Are There Therapeutic Strategies Targeting Fork Protection?
Yes, several therapeutic strategies aim to target fork protection and stabilization in cancer. One approach is the use of PARP inhibitors, which exploit the concept of synthetic lethality in cancers with defective BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes. By inhibiting PARP, a key enzyme in DNA repair, these drugs exacerbate replication stress and selectively kill cancer cells while sparing normal cells. Another strategy involves targeting proteins involved in the replication stress response, such as ATR and CHK1, to further destabilize the replication fork in cancer cells.
