastoma cells produced more BCL6 when exposed to radiation and chemotherapy.
“If we blocked BCL6 at the same time as applying radiation or chemotherapy, the glioblastoma tumour died much more rapidly. This indicates that the BCL6 was keeping the glioblastoma cells alive during treatment.”
Dr McConnell’s colleagues in the United States are developing drugs that can block BCL6. These drugs are currently designed to use against B cell lymphomas, but if they can cross into the brain they could be used against glioblastoma tumours as well.
“This might not be enough to kill the glioblastoma cancer cells, but it should make radiation therapy much more effective,” Dr McConnell says. “This is exciting because radiation can be targeted directly to the tumour, and it is relatively cheap and easy to deliver.”
Dr McConnell’s work was recently honoured by the journal PLOS ONE, who published her research team’s most recent paper.
“Our paper was selected from several hundred articles published that week, across all areas of science, to be featured on the front page of the PLOS ONE website,” Dr McConnell says. “These ‘highlight’ articles represent the best of the high quality, relevant research that is published by the journal.”
For up-and-coming researchers wanting to get into this field, Dr McConnell has some advice on the interests and skills they need.
“Students wanting to work in this area should have a background in cell and molecular biology. Skills in puzzle-solving and the ability to think outside the box are also essential. They might also be interested in learning how to work with surgeons and oncologists to set up clinical trials to test their ideas for new treatments.”
The work was funded by the Cancer Research Trust, and the Cancer Society of New Zealand.