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Lab disaster = new cancer drug?
"I was using these cancer cells as models of the normal intestine. I made a calculation error and used a lot more [PPAR-gamma modulator] than I should have. And my cells died"
- Katherine Schaefer, researcher, University of Rochester Medical Center
Washingtong, D.C. - Her carefully cultured cells were dead and Katherine Schaefer was annoyed, but just a few minutes later, the researcher realized she had stumbled onto a potential new cancer treatment.
Normal human cells are difficult to grow and study in the lab, because they tend to die. But cancer cells live much longer and are harder to kill, so scientists often use them. Schaefer was looking for drugs to treat the inflammation seen in Crohns disease and ulcerative colitis, both of which cause pain and diarrhea. She was testing a compound called a PPAR-gamma modulator. It would never normally have been thought of as a cancer drug, or in fact a drug of any kind.