A group of researchers from the University of California (USA) has discovered that aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) could be an effective tool against colorectal cancer, as it seems to have the ability to interfere with the development of tumor cells , causing them to die and stop proliferating.
Cancer begins to develop when healthy cells begin to turn into a pathogenic state and begin to divide uncontrollably, proliferate and spread throughout the body. Researchers have found that it is precisely at this point in evolution that aspirin could play a fundamental role, as it slows down cell division and increases the rate of cell death.
The research, published in the eLife review, has been carried out using a mathematical model with multiple stages and components in which advanced colorectal adenomas and the possible effect of aspirin on them are analyzed. Although this drug is anti-inflammatory and acts in the tumor microenvironment, in vitro and in vivo experiments have shown that it also has the ability to alter cell kinetics and fitness.
Aspirin alters the evolutionary process of carcinogenesis
“We think that a slow development of cancer due to aspirin must somehow arise from a slow evolution of cells towards malignancy. What surprised us was that this mechanism could explain quite well the level of protection observed in the human population. In other words, the predicted magnitude was consistent with the protective effect observed in the human population, in epidemiological studies”, explains Natalia Komarova, one of the researchers.
Aspirin is anti-inflammatory and acts on the tumor microenvironment, but has also been shown to alter cellular kinetics and fitness
Another earlier study, conducted in 2011, found that taking 600 mg of aspirin daily for a period of two years could reduce the risk of developing colorectal cancer by up to 63% in patients with Lynch syndrome, an inherited genetic predisposition that predisposes to having colon and rectal cancer.
These results had already been corroborated by other works previously, however, this new study provides as a novelty how aspirin interferes in the development of colorectal cancer, which they have discovered is due to the alteration of the evolutionary process of carcinogenesis. In addition, according to the authors, this study is proof that mathematical approaches can be very useful in understanding complex phenomena in cancer biology that would be very difficult to observe simply through experimentation.
The next step that the researchers want to take is to find out if aspirin or acetylsalicylic acid could have similar effects on other cancers located in another part of the body, this could represent a great advance for the world of oncology and a possible hope for patients with cancer.
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