The findings, appearing in the latest edition of Cancer Cell, suggested the compound could be used in targeted therapies for lung and other cancers, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas said in a news release.

The synthetic compound mimics the action of a naturally occurring cellular protein called Smac, which plays a major role in the normal self-destruction of a cell, researchers said.

"We found that certain kinds of lung-cancer cells were sensitive to this compound, which sends a signal to cancer cells to self-destruct," said Dr. Xiaodong Wang, professor of biochemistry at UT Southwestern and senior author of the study.

Wang's research group tested 50 human non-small-cell lung-cancer cell lines and found that 22 percent of them were sensitive to the Smac protein. They also found that the Smac mimic was effective against some types of breast cancer and melanoma cells.

"The apparent ability of a Smac mimetic, as a single agent, to induce cell death in nearly one-quarter of lung-cancer cell lines tested was quite remarkable," Wang said.