Drug targets radiation damage
From Times Staff and Wire Reports
Scientists mimicked one of cancer’s sneaky tricks to create a drug that promises to prevent a serious side effect of cancer treatment -- radiation damage -- or offer an antidote during a nuclear emergency.
A dose of the experimental drug protected mice and monkeys from what should have been lethal doses of radiation, researchers reported Friday in the journal Science. A study to see if the compound is safe in people could begin as early as this summer.
The drug activates a protein that prevents cells from self-destructing, as they would normally do when damaged by radiation.
