New Treatment Approaches for Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer
Official title: Targeting the Plk1/Pdcd4/mTORC2 Signaling to Treat Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer
Funded at University of Kentucky · NIH-11131062 · Data updated 2026-11-12
This research looks for new ways to treat prostate cancer that has become resistant to standard hormone therapies.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R01 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | University of Kentucky NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Lexington, United States) |
| Project start | July 1, 2023 |
| Project end | June 30, 2028 |
| Funding year | 2025 |
| Award (this year) | $631,310 |
| NIH project number | 5R01CA272483-03 |
| Project ID | NIH-11131062 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
This research is relevant for patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer, especially those whose disease has become resistant to androgen signaling inhibitors like abiraterone and enzalutamide.
✕Less likely to help
Patients with early-stage prostate cancer or those who are still responding well to current androgen signaling inhibitors may not directly benefit from this specific research.
What this research studies
Prostate cancer often relies on a signal called the androgen receptor (AR), and current treatments like abiraterone and enzalutamide block this signal. However, many patients eventually develop a form of the disease called castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) that no longer responds to these therapies. This project aims to understand how a specific pathway, involving proteins called Plk1, Pdcd4, and mTORC2, contributes to this resistance. By understanding this pathway, we hope to find new drug targets to help patients whose cancer has stopped responding to existing treatments.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, this work could lead to new treatment options for patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer who no longer benefit from current hormone therapies.
How similar studies have gone: Previous work has shown that blocking Plk1, one of the proteins in this pathway, can improve the effectiveness of existing hormone therapies.
Where this research is happening
-
University of Kentucky
Lexington, United States Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Liu, Xiaoqi — University of Kentucky
- Study coordinator: Liu, Xiaoqi
Related research
Other NIH-funded projects on the same topics.
-
Understanding how aggressive cell states emerge in castration-resistant prostate cancer
A research project aims to uncover the hidden cell states that help prostate cancer resist standard therapy and how these states arise early in tumor development.
-
Enhancer RNA CYP11A1-eRNA in castration-resistant prostate cancer
Researchers are testing a new RNA-based target, CYP11A1-eRNA, to see if blocking it can hamper the growth of castration-resistant prostate cancer in the lab and animal models.
-
Targeted Immunostimulatory Dual Drug Conjugates for Heterogeneous Metastatic Prostate Cancer
Researchers are testing a targeted therapy approach to help people with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer by boosting the immune system and delivering drugs directly to cancer cells.
-
Androgen Receptor Action in Prostate Cancer that Stops Responding to Therapy
This grant supports research to understand why certain prostate cancers stop responding to AR-targeted therapies and to find new ways to target them.
-
Hyperactive methylation in a hard-to-treat prostate cancer subtype
Researchers are studying a newly identified methylation-heavy group of advanced prostate cancer to understand its biology and find clues for better treatments.
-
Therapeutic Targeting of Lineage Plasticity in Advanced Prostate Cancer
A cancer research effort aimed at understanding and tackling how aggressive prostate cancers become resistant to standard AR-targeted therapies.
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.