Dr. Catherine Pallen
The development of treatments for disease targeted at specific molecules, or molecular therapeutics, is widely considered one of the more exciting new areas of medical research. The promise of this research, according to molecular biologist Dr. Catherine Pallen, is the development of drugs directed specifically at diseases like cancer, avoiding the "bombing approach" of current treatments like radiation therapy with its unwanted side effects.
Dr. Pallen's research is focused on a class of enzymes called protein tyrosine phosphatases and on the role of these enzymes in the signalling process (or signal "transduction") within normal and cancer cells.
Activity within a cell is triggered by signals it receives from outside its membrane. As these signals are received within the cell they are translated and cause a flurry of biochemical reactions in response. For normal cells these reactions are a normal part of cellular activity and are fully regulated. Not surprisingly, cancer cells don't respond to outside signals in the same way as normal cells. For example, where normal cells require an external signal to trigger growth by cellular division, the trigger for a cancer cell to divide is unregulated and can be given continuously by an abnormal gene within the cell itself.
Dr. Pallen is interested in the protein tyrosine phosphatases because of their crucial role in regulating these intracellular processes. Where they are abnormally expressed, these enzymes have been related to a number of diseases, including breast and colon cancer, Alzheimer's disease, diabetes and immune disorders. Dr. Pallen's interest in the phosphatase enzymes is motivated by the hope they may emerge as a good molecular target for new drug therapies to treat cancer and other diseases.
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Last updated:
03/11/2010
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