Protein Mapping Can Aid Cancer Detection

A technique that automatically locates and maps proteins involved in regulating cell behavior represents a new way of identifying types of cancer.

Misplaced proteins in their new locations change the ways cells behave and participate in the promotion of cancer. By measuring protein-location shifts, scientists can determine a protein's function in cancer development and allow the protein to be used as a treatment target.

In a new study, Sophie Lievre, assistant professor of basic medical sciences at Purdue University (West Lafayette, IN, USA; www.purdue.edu), and colleagues used a new imaging technique to identify shifts in the distribution of a fluorescently stained nuclear protein in human mammary cells and to create a three-dimensional (3D) map of the protein. The protein, called nuclear mitotic apparatus protein (NuMA), has been linked to leukemia and breast cancer. The study findings were reported in the March 6, 2006, issue of the online Proceedings of the [U.S.] National Academy of Sciences.

The new imaging technique, called an automated local bright-spot feature image analysis, was used to identify NuMA location shifts. It recorded luminescence throughout the nucleus and located the brightest spots, which were the protein. The system automatically measured differences in the protein's distribution in each cell type and mapped it. This enabled the researchers to differentiate between cells that were still multiplying, normal mammary cells, and malignant cells.






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