Emanuel Petricoin on Genomic Profiling and Targeted Therapy

Emanuel "Chip" Petricoin III, PhD, Co-Director, Center for Applied Proteomics & Molecular Medicine, Professor of Life Sciences, George Mason University, discusses the inability of DNA and RNA profiling to predict response to treatment with targeted therapies.

One major problem with translating transcript profiling and genomic profiling to clinical use in the era of personalized medicine, Petricoin says, is that almost all experimental therapeutic agents and many FDA-approved drugs act at the level of the protein, inhibiting or modulating activity. To address this, researcher examined the relationship between DNA, RNA, and protein expression.

After much research, data shows that measuring DNA and RNA does not predict protein expression, levels, or activity. If targeted agents work by modulating protein activity, Petricoin says, then DNA and RNA cannot predict the agents' efficacy, since they are unable to predict protein expression. In general, this highlights the need to look at the drug target itself for prediction.