Agios Pharmaceuticals, the leading biopharmaceutical company focused on
discovering and developing novel drugs in cancer metabolism, announced
today the publication of a new study that provides further evidence of
the link between a mutated metabolic enzyme and acute myeloid leukemia
(AML), one of the most common types of leukemia in adults. Called an
"oncometabolite" for its role in cancer metabolism, the
2-hydroxyglutarate (2HG) metabolite is produced at high levels by
cancer-associated mutations in an enzyme known as isocitrate
dehydrogenase (IDH). The article, "Idh1-R132H mutation increases murine
hematopoietic progenitors and alters epigenetics," was published in the
July 4, 2012 online edition of the journal Nature.
Lead author and Agios co-founder Tak Mak, Ph.D., director, The Campbell
Family Institute for Breast Cancer Research at Princess Margaret
Hospital, and professor, University of Toronto, in the Departments of
Medical Biophysics and Immunology, said, "This is the first preclinical
model to demonstrate the direct oncogenic effects of an IDH1 mutation in
vivo. This preclinical research sets the stage for the work of
companies like Agios that focus on developing inhibitors to block the
mutated enzyme and prevent the production of this disease-initiating
metabolite."