food

healih

the scene

O and f Mice

en

A Detroiter's work is helping prostate
cancer researchers throughout the country.

Two aides watch Dr. Michael Cher work with a
mouse in a prostate cancer study.

RUTHAN BRODSKY

Special to the Jewish News

rostate cancer is the most prevalent
cancer diagnosed and the second lead-
.ing cause of cancer death for North
American men. More than 200,000
men in the US are diagnosed with prostate cancer
each year and nearly 42,000 deaths result from
the disease.
Even with improvements in early detection and
diagnosis, and with a better understanding of how
the disease progresses, the success rate for treating
metastatic prostate cancer is not very good.
Michael L. Cher, M.D., a urologist and associ-
ate professor in the departments of urology and
pathology, at Wayne State University and the
Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute, believes
he has an answer for more positive results. Dr.
Cher and his colleagues recently developed an
experimental animal model of human prostate
cancer metastasis to human bone.
"We know that if prostate cancer is not caught
in its earliest stages, it metastasizes to the bones,"
says Cher. "Once the cancer spreads to the bones,
it becomes more difficult to treat and impossible
to cure."
In spite of remarkable medical advances in the
the last 50 years, not much has changed in the
way advanced prostate cancer is treated. Standard
treatment when the rumor has metastasized are
drugs that block testosterone production because
prostate cancer cells are dependent on the male
sex hormone for growth. This approach works for
a while, but then fails when the cancer cells begin

po

to grow independent
of testosterone — a
feat that researchers
cannot yet explain.
Scientists are seeking fundamental knowledge
about all the aspects of prostate cancer. A good
laboratory model simulates the properties of
prostate cancer in humans so that researchers can
use it to define the mechanisms of prostate cancer
progression and for testing treatments.
Unfortunately, a major barrier in this research
was the lack of a useful laboratory model. A mix
of models was used for years for the research
because no one model was doing the job. This
made the research process very slow and compli-
cated.

prostate cancer cells are introduced. After 4-6
weeks, the prostate cancer invades the implanted
human bone. How this interaction between
prostate cancer and bone tissue takes place can
now be observed and studied.
"When a prostate cancer metastasizes to the
bone, it stimulates the bone cells to become very
metabolically active and make new bone," says
Dr. Cher. "The new bone formation stimulates
the growth of the prostate cancer. If we under-
stood how the prostate cells are talking to the
bone cells, we could figure out a way to interrupt
their conversations and stop the progress. New
treatments could then be designed based on this
research."

A Breakthrough

Wayne State and Karmanos provided seed
money for the pilot project. Now that they
have preliminary data, the researchers received
$1.5 million from the
National Cancer
Institute, $2 million

Research Funding

Recently, Dr. Cher, together with post-doctoral
research associate Jeffrey Nemeth, Ph.D., devel-
oped a model in
which tumors were
grown in mice. This
from the U.S.
model replicates how
Department of
prostate cancer
Defense Prostate
spreads to the bone in
Cancer Program, plus
humans.
private
funding from
Last year, Dr. Cher
the
Association
for
was honored with the
the
Cure
of
Cancer
of
Karmanos Cancer
the
Prostate.
Institute's President's
"Another part of
Clinical/Translational
our
program involves
Research Award for
the
detection and
this model, which is
characterization
of
being used widely by
Dr. Michael Cher's work is providing a
very
small
numbers
other researchers.
model for researchers.
of metastic prostate
Dr. Cher's experi-
cancer cells found in
mental model is
the
blood
and
bone
marrow
of patients whose
unique, but uncomplicated. Small pieces of
cancers
are
otherwise
thought
be confined to
human bones are implanted directly under the
the
prostate.
These
cells
are
called
micrometas-
skin of laboratory mice. Once these bones develop
tases
and
their
presence
may
have
a
profound
a new blood supply (about one month) human

10/5

2001

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