Protein once seen as promising anti-cancer compound helps to stabilize neural circuits

Researchers at UC San Francisco (UCSF) have discovered that endostatin, a protein that once aroused intense interest as a possible cancer treatment, plays a key role in the stable functioning of the nervous system.

A substance that occurs naturally in the body, endostatin potently blocks the formation of new blood vessels. In studies in mice in the late 1990s, endostatin treatment virtually eliminated cancer by shutting down the blood supply to tumors, but subsequent human clinical trials proved disappointing.

"It was a very big surprise" to find that endostatin, through some other mechanism, helps to maintain the proper workings of synapses, the sites where communication between nerve cells takes place, said Graeme W. Davis, PhD, Hertzstein Distinguished Professor of Medicine in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at UCSF and senior author of the new study. "Endostatin was not on our radar."

Protein once seen as promising anti-cancer compound helps to stabilize neural circuits