Source Newsroom: Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Study pinpoints
targets for potential drug treatment of meningiomas Newswise —
BOSTON—Large-scale genomic sequencing has revealed two DNA
mutations that appear to drive about 15 percent of brain tumors
known as meningiomas, a finding that could lead to the first
effective drug treatments for the tumors, report scientists from
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Broad Institute. Surgery
and radiation currently are the only treatments for meningiomas
– slow-growing, often benign tumors that develop in the
membranes surrounding the brain. Meningiomas can grow
dangerously large, however, causing seizures and limb weakness,
and occasionally are fatal. In some instances, the tumors grow
aggressively or their locations make surgery and radiation a
challenge to carry out, and chemotherapy has proven ineffective
as an alternative. The researchers report in the journal Nature
Genetics that they have identified two mutations, SMO and AKT1,
in the genomes of 15 percent of a