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Grabbing cancer by the short and curlies 短发卡钳住癌症的新武器 A new technique for analysing tumours promisesbetter understanding and more effective treatment 一项研究肿瘤的新技术为人类更加深入地了解肿瘤并找到更加有效的治疗方法带来了希望 ONE of the great hopes nurtured by the Human Genome Project was that it would crack canceropen. Knowing which genes were going wrong would, the theory went, allow specifically tailoreddrugs to be developed. And this is, indeed, happening. Only last month Americas Food andDrug Administration approved a medicine called Xalkori for patients whohave a particular type of non-small-cell lung cancer, the most common form of that disease.Xalkori blocks the growth of tumours caused by a mutant form of the gene which encodes asignalling molecule known as anaplastic lymphoma kinase. This mutation occurs in 3-5% oflung-cancer patients, and in trials Xalkori caused a dramatic shrinkage of the tumour in aroundhalf of those treated. 找到克服癌症的方法，是人类基因组计划带给人们最大的希望之一。理论上，只要找到出错的基因，就能研发出针对它的特定药物。事实上，这些期望正在被逐步实现。就在上个月美国食品药品管理局批准了一种名为Xalkori的新药上市，用于治疗非小细胞肺癌。Xalkori能够抑制由编码信号分子间变性淋巴瘤激酶基因的突变体所导致的癌细胞的增长。3-5%的肺癌患者体内存在这种突变。临床试验中，大约一半受试者在服过此药后体内癌细胞数量显著减少。 | 
