Controlling a certain enzyme could inhibit growth of lung, breast, colon and pancreatic cancers, University of Oklahoma researchers said.

The researchers discovered that an enzyme called sFAP can act as a "scaffolding," helping cancer cells divide beyond their normal limits, intrude on and destroy adjacent tissues and spread to other locations in the body, Dr. Patrick McKee said in research published in the journal Blood and the Journal of Thrombosis and Haemostasis.

Enzymes are proteins that catalyze, or increase the rates of, chemical reactions in cells.

If this specific enzyme can be inhibited, then cancer might be slowed or halted, McKee said.

Combined with chemotherapy or radiation, a malignancy might actually be able to be cured, the researchers theorize.

"You'd be able to hold a cancer in check," McKee told The (Oklahoma City) Oklahoman.

Their work "has attracted the attention of a number of pharmaceutical companies," he added.

The researchers received a $365,000 grant from the U.S. Defense Department to work at the University of Arkansas Medical Center.