A brand new way to treat advanced prostate cancer

Grant information

Institution - Strathclyde University
Researcher - Professor Simon MacKay
Grant award - £249,289
Duration - 2013-2016
Reference - PG12-27

Why did we fund this project?

• There are many effective treatments for early-stage prostate cancer, including hormone therapy.
• Whilst most men respond, some progress to advanced prostate cancer that is resistant to hormone therapy.
• Professor Simon MacKay and team had previously identified that a protein called IKKα is key to the development of advanced prostate cancer. This protein had not been widely studied in prostate cancer before, and represented a brand new treatment target.
• They had made a series of completely new drugs that can prevent IKKα from working, and stop it driving advanced prostate cancer.
• In this project, the team wanted to find how effective these drugs were at treating advanced prostate cancer, and to identify the best drug to take forwards into clinical trials.

What did the team do?

• The team first wanted to refine the drugs, to make them more effective and ensure they could be safely given to men.
• This involved a large multidisciplinary team. Chemists helped by making better drugs; biologists studied how good the drugs were at slowing the growth of prostate cancer; and doctors advised on which men might benefit from the drugs.
• The drugs were then tested on a number of mouse models of advanced prostate cancer, to see how effective each drug was at slowing prostate cancer growth.

What did the team achieve?

• The team showed their new drugs were effective, and can shrink tumours in mouse models of advanced prostate cancer.
• The team identified one drug as the most effective, and so the most promising to take forward into clinical trials. This new drug could offer a completely new way of treating advanced prostate cancer.
• However, the drug is difficult to make into a form that can be given to men. To overcome this challenge, the team has started a new Prostate Cancer UK-funded project to develop a form of the drug that men can take as a pill.

How does this benefit men?

• Treatment options for men with advanced prostate cancer are limited, and new treatments are urgently needed.
• The team have shown targeting IKKα with a new drug could slow the growth of advanced prostate cancer. 
• The next step is to develop a form of the drug that can be taken by men, and this is the focus of their new project.
• The team then hope to carry out trials to prove this drug works in men with advanced prostate cancer, paving the way for its approval as a new treatment option.