A new study reveals critical molecular mechanisms associated with the development and progression of human neuroblastoma, the most common cancer in young children.
The research, published by Cell Press in the January 6th issue of the journal Cancer Cell, may lead to development of future strategies for treatment of this aggressive and unpredictable cancer.
Neuroblastoma cells are derived from migratory neural crest cells that give rise to the peripheral sympathetic nervous system. During normal development, neural crest cells stop dividing and differentiate. However, neuroblastoma cells seem to have lost this capacity. Previous work has shown that amplification of the MYCN gene, which disrupts control of cell division and differentiation, is a strong predictor of poor prognosis in neuroblastoma.
"We speculated that genes that are expressed in a MYCN-dependent manner might be required specifically for the growth of MYCN-amplified neuroblastomas and that MYCN-amplified neuroblastomas might depend not only on N-Myc itself, but also on upstream regulatory factors or downstream target genes," explains senior study author, Dr. Martin Eilers, from the University of Wurzburg in Germany.
Dr. Eilers and colleagues performed a genetic screen of nearly 200 genes that are dependent on amplified MYCN in human neuroblastoma or are direct targets of Myc. The researchers found that the oncogene AURKA is required for growth of MYCN-amplified neuroblastoma cells, but not cells lacking amplified MYCN.