Funding Research

Sponsoring research is a fantastic way to get involved with the life of the University. It is also a chance to be part of some truly amazing research being carried out across a wide range of areas. For instance, a Brunel research team is making great strides inlearning how to combat cancer (see case study below). This project and others like it depend on funding from a variety of sources, including industry and private gifts.

If you, or your company, think that you would be interesting in sponsoring research, please contact the Development & Alumni office on 01895 267773.

Case Study:

Switch to Cancer's Immortality
Researchers at Brunel University have discovered a genetic switch that allows cancerous cells to divide and spread forever. The discovery could lead to new treatments to restore mortality to many common cancers.

The switch controls an enzyme called telomerase. In normal cells, the regulating gene is tightly packaged and coiled and the switch is off, so the enzyme is not produced and the cells eventually stop dividing when they reach a certain age - part of the natural process to keep the number of cells in our body in balance.

Cancerous cells though continue to divide indefinitely.

Lead researcher Professor Robert Newbold, Dean of the Faculty of Life Sciences at Brunel and Director of the Institute of Cancer Genetics and Pharmacogenomics says:

"Telomerase is crucial in allowing our cells to keep on dividing. By the time a baby is born the body has shut down the production of telomerase. From then on a strict limit is placed on the number of times our cells can divide."

"But around 85% of cancers re-activate the molecule allowing their cells to divide over and over without succumbing to normal ageing and death."

Scientists from Brunel collaborated with researchers from the Swiss Cancer Research Institute in Lausanne to look for differences in the structure of the telomerase gene in normal and cancer cells. They added genes from normal cells into cancerous cells that made the telomerase gene recoil into its compact mode – cutting off the enzyme causes the cancerous cells to stop multiplying.

“It seems that cancer cells activate telomerase by unravelling the DNA that codes for the molecule,” adds Professor Newbold. “Blocking this process could be an extremely effective way of stopping the rapid growth of some tumours. "

"Now we understand more fully how tumours activate telomerase we can begin to develop drugs that target this process to restore mortality to cancer cells and stop them from growing and dividing indefinitely."

Professor Newbold is setting up a Europe-wide collaboration between research institutes and pharmaceutical companies to design drugs that will exploit this new discovery and stop telomerase from being activated in cancer cells.

The research is published in the journal Cancer Research. See also: BBC