Arming the 'guardian of the genome'

A pre-seed investment from Venture Partners at CU Boulder has helped spinout Illumen Therapeutics pursue a cancer-treatment “moonshot” aimed at p53, a tumor suppressor gene known as the “guardian of the genome” because it prevents damaged cells from multiplying.

“P53 is a key protein mutated in 85 to 95% of human cancers, and its loss allows cells to grow in an uncontrolled way,” explained Roy Parker, company co-founder, CU Boulder’s BioFrontiers Institute director and Cech-Leinwand Endowed Chair of Biochemistry.

Many strategies to target p53 have focused on blocking gene-inhibiting proteins, but Illumen has taken a new approach. The leading-edge science behind the company, which emerged from the Parker Lab, reduces the enzyme PARN to boost functional p53. That strategy could potentially treat nearly half of all human tumors in aggressive cancers with limited therapeutic options like colorectal, triple-negative breast, pancreatic and others.