Endocrine Abstracts

Sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG) is characterized by the unique ability of regulating estrogen free fraction and cross-talking with estradiol pathways in breast cancer cells, therefore reducing breast cancer cell growth and proliferation. In addition, the presence of the D327N (Asp327Asn, rs6259) single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) of SHBG exon 8 confers a protective role to SHBG in breast cancer. Another polymorphism that has been receiving quite a lot of at...

Breast cancer cells may present a number of resistance mechanisms to conventional therapy, and therefore new treatments are under evaluation. The histone deacetylase inhibitor (HDI) valproic acid (VPA) is of particular interest, since having been used for a long time in neurological patients its side-effects and tolerability are well known. We have recently demonstrated that VPA is a powerful antiproliferative agent in estrogen-sensitive breast cancer cells. Unfortunately, its...

Poorly differentiated and anaplastic thyroid carcinomas are aggressive human cancers that are resistant to conventional therapy. DAC inhibitors (DACi) are a promising class of drugs, acting as anti-proliferative agents by inducing apoptosis and cell cycle arrest.Panobinostat (LBH589) is a potent DACi belonging to a structurally novel cinnamic hydroxamic acid class of compounds, able to inhibit the activity of different isoforms of HDACs (HDAC 1, 3–6...

Sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG), the specific plasma carrier for sex steroids, regulates hormone bioavailable fraction and estrogen signalling system in breast cancer cells. A common single nucleotide polymorphism in the human SHBG gene results in an amino acid substitution (Asp327Asn), which introduces an additional N-glycosylation site that has been associated with reduced breast cancer risk in postmenopausal women. Since wild-type SHBG was demonstrated to interfe...

A functional sodium iodide symporter (NIS) is essential for radioiodine treatment of thyroid cancer. Unfortunately, most of de-differentiated tumours as well as anaplastic thyroid cancers loss the ability to concentrate iodine. Loss of NIS expression usually depends on epigenetic modifications, suggesting the use of epigenetic drugs as promising tools for re-differentiation. Panobinostat (LBH589) is a novel deacetylase inhibitor, acting at nanomolar concentrations, currently i...