Pertuzumab by Genentech

[julierene]

Pertuzumab: Directed against the HER2 family, pertuzumab is a humanized potential therapeutic antibody in Phase II testing. Pertuzumab is designed to directly attack tumor cell growth by inhibiting the signaling pathway of the entire family of HER kinases.

Future of Cancer Therapy and the HER Pathway Having established the HER pathway's role in a variety of solid tumors, molecular-targeted therapies are a valid and rationale approach to cancer treatment. Scientists are now utilizing the underlying biological mechanisms involved in cancer growth and metastases to develop clinical strategies to treat patients with cancer. While researchers continue to study the biological inner-workings of the HER pathway and other pathways involved in cancer, Genentech clinicians and collaborators are using the acquired knowledge to identify new and innovative ways to treat cancer patients.
Since certain receptors in the pathway work together to produce malignancy, one of the clinical strategies being explored today involves the possibility of combining several targeted HER molecules as well as other targeted therapies into a single treatment regimen - based on the biology of disease - that potentially have a synergistic or additive effect on the tumor and could on day lead to cancer becoming a more chronic disease.

http://www.gene.com/gene/products/ed...herpathway.jsp

Could this be something even more powerful than Tykerb and Herceptin in the works?