What is the importance of cancer biomarkers in drug discovery?
Hernán: Personalized medicine is every day becoming increasingly in demand in modern clinical practice. The particular characteristics of the so-called cancer biomarkers open a window for the exploitation of new therapeutic approaches that, far from being generic with a broad spectrum of action, are directed to specific tumors with a very particular molecular profile. This new era of drugs is meant to pinpoint step by step the dark side of the complex molecular networks within the tumor cells, with the ultimate goal of considerable curative/palliative improvements in the quality of life of cancer patients. CHI: What is the importance of cancer biomarkers in treatment? Hernán: Every protein in the human body has a function. Knowing these particular functions enables scientists to modulate biological responses by blocking to some extent the activity associated with those proteins. Since cancer is a phenomenon in which cellular division is deregulated, the traditional therapeutic approach
