Study helps explain fundamental process of tumor growth

“Because PKM2 is found in all of the cancer cells that we have examined, because it is not found in most normal adult tissues, and because it is critical for tumor formation, this form of pyruvate kinase is a possible target for cancer therapy,” he adds.

This research was funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health and the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation.

Coauthors of the Nature article “Pyruvate kinase M2 is a phosphotyrosine binding protein,” include lead author Heather Christofk, of Harvard Medical School (now at UCSF Cancer Research Institute); Matthew Vander Heiden of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute; Ning Wu of Harvard Medical School; and John Asara of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Coauthors of the second Nature paper, “The M2 splice isoform of pyruvate kinase is important for cancer metabolism and tumour growth,” include Christofk (lead author) and Vander Heisen; Marian Harris and Mark Fleming of Children’s Hospital Boston; and Arvind Ramanathan, Robert Gerszten, Ru Wei and Stuart Schreiber of the Broad Institute, Cambridge, Mass.

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center is a patient care, teaching and research affiliate of Harvard Medical School and consistently ranks in the top four in National Institutes of Health funding among independent hospitals nationwide. BIDMC is clinically affiliated with the Joslin Diabetes Center and is a research partner of the Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center. BIDMC is the official hospital of the Boston Red Sox. For more information, visit www.bidmc.harvard.edu.

Harvard Medical School has more than 7,500 full-time faculty working in 11 academic departments located at the School’s Boston campus or in one of 47 hospital-based clinical departments at 17 Harvard-affiliated teaching hospitals and research institutes. Those affiliates include Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Cambridge Health Alliance, Children’s Hospital Boston, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Forsyth Institute, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, Joslin Diabetes Center, Judge Baker Children’s Center, Immune Disease Institute, Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, Massachusetts General Hospital, McLean Hospital, Mount Auburn Hospital, Schepens Eye Research Institute, Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, and VA Boston Healthcare System.