Judah Folkman - Work On Angiogenesis

Work On Angiogenesis

In 1971, he reported in the New England Journal of Medicine that all cancer tumors are angiogenesis-dependent. If a tumor could be stopped from growing its own blood supply, he surmised, it would wither and die. Though his hypothesis was initially disregarded by most experts in the field, Folkman persisted with his research.

After more than a decade, his theory became widely accepted and is now being exploited in the treatment of a growing number of diseases, including blindness caused by macular degeneration.

Folkman pioneered the use of interferon to heal hemangiomas, growths that often threaten the lives of infants. His research has led to the development of progressively more potent compounds, such as angiostatin, endostatin, vasculostatin, caplostatin and lodamin, that have successfully halted the growth of tumors in laboratory mice. Two angiogenesis inhibitors based on Dr. Folkman’s hypothesis and developed by Genentech, Lucentis and Avastin, are now FDA-approved for use in age-related macular degeneration and some metastatic cancers respectively.

Over 50 angiogenesis inhibitors — including endostatin, angiostatin, 2ME2 (Panzem), and a thrombospondin analogue — are in clinical trials today for cancer treatment, including a number with unanticipated anti-angiogenic effects. These include the anti-inflammatory drug celecoxib (Celebrex); rosiglitazone (Avandia), a drug commonly used to treat Type 2 diabetes; doxycycline, a common antibiotic; and some cancer drugs that also have other mechanisms of action, including Erbitux, Herceptin, Velcade and Tarceva. Even some conventional chemotherapy drugs have demonstrated anti-angiogenic effects when given frequently in smaller doses (see Anti-Angiogenic Chemotherapy below). Folkman envisioned that someday, angiogenesis inhibitors would be used together or in combination with conventional anticancer therapies such as chemotherapy, radiotherapy, immunotherapy, gene therapy, or vaccine therapy.