Prototype Shows Promise As Approach to Countering Pancreatic Cancer News provided by Share this article Share this article NEW YORK, May 11, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- A research team has designed a molecule with potential to interfere in a new way with altered proteins that cause abnormal growth in 35 percent of pancreatic cancers. Published online in Nature Communications on May 11, a new study found that a molecule called a monobody clings to cancer-causing versions of the KRAS protein and keeps them from transmitting their signals. Changes in the DNA of the KRAS gene – which encodes a molecular switch that toggles between active and inactive states to regulate growth – cause the related protein to become "stuck in the on mode." Cells with such mutations continually multiply and give rise to cancer.