RATIONALE: Drugs used in chemotherapy use different ways to stop tumor cells from dividing so they stop growing or die. Bryostatin-1 may help paclitaxel kill more cancer cells by making tumor cells more sensitive to the drug.

PURPOSE: Phase II trial to study the effectiveness of combining paclitaxel and bryostatin-1 in treating patients who have locally advanced unresectable or metastatic pancreatic cancer.

OBJECTIVES:

• Determine the complete and partial response rates in patients with locally advanced unresectable or metastatic adenocarcinoma of the pancreas treated with sequential paclitaxel and bryostatin 1.
• Determine the survival of patients treated with this regimen.
• Determine the toxicity and pharmacokinetics of this regimen in these patients.

OUTLINE: This is an open-label, multicenter study.

Patients receive paclitaxel IV over 1 hour on day 1 followed by bryostatin 1 IV over 1 hour on day 2 of weeks 1-3. Courses repeat every 4 weeks in the absence of disease progression or unacceptable toxicity.

PROJECTED ACCRUAL: A total of 18-35 patients will be accrued for this study within 1 year.

• Drug: bryostatin 1
• Drug: paclitaxel

DISEASE CHARACTERISTICS:

• Histologically confirmed adenocarcinoma of the pancreas

  • Locally advanced and unresectable disease OR
  • Metastatic disease

• At least 1 unidimensionally measurable lesion

  • At least 20 mm by conventional techniques OR at least 10 mm by spiral CT scan
  • Indicator lesion within field of prior irradiation must have evidence of disease progression
• No brain metastases

PATIENT CHARACTERISTICS:

Age:

• Over 18

Performance status:

• ECOG 0-1 OR
• Karnofsky 70-100%

Life expectancy:

• Not specified

Hematopoietic:

• Absolute granulocyte count greater than 1,500/mm^3
• Platelet count greater than 150,000/mm^3

Hepatic:

• Bilirubin less than 1.5 mg/dL

Renal:

• Creatinine less than 1.5 mg/dL

Cardiovascular:

• No history of active angina
• No myocardial infarction within the past 6 months

• No history of significant ventricular arrhythmia requiring antiarrhythmics

  • Well-controlled atrial fibrillation on standard management allowed

Other:

• No history of HIV disease

• No other active malignancy within the past 5 years except nonmelanoma skin cancer or carcinoma in situ of the cervix

  • Prior T1a or b prostate cancer (detected incidentally during transurethral resection of prostate [TURP] and comprising less than 5% of resected tissue) is allowed provided PSA normal since TURP
• No serious concurrent infection
• No concurrent uncontrolled nonmalignant medical illness (control must not preclude study participation)
• No psychiatric disorder that would preclude study participation
• No other medical condition that would preclude study participation
• No pre-existing neurotoxicity grade 3 or greater
• Not pregnant or nursing
• Negative pregnancy test
• Fertile patients must use effective contraception during and for 2 months after study participation

PRIOR CONCURRENT THERAPY:

Biologic therapy:

• Prior biologic therapy (e.g., trastuzumab [Herceptin], epidermal growth factor receptor antagonists, or ras inhibitors) allowed
• Prior adjuvant vaccine therapy allowed
• No prior biological response modifiers
• No concurrent immunotherapy

Chemotherapy:

• No more than 2 courses of prior standard cytotoxic chemotherapy for pancreatic cancer, including any of the following:

  • One course of neoadjuvant, adjuvant, or definitive chemoradiotherapy
  • One course of chemotherapy alone (e.g., gemcitabine or combination chemotherapy)
  • One course of chemoradiotherapy followed by chemotherapy alone (e.g., gemcitabine)
• No prior taxanes (e.g., paclitaxel) for pancreatic cancer
• No other concurrent chemotherapy

Endocrine therapy:

• Not specified

Radiotherapy:

• See Disease Characteristics
• See Chemotherapy
• Prior radiotherapy allowed
• No concurrent radiotherapy

Surgery:

• Not specified

Other:

• Recovered from prior therapy
• At least 4 weeks since other prior therapy for this disease