CONTEXT

Most of the emphasis in cancer therapy has been focused on primary tumours. Most cancer deaths, however, are the result of metastatic disease. Researchers are only just beginning to understand how cancer cells escape from their original location, travel throughout the body and select a new site at which to form new tumours, and metastasis research is one of the most rapidly developing areas of cancer biology.

The cofilin pathway has been identified as a major determinant of metastasis. Recent studies indicate that the overall activity of the cofilin pathway, and not that of any single gene within the pathway, determines the invasive and metastatic phenotype of tumour cells. These results predict that inhibitors directed at the output of the cofilin pathway will have therapeutic benefit in combating metastasis. LIM kinase (LIMK), which phosphorylates cofilin is the very last kinase involved in the cofilin pathway.