The clinical application of miRNAs

MiRNAs are endogenous, small non-coding RNAs which functions in post-transcriptional regulation of gene expression. Researches show that miRNAs can induce the changes in genome expression patterns, thus miRNAs is predictive for a variety of human diseases. Medical staffs might arrange treatments based on these micro-molecules. Scientists are also discussing how to develop a variety of clinical application potentials of miRNAs.

MiRNAs may have great clinical applications. First of all, the overall changes in gene expression patterns induced by miRNAs have been discovered in a variety of malignant tumors. Therefore, miRNAs can not only be regarded as cancer marker, but also used in the prognostic and therapeutic.

Secondly, miRNAs could regulate the entire gene pathway rather than a single one. So they will have a great advantage if used as therapeutic agents. The existing protease inhibitors, which are only aimed at a single gene pathway or a single gene, are much easier to induce resistance. The prospect of cancer treatment will be an open field if miRNAs can be used as tumor suppressors.

The clinical application of miRNAs is also facing multiple challenges. For example, we need to find a non-toxic delivery system to deliver miRNAs into the target tissues. Therefore, the better understanding of miRNAs is the premise of whether miRNAs can be put into clinical applications. Research in this field is still in its early stages, despite many challenge, miRNAs are no doubt with huge potential positive significance for various diseases.

In 2011, the CEO of the Puma Biotechnology Alan Auerbach got a humble breast cancer drug from pharmaceutical giant Pfizer. And now, the drug may eventually become a blockbuster drug.

The drug, with the name of neratinib, is a tyrosine kinase inhibitor under investigation for the treatment breast cancer and other solid tumors. Like the lapatinib of GSK, neratinib is a dual inhibitor of the human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (Her2) and epidermal (EGFR) kinases. In July 22, Puma has announced the results from the Phase III clinical trials that examined the effect of neratinib to early HER-2 positive breast cancer, the results displayed that neratinib could improve disease-free survival of patients (DFS) up to 33% when compared with placebo. Being influenced by this amazing result, the share price of Puma’s company jumped almost twice as much overnight. Interestingly, Puma’s stock has plunged over 25% on June 2 after investors soured on its "positive" news about neratinib with only three of 40 breast cancer patients in a study demonstrating a partial response. Howard Liang, the analyst of Leerink Partners, predicted that the drug will reach $ 2.5 billion in annual sales in 2020 if approved. However, even Puma looks will get huge profits from neratinib in clinical trials, this drug is started by Prizer and almost all study patients also recruited by Pfizer.

Numerologist Warda is hooked on OG-L002 fishing, collecting. And lastly her encouragement comes from socializing along with her companions.