Validating cancer drug targets.
A cancer drug target is only truly validated by demonstrating that a given therapeutic agent is clinically effective and acts through the target against which it was designed. Nevertheless, it is desirable to declare an early-stage drug target as 'validated' before investing in a full-scale drug discovery programme dedicated to it. Although the outcome of validation studies can guide cancer research programmes, strictly defined universal validation criteria have not been established.
Benson
John D
JD
Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, 250 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
Chen
Ying-Nan P
YN
Cornell-Kennon
Susan A
SA
Dorsch
Marion
M
Kim
Sunkyu
S
Leszczyniecka
Magdalena
M
Sellers
William R
WR
Lengauer
Christoph
C
D000818:Animals; D002477:Cells / Q000187:drug effects / Q000378:metabolism; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D004353:Drug Evaluation, Preclinical / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013379:Substrate Specificity