Blue-green algae, or cyanobacteria, have been around for at least 2 billion years, making them one of the oldest forms of life on Earth. Researchers have discovered that a unique compound derived from the algae holds promise in treating two of the most aggressive types of cancer: brain tumors and triple negative breast cancer.
Discovered eight years ago by Kerry McPhail, Ph.D., coibamide A was derived from a mashup of at least three species of algae growing together in areas characterized by fast-moving waters. The specific sample that McPhail gathered was from a dive in the Coiba National Park in Panama. Aside from Panama, however, off the South African Coast and the Red Sea are other locations that similar algal communities can be found.
According to Jane Ishmael, Ph.D., lead author of the study presented at the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (ASPET) Annual Meeting held April 6 at the Experimental Biology 2016 conference, chemical diversity in nature has been known to be a source of inspiration for designing and developing drugs. Medicinal properties in plants have been widely recognized but those in the marine environment have been largely untapped.
"We think that with this compound, nature has already found a way to target some of the specific proteins that are relevant to the growth of tumors," Ishmael said.
After McPhail was able to isolate coibamide A from the original specimen, the compound was assessed using a National Cancer Institute screening system designed to detect possible anti-cancer activity in 60 different types of the disease. Coibamide A was shown to have an activity pattern that doesn't match any other known compounds, which suggests its potential in fighting cancer via a mechanism of action that has not been used before.
The screening showed that coibamide A has the ability to kill a lot of cancer cell types but the researchers focused instead on brain tumors, or glioblastomas, and triple negative breast cancer.
Based on experiments, coibamide A works by cutting off communication between cancer cells and other cells and blood vessels, which leads to cancer cells eventually starving and dying.
The researchers' next challenge is to determine if the compound will be able to cross the blood-brain barrier, a special filtering system that only lets in certain substances into the brain, to specifically target brain tumors.
If coibamide A turns out to be incapable of crossing the blood-brain barrier or results in adverse side effects, its mechanism of action and structure can still be used to guide further research into developing cancer treatments.
Photo: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center | Flickr
