Researcher Spotlight: John Bushweller, PhD, Targets Transcription Factors That Drive Cancer

The pharmaceutical industry once deemed transcription factors that drive cancer "very difficult targets to make drugs for." UVA Health researcher John Bushweller, PhD, is undeterred.

Aberrant behaviors of certain transcription factors play an important role in several cancers, including leukemia, prostate cancer, lung cancer, and Ewing sarcoma.

"Transcription factors have traditionally been viewed as 'undruggable' due to the need to target the more challenging protein-protein or protein-nucleic acid interactions through which these proteins act," Bushweller shares. "There are still relatively few examples of such agents for cancer treatment. We are exploring several unique approaches to target this important class of proteins for drug development."

Watch Bushweller talk about his research and read his answers to our questions below.