William Plunkett, Ph.D. University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

NEW DRUGS

Development of New Drugs for CLL

Update:

Major breakthroughs in the treatment of CLL have come after the introduction of new drugs into clinical trials. The objective of this project is to understand the mechanism by which several new agents work and provide information that will guide their use and evaluation in clinical trials. Three new agents have been studied. All act by different mechanisms, and all are now in clinical trials.

The first drug causes the premature destruction of proteins that are necessary for CLL cells to live. The second drug is incorporated into the genetic material, DNA. This causes reactions that lead to CLL death in much of the tumor population, and prevents the survival of cells that may survive as they try to reproduce. The third agent directly damages DNA and prevents generation of information for viability. Furthermore, attempts by the CLL cells to remove this drug from DNA leads to still greater damage to the DNA and cell death. The different mechanisms that we have identified give rise to the promise that CLL cells will be less likely to become resistant to these drugs.