Jocelyn Cai
Pronouns: she/her/hers
Research Mentor(s): Jie Luo
Research Mentor School/College/Department: Pathology / Medicine
Program: UROPF
Session: Session 4 (1:40pm – 2:30pm)
Authors: Jocelyn Cai, Kenneth Gu, Jie Luo
Abstract
Castration-resistant metastatic prostate cancer is an incurable form of prostate cancer that develops following the failure of traditional androgen deprivation therapy. This project aims to test a novel therapeutic compound that would target prostate cancer by degrading the CBP/P300 transcription coactivators on different prostate cancer cell lines. Previous research has established a link between the CBP/P300 proteins and prostate cancer development, with CBP/P300 being one of the most important transcriptional cofactors in prostate cancer cells. Although CBP/P300 inhibitors have been developed, they only partially suppress CBP/P300 activity. In one part of the study, prostate cancer cells and normal prostate cells were treated with both the compound and other CBP/P300 inhibitors. After treatment, final cell count was measured to compare cytotoxicity and efficacy at suppressing cancer growth. In the second part of the study, prostate cancer cells were treated with various concentrations of the compound. The cells were then lysed and protein levels were measured through Western blot in order to determine the on-target and off-target effects the compound had on cell protein levels. Results show that the cell count of prostate cancer cells treated with the compound are lower than those treated with other CBP/P300 inhibitors, and that the cell count of normal cells treated with the compound does not experience significant decline. Additionally, results indicate that CBP/P300 levels in the treated prostate cancer cells significantly decline, and that no other essential proteins are inadvertently affected. CBP/P300 is an important transcription coactivator in other types of cancers like melanomas and neuroblastomas and if further testing is done to verify these results, it could indicate that this compound is an effective treatment for prostate cancer that could also potentially be applied to the treatment of other related cancers.
