The Hidden Tumor Trick That Fooled the Immune System for Years
Indian Defence Review • • health
Key Points:
- Researchers at the University of Würzburg, in collaboration with MIT and Würzburg University Hospital, identified a molecular "invisibility switch" in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma where the MYC protein shifts from DNA binding to RNA binding, suppressing innate immune signaling.
- Under cellular stress, MYC relocates from DNA to nascent RNA, forming multimers around RNA-DNA hybrids (R-loops) and recruiting the nuclear exosome to degrade abnormal RNA, thereby preventing activation of immune receptors like TLR3 and kinase TBK1.
- Mutations in MYC's RNA-binding region RBRIII impair its ability to suppress immune signaling, leading to tumor shrinkage in immunocompetent mice, highlighting that MYC’s RNA-binding
