Question

8. In some types of lung cancer, there is an overabundance of the EGFR in membranes of lung epithelial cells (due to gene amplification) and the p53 gene has been inactivated. Based on this information and what we covered in class, which of the following would be a useful treatment to help combat this type of cancer? a. a drug that turns on the telomerase gene X b. inserting the gene for the E6 protein into the cell X e. antibodies (proteins) that bind to EGFR c. a drug that methylates the p53 gene x ? d. an antisense (RNAi) drug that targets p53

Answer 1

The answer is c.) a drug that methylates the p53 gene. because p53 gene is inactivated in this case, methylation would activate the p53 gene and since it is a tumor suppressor gene, it will keep a check on cancer progression. Additionally, e) antibody targetting EGFR works to combat cancer, but since we are aware that our case p53 dependent and p53 is inactivated, targetting p53 is more important, and otherwise EGFR is also required for normal cell growth and differentiation. On the contrary, b) is wrong because E6 degrades the p53 gene, which is not desirable; d) RNAi will also suppress the role of p53, again not desirable; a) a drug that turns on the telomerase gene, will not be sufficient here, as it is not gene specific, and even if we can specify gene, only gene termination by using telomerase will not be sufficient as EGFR is also required for normal cell growth and differentiation.

Good Luck.