By unlocking the secrets of cell death, we hope to discover the keys to a whole new realm of precision medicine therapeutics. By Georgia Atkin-Smith
22 COSMOS MAGAZINE
A
LA TROBE UNIVERSITY
Inflamed passions
ustralian scientists have long been world leaders in the field of cell death research. Back in 1972, Australian pathologist John Kerr first described how cells undergo apoptosis – the normal, controlled death of cells that occurs as a natural part of growth. Since then, we’ve made many significant advances in our understanding. For example, we now know there are more than 12 different ways that cells can die. At the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research (WEHI) in Melbourne, I’m surrounded by world-leading researchers who have shaped our understanding and discovered the very complex regulation underpinning cell death and survival. We have approximately 23 trillion cells in our body and it’s very important that they die, but at the right time. Cell death removes old, damaged, infectious or cancerous cells – essentially, getting rid of the bad and making space for the good. It’s pretty amazing to think that humans are just trillions of cells that have come together. That’s why it’s so important to understand the basic cellular biology of who we are. It’s sometimes a struggle in research to get recognition from the broader population: a lot of people want to know about the “sexy science”, such as therapeutics and translational work that’s directly going into the clinic. However, researchers who work on the basic biology of science to gain the fundamental understanding underpin those advances – which allow us to translate these findings into the clinic and create an impact. We have learnt so much over the past 50 years, but there’s still so much we don’t know, and some of the biggest challenges are in the cancer field. If we’re going to kill a cancer, the best way is to do it in a way that’s selective. If we can have a better understanding of how our cells are dying, and if it’s good or bad in a particular setting, it’s going to be a very exciting area for us to expand on to make more directed therapeutics. We’re eventually going to be looking at the genomic details of each individual to match it against the effectiveness of particular therapies. This realm of precision medicine is definitely the next big thing. That’s why it’s so important to have places like WEHI spreading their research
