C-Myc as a biomarker for tumor sensitivity to treatment with RNA polymerase II inhibition
AssigneesInstitute For Cancer Research, NexusPharma, Inc.
InventorsIgor Astsaturov, Vladimir Khazak, Ilya Serebriiskii
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Abstract
Systems and methods for determining whether a cancer patient may respond to inhibition of RNA polymerase II as a treatment for the patient are provided. Inhibition of RNA polymerase II may be by way of chemotherapy with an agent such as triptolide, an analog of triptolide, or a prodrug form of triptolide. The cancer patient may be a pancreatic cancer patient, an ovarian cancer patient, a gastric cancer patient, or an esophageal cancer patient. The patient may have any cancer in which c-Myc is over-expressed or over-amplified.
Claims14
A method for treating a subject having an ovarian tumor or a gastric tumor, comprising detecting an overamplified level of the c-Myc gene, an overexpressed level of the c-MYC protein, or both an overamplified level of the c-Myc gene and an overexpressed level of the c-MYC protein in a cell isolated from the tumor, determining that the serine at position 62 of the c-MYC protein is not phosphorylated, and administering to the subject an effective amount of triptolide or minnelide.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.