European researchers claim to have discovered a “hidden vulnerability” glioblastoma, one of the most aggressive and deadly forms of brain cancer. This discovery opens the way to new therapeutic avenues, in particular thanks to diet and treatments already well known to doctors.
The study, published in the journal Science Advances and relayed by The Independent, was carried out by an international team involving research institutes from five European countries, including the Cancer Research UK Scotland Institute in Glasgow. Their goal: to understand how this cancer resists almost all existing therapies, and to identify an exploitable flaw in its functioning.
Scientists have been interested in how glioblastoma cells metabolize certain essential vitamins, particularly vitamin B3. To their surprise, they discovered that steroid medications, commonly used to reduce inflammation in patients, strongly alter this metabolic activity.
“We discovered a previously invisible vulnerability in glioblastoma tumorsexplains Dr. Saverio Tardito, co-senior author of the study. This particularity could pave the way for new diagnostic and therapeutic approaches, including diet-based strategies.”
Clinical trials necessary
Concretely, the researchers showed that by combining a treatment based on steroids with a diet reducing the presence of methionine – an amino acid found in many protein foods – they managed to considerably slow down the growth of tumors in preclinical models. By depriving cancer cells of certain essential metabolic resources, their proliferation becomes much more difficult.
This approach, often called “metabolic therapy,” is based on a simple idea: if you prevent a cancer from getting the nutrients it needs to grow, you can weaken it without disproportionately attacking healthy tissue. Until now, this strategy had given mixed results, but the discovery of such a specific weak point in glioblastoma gives new hope.
The authors specify that these results were obtained on animal models and that clinical trials will be necessary before any large-scale application in humans. But the potential is considered promising, because it relies on drugs already in use and well-tolerated nutritional adjustments.
For Sam Godfrey, head of science communications at Cancer Research UK, this breakthrough could be a vital turning point: “Glioblastoma is a rapidly growing cancer for which there is an urgent need to find new forms of treatment. Discoveries that can slow its progression and give families more time are crucial.”
By combining pharmacology and nutrition, research on glioblastoma could, in the near future, offer patients a new option: weakening the cancer from the inside, without adding to already difficult treatments.
