Established science. Settled medical knowledge, curated for teaching — distinct from the platform’s own evolving research.
Understand HER2 from the ground up.
HER2 is a protein that sits on the surface of cells. In some breast and stomach cancers there is far too much of it, and it drives the cancer to grow. This is a free, plain-English guide to what HER2 is and how today’s medicines shut it down — no background required.
Start here and read straight through.
Each lesson builds on the one before it. Take them in order and you’ll finish with a genuine, honest understanding of HER2 and its treatments.
What is HER2?
Meet the protein: what a healthy cell uses HER2 for, what “too much” means, and how it tells a cell to grow. Ends with the real 3D structure the platform studies.
How the treatments work
Three ways medicine switches HER2 off — antibodies on the outside, kinase blockers on the inside, and “guided missiles” that carry chemo straight to the cancer cell.
The seven approved drugs
Every HER2 medicine cleared for patients, in plain English — what it is, how it works, and when it arrived, grouped by the way it acts.
Beyond the settled science: the platform’s frontier
Everything above is settled science that doctors and scientists already agree on. This platform does something different: it reads the newest HER2 research non-stop and tracks the questions that are still open and still argued over — unproven ideas, conflicting findings, and mutations that may resist treatment. That evolving, frontier layer is a separate, researcher-facing part of the site. When you’re ready to go past the textbook, that’s where to look.
This guide is for education only and is not medical advice. For decisions about care, talk to a qualified clinician.