More is known about the healing process for acute promyelocytic leukemia, a rare form of blood cancer. Leukemias are diseases of the blood system linked to the presence of excess numbers of abnormal white blood cells, which invade the bone marrow and / or the blood. In acute promyelocytic leukemia, patients’ cells have an abnormality that results in the synthesis of an oncoprotein, the PML / RARA protein, which triggers the proliferation of cancer cells.
In 2010, Inserm researchers, led by Prof. Hugues de Thé, discovered that arsenic associated with retinoic acid, a hormone, promotes the destruction of this oncoprotein and the elimination of leukemic stem cells. Three years later, the same team has succeeded in understanding how this healing process works at the cellular and molecular level. These new works published in the journal Nature Medecine demonstrate that senescence, the aging of cells, can have an anti-cancer effect.
How is it possible ? To put it simply, treatment with arsenic and retinoic acid reorganizes nuclear bodies, activates a protein (p53), the cause of aging and death of cancer cells. “During this targeted treatment, the researchers showed that the p53 protein [qui joue un rôle essentiel dans la prolifération cellulaire], arbiter between cell death and survival, triggers senescence thanks to the involvement of PML nuclear bodies, ”Inserm explains in a press release.
It is this phenomenon which would explain the total cure of the patient, by sparing them chemotherapy and its side effects, assure the French researchers.
This finding is not limited to the treatment of acute promyelocytic leukemia. It opens up prospects for the treatment of other cancers, the scientists conclude.
