Bringing Cancer Science to the Bedside

Craig Jordan began studying cancer stem cells in 1998, when it was still a relatively new field. He soon realized that most drug developers weren't taking advantage of this new science, and he started looking into ways to specifically target leukemic stem cells. His big break came when he discovered that the transcription factor, nuclear factor kappa B (NFkB), was overexpressed in the stem cells because there was already a known agent that inhibitted it: parthenolide. "But that was just the beginning," says Jordan. For the next five years he and his team developed and tested analogs of parthenolide that were soluble and would actively kill stem cells. One of the two agents his team found is scheduled to go into Phase I trials this year. "It's a little scary but really exciting," says Jordan. "We won't really know if it works until it goes into humans."