By Beatrice Jeschek

Malignant melanoma is considered to be the most dangerous type of skin cancer. A genetically targeted drug promises now to slow the progress.

Those diagnosed with advanced melanoma usually die within a year. New hope for patients lies on a brand new drug which prevents the mutated B-RAF gene from generating cancerous cell growth. This very fact promises to be a breakthrough in skin cancer therapy.

A study published last week in Nature and the New England Journal of Medicine describes the structure of this experimental new drug PLX 4032 developed by the US biotechnology company Plexxikon based in Berkeley, California.

It is still so new that it does not have a proper name yet. However, a BBC blogger asks already confidently if this might be “cancer’s penicillin moment”.

The number of those tested is small, and the trials of the drug are still in phase one. Nevertheless, 24 out of 32 participants could reduce the size of their tumours by 30 percent. In two people the tumour even disappeared entirely.

This means, a former incurable disease form turns out to be curable thanks to great new insight in gene sequencing which allows to compare healthy and diseased cells.

This new insight in genetics might indeed create “cancer’s penicillin moment” to be used also for other forms of cancer therapy.

This article was first published 16/09/2010 on maltastar.com.