How one enzyme could stop the spread of cancer and how key cancer-related enzyme functions.

Scientists have identified a new enzymatic mechanism that induces cancer cells that are about to migrate to destroy themselves by degrading their small power plants or mitochondria. They hope that this discovery will lead to new treatments that can stop the spread of tumors.

Researchers have observed how an enzyme works that plays a key role in the development of cancer. The researchers hope that the new knowledge will lead to the design of more precise medications.

The new study shows, first, that the METTL13 enzyme helps control the formation of new proteins in cells.

Errors in protein production are undesirable, as we know from other studies that it can result in the development of cancerous tumors and degenerative brain disorders.

The enzyme helps control protein synthesis by placing the so-called methyl labels on a particular protein called eEF1A. If methyl is not properly connected to the protein, it cannot do its function properly. And that also affects the formation of proteins in the cell, which will take place at a suboptimal rate, and although that does not sound so bad, it seems to be related to very serious disorders.

Researchers have shown how the enzyme works by studying isolated human cancer cells using advanced mass spectrometers that, in short, are able to identify and quantify proteins and their methyl modifications in a cell.

Enzymes have two functions:

1. Stop the division and spread of cancer cells

2. The cancer cells are coated with 17 layers of fibrin that prevent the immune system from detecting them. High doses of enzymes will "go through" that protective layer and make cancer cells more vulnerable.

Now the researchers hope that the study will lead to the development of methods and drugs capable of targeting and ensuring that the enzyme works as expected in our cells.