Ross Douglas D, Doyle L Austin
University of Maryland Greenebaum Cancer Center, Program in Experimental Therapeutics, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Departments of Internal Medicine and Pathology, Baltimore, MD 21201 USA.
Cancer Cell. 2004 Aug;6(2):105-7. doi: 10.1016/j.ccr.2004.08.003.
The association of transporter proteins and cancer drug resistance has been known for approximately 25 years, with recent discoveries pointing to an ever-increasing number of ATP binding cassette (ABC) transporter proteins involved with the response of cancer cells to pharmacotherapy. As reported in this issue of Cancer Cell, Szakács et al. couple quantitative, real-time PCR assays for all 48 human ABC transporters with chemosensitivity information mined from the NCI-60 cancer cell line database. Predictions of transporter involvement in drug effect were validated in selected cases, and furthermore produced novel leads relating ABC transporter expression and chemoresistance or chemosensitivity.
