• Question: has your work made any impact on the research of cancer and if so how?

    Asked by miles on 16 Jun 2023.
    • Photo: Duncan Smith

      Duncan Smith answered on 16 Jun 2023:

      I’ve been lucky to have many.

      A good example

      In the late 1990s during my PhD, I worked on defining the way a chemical (STI571) could alter the modification of proteins in leukaemia cells. I showed some key modifications that the leukaemia relied on were inhibited by this chemical. We proposed this could kill leukaemia cells. That chemical went on to become the front line therapy for Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia called ‘Gleevec’ and its saved hundreds of thousands of lives.

    • Photo: Zahra Rattray

      Zahra Rattray answered on 21 Jun 2023:

      Yes, a project I worked on 5 years ago was a discovery project looking at developing new antibodies for targeting cells that cannot repair their DNA properly. These drug molecules are now about to be tested in clinical trials for patients with untreatable brain tumours.

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