Mysuru: University of Mysore (UoM), Singapore’s National University and Tsinghua-Berkeley Shenzhen Institute have jointly developed an anti-cancer chemical agent. This has been accepted in the internationally reputed journal of Proceedings of the United States of America (PNAS).

The team, led by former UoM VC Prof. K.S. Rangappa and Prof. Peter Lobie from the National University of Singapore and Tsinghua-Berkeley Shenzhen Institute, have synthesised a cell and new drug that can act against wide range of cancers as a single agent.

Prof. Rangappa said that the 30 years of research, hard work of his team comprising Dr. Basappa, Dr. C.D. Mohan, Dr. K.S. Girish and Dr. Shobith of Adichunchanagiri Institute for Molecular Medicine have brought him a major breakthrough.

The chemical agent developed has been named ‘NCB,’ a unique synthesised molecule that will not kill healthy cells, he added.

He said that the newly synthesised compound efficiently decreased the viability of breast, endomaterial, prostate, ovary, liver, colon and pancreatic cancer cells. The anti-cancer activity of the compound was validated by different standard methods using cheminformatics platform and identified BAD (Bcl-2 agonist of cell death) that is a protein essential for driving patients towards death.

Speaking to SOM here this morning from Jerusalem, Prof. Rangappa said that he had been invited to present his research paper and findings at the World Cancer Institute, Jerusalem and the Cancer Institute of Germany.