SCC work units for FLI-1 and MyoD1 targets

Background

The Smash Childhood Cancer project aims to find the best drugs that target key molecules in childhood cancers. This research has been aided by thousands of World Community Grid members across the world, who have donated over 48 thousand CPU years to this project. Thanks to their help, the team has been able to design drugs for multiple types of cancer, such as neuroblastoma (cancer of nerve tissues), hepatoblastoma (liver cancer), osteosarcoma (bone cancer), and most recently, Ewing’s sarcoma, at an incredible pace.

SCC workunit update

The SCC team began research into a new target named FLI-1, a gene that controls cell proliferation, differentiation and survival. When fused with EWSR1, the combined protein of EWS-FLI-1 is an important factor in the growth of Ewing’s sarcoma cells. Creating countermeasures against FLI1 in the form of inhibitors may lead to curing Ewing’s sarcoma in the future. For more information, read our previous SCC update article.

We are excited to announce that we have been able to make new SCC work units available to volunteers as of today. The SCC team shared this statement with us on the nature of these work units:

At the Children's Cancer Therapy Development Institute, we're very excited to be working with Dr. Tyuji Hoshino at Chiba University in an international collaboration of the World Community Grid.

Our existing project that have been computed already are: 

1. an inhibitor of the PAX-FOXO1 protein involved in the sometimes-fatal childhood muscle cancer, rhabdomyosarcoma. This project's findings and planned follow-on studies recently were reviewed by the NIH and received a very favorable grant score.
2. an inhibitor of the CREB transcription factor in teen & young adult cancer, clear cell sarcoma. Our related work with our colleagues at Atomwise was recently published in the British Journal of Cancer. The WCG work extends this drug discovery program.
3. an inhibitor of Osteopontin, a pro-metastasis factor in many childhood and adult cancers.
4. an inhibitor of the TrkB protein of childhood nervous system cancer, neuroblastoma.

New work units are:

1. binding compounds for FLI1 protein found in Ewing sarcoma cancers,
2. binding compounds for mutant MyoD1 protein found in the poor prognosis cancer sclerosing and spindle cell rhabdomyosarcoma, and
3. binding compounds for KLF15 protein found in the untreatable childhood and adult cancer Myoepithelial Carcinoma.

Thank you to the SCC team for sharing this with us. We look forward to sharing more scientific updates from them as the research progresses. If you have any comments or questions, please leave them in this thread for us to answer. 

WCG team