黑料吃瓜资源

Pancreatic cancer is projected to become the second-deadliest cancer by 2030. By the time it鈥檚 diagnosed, it鈥檚 often difficult to treat. So, for both individual patients and the general population, fighting pancreatic cancer can feel like a race against time. 黑料吃瓜资源 (CSHL) Professor and Cancer Center Director David Tuveson offers a telling analogy:

鈥淲e all have moles on our skin. Most of your moles are fine. But some of your moles you have a dermatologist looking at to make sure it鈥檚 always fine. They may take it out and send it to the pathologist to ask, 鈥業s this an early melanoma, a melanoma in situ?鈥� Now, that鈥檚 just what you can see. Imagine that in your pancreas鈥攂ecause that鈥檚 the reality. We all have early versions of cancer in many tissues at all times.鈥�

Now imagine treating those 鈥渆arly versions鈥� in the pancreas鈥攂efore they become cancerous. A new discovery at the CSHL Cancer Center could help make this possible. Tuveson and Research Investigator Claudia Tonelli have found a way to effectively 鈥渋ntercept鈥� pancreatic cancer. To understand how it works, we need to first understand a little bit about pancreatic cancer genetics.

鈥淥ver 95% of pancreatic cancer patients have mutations in KRAS,鈥� Tonelli explains. 鈥淚t鈥檚 the driving oncogene in this disease. We discovered that another gene, FGFR2, plays a role in enhancing mutant KRAS signaling in pancreatic cancer. When that happens, those 鈥榚arly versions鈥� of pancreatic cancer become much more aggressive.鈥�

Tonelli and Tuveson observed this outcome in mice and organoids鈥攍ab-grown versions of human pancreatic tissue. Of course, the researchers weren鈥檛 just having a look. Their goal was to stop the pancreatic tissue from becoming cancerous. Because FGFR2 is a known oncogene in other cancers, several inhibitors are already used in the clinic today.

When Tonelli and her colleagues inhibited FGFR2 at precisely the right moment, they got the results they wanted. Tumor formation slowed significantly. When they targeted FGFR2 along with EGFR鈥攁 protein known to be overactive in pancreatic cancer鈥攖hey saw even better results. Fewer 鈥渆arly versions of cancer鈥� formed in the first place.

鈥淲ith an increasing number of FGFR2 inhibitors entering the clinic, our study lays the foundation to explore their use in combination with EGFR inhibitors for pancreatic cancer interception,鈥� Tonelli says. Patients with a family history of pancreatic cancer would likely be among the first candidates to receive such treatments.

For now, fighting pancreatic cancer remains a race against time. But with this discovery, the day may soon come when time is on our side.

Written by: Samuel Diamond, Senior Communications Strategist | [email protected] | 516-367-5055

Funding

National Institutes of Health, The Lustgarten Foundation, Thompson Family Foundation, Pershing Square Foundation, CSHL-Northwell Health Affiliation, Northwell Health, 黑料吃瓜资源 Association, Simons Foundation, American-Italian Cancer Foundation, National Cancer Institute

Citation

Tonelli, C., et al., 鈥淔GFR2 Abrogation Intercepts Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma Development鈥�, Cancer Research, April 2, 2025. DOI:

Core Facilites

鈥淭丑别 Animal Shared Resource houses and cares for the animals essential for scientific research. Our staff perform all aspects of animal husbandry, ensure humane care, and assist researchers with highly technical procedures and protocol design and development.鈥� 鈥� Animal Facility Director and Attending Veterinarian Rachel Rubino, DVM

鈥淭丑别 Bioinformatics Core Facility provides researchers with essential services and technical support for Next Gen Sequencing (NGS) analysis. We work closely with researchers from the earliest planning stages of data-intensive experiments to developing customized software tools for analyzing data.鈥� 鈥� Director Rad Utama, Ph.D.

鈥淭丑别 Flow Cytometry Shared Resource offers researchers equipment, training, and assistance with cellular analysis for a variety of applications as well as cell sorting. Our staff oversees equipment maintenance and quality control, trains new users on instrument operation, and assists with assay development and data analysis. We also provide tissue culture facilities for sample preparation and cell maintenance during ongoing flow cytometry experiments.鈥� 鈥� Director Pamela Moody

鈥淭丑别 Microscopy Core Facility provides training, consultation, experimental design and technical assistance to investigators at CSHL in widefield, spinning disk laser scanning or point laser scanning confocal fluorescence microscopy, and super-resolution microscopy. In addition, the Microscopy Shared Resource provides customized state-of-the-art optical imaging and quantitative image analysis applications to support a wide range of scientific endeavors.鈥� 鈥� Director Erika Wee, Ph.D.

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