| Grant ID | RP100678 |
| Awarded On | January 20, 2010 |
| Title | Discovery of Novel Anti-Tumor Therapeutics Targeted at Colon Cancer Stem Cells |
| Program | Academic Research |
| Award Mechanism | Individual Investigator |
| Institution/Organization | The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston |
| Principal Investigator/Program Director | Qingyun Liu |
| Cancer Sites | Colorectal |
| Contracted Amount | $1,280,107 |
| Lay Summary |
A major problem in cancer therapy is that tumors often became resistant to treatment after initial response. Such resistance is believed to be mostly due to the existence of cancer initiating cells, also called cancer stem cells that can regenerate the tumor. For colon cancer, a gene called Lgr5 has been found that not only marks the cancer stem cells but also modulate their growth. Drugs that target Lgr5 can hit colon cancer stem cells directly and, therefore, offer the potential of curing the cancer. However, little is known about the mechanism of Lgr5, making it nearly impossible to start drug discovery efforts. Our proposal is to uncover the signaling mechanism of Lgr5, charact... |