As part of her PhD, Sylvie Carmona investigated the beneficial effects of NV669, an aminosterol derived from squalamine on human pancreatic and hepatic cancer models. In vitro results exposed in this paper showed that NV669 inhibited the proliferation of cancer cells, induced cell cycle arrest and subsequent apoptosis. Moreover, NV669 inhibited PTP1B activity and impacted adhesion molecules expression. This suggests that NV669 by inhibiting PTP1B would affect cell contacts and would induce apoptosis. Subsequently, in vivo results confirmed that NV669 inhibited the growth of pancreatic and hepatic tumor xenografts.
This original work by Sylvie Carmona et al. suggests that NV669 may serve as an alternative anticancer agent, used alone or in association with other medications, for the treatment of pancreatic adenocarcinoma and hepatocellular carcinoma.
