BioCentury
ARTICLE | Targets & Mechanisms

An miRNA boost for p53

October 7, 2010 7:00 AM UTC

Although many studies have shown that altered expression of one or more microRNAs is associated with cancer, they have not shown that the miRNAs could be therapeutically targeted with a drug-like molecule. Now, U.S. and Australian researchers have shown for the first time in vivo that blocking miRNA can slow tumor growth.

"For years, there have been studies suggesting that the 3¢ untranslated region of p53 mRNA could be important for the regulation of the protein," said Andrei Goga, assistant professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. "What we have been trying to do is to identify microRNA sequences that target this region."...