Student in world first with breast cancer drug research

An Irish student has secured a world first with her research into a way of boosting the effectiveness of chemotherapy for breast cancer patients.

Patricia Cleary, a PhD student at NUI Galway, is the only researcher in the world testing a new drug that aims to stop cancer cells building up a resistance to chemotherapy treatment.

Her study, funded by the Irish Cancer Society, is probing how a protein in cancer cells, called XBP1s, helps the cells survive the onslaught of chemotherapy drugs.