Researchers at UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, after decades of research efforts, have developed a mouse model of Kaposi sarcoma that could be key to the development of new drugs to treat the disease.
Apr 29 2024University of North Carolina Health Care Kaposi sarcoma is a cancer that is the most common cancer in people living with HIV . This is an important development as we have created the first animal model ever of Kaposi sarcoma. Animal models are essential to move new drugs from the laboratory bench into clinical trials.
About 20% of all human cancers arise from viruses or require viral infection as an essential cofactor. The Kaposi sarcoma-associated herpes virus was discovered in 1994 and is associated with Kaposi's sarcoma as well as B-cell cancers. KSHV-associated diseases affect internal organs and are ultimately fatal. In the U.S., the diseases are found primarily in immunosuppressed people such as those who are HIV-positive or are transplant patients.
Aside from animal models, one way to study cancer is to look at tumor cells in the lab. But according to Dittmer, Kaposi sarcoma tumor cells are very finicky and dependent on signaling molecules and blood supply, which is why they don't survive in a laboratory culture dish. Therefore, researchers have been focusing on developing animal models that would mimic, as closely as possible, the disease in humans.
Cervical cancer and its related virus, HPV , offers a good comparison for the challenge of developing a Kaposi sarcoma mouse model. The KSHV genome is 20 times larger than HPV. HPV has two cancer-causing genes, E6 and E7, so to mimic the disease in animals, researchers only needed to design two mice, one for each gene.
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