Cancer blog

August 11, 2010, 6:58 PM CT

Seeing melanoma

A new imaging technique creates detailed three-dimensional images of the deadliest form of skin cancer.

Melanoma is one of the less common types of skin cancer but it accounts for the majority of the skin cancer deaths (about 75 percent).

The five-year survival rate for early stage melanoma is very high (98 percent), but the rate drops precipitously if the cancer is detected late or there is recurrence.

So a great deal rides on the accuracy of the initial surgery, where the goal is to remove as little tissue as possible while obtaining "clean margins" all around the tumor.

So far no imaging technique has been up to the task of defining the melanoma's boundaries accurately enough to guide surgery.

Instead surgeons tend to cut well beyond the visible margins of the lesion in order to be certain they remove all the cancerous tissue.

Two researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have developed technologies that together promise to solve this difficult problem.

Their solution, described in the recent issue of ACS Nano, combines an imaging technique developed by Lihong Wang, PhD, the Gene K. Beare Distinguished Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and a contrast agent developed by Younan Xia, PhD, the James M. McKelvey Professor of Biomedical Engineering......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

August 2, 2010, 7:01 AM CT

Gas pedal and brakefor uncontrolled cell growth

Scientists at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have identified a new way to regulate the uncontrolled growth of blood vessels, a major problem in a broad range of diseases and conditions.

The findings appear in the online edition of Nature Medicine by David A. Cheresh, PhD, professor of pathology in the UC San Diego School of Medicine and associate director for translational research at the Moores UCSD Cancer Center, and his colleagues at the cancer center and at the University of Michigan.

Blood vessels grow and expand in association with many diseases. In particular, new blood vessel growth (known as angiogenesis) occurs during the growth of tumors, enabling them to expand and metastasize or spread to other parts of the body.

Uncontrolled vascular growth can lead to vascular malformations and hemangiomas, which appears to become life-threatening. As per the National Cancer Institute, as a number of as 500 million people worldwide could benefit from therapies targeting angiogenesis.

Scientists have been trying to identify the switch mechanism that converts normal blood vessels from the resting state to the proliferative or diseased state. Cheresh, along with the study's first author Sudarshan Anand, also of the UCSD School of Medicine and the Moores Cancer Center, and his colleagues discovered how an "angiogenic switch" turns on and developed a strategy to turn it back off......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

June 24, 2010, 11:21 PM CT

Profiling prostate cancer

A large scale genetic analysis of multiple prostate cancer samples, published online by Cell Press on June 24th in the journal Cancer Cell, is providing exciting new insight into the disease and may lead to more effective therapy strategies. In addition, the freely available genetic and clinical outcome data obtained in the study represents a valuable public resource for the cancer research community.

Prostate cancer is clinically diverse with some patients developing fatal metastatic disease within a couple of years and others living for decades. This suggests that prostate tumors may have a substantial underlying genetic diversity. Eventhough large-scale genomic characterization projects have provided helpful insight into the molecular classification of a number of other types of cancer, similar studies of prostate cancer have proven to be more of a challenge.

"Our current knowledge of prostate cancer genomes is largely based on small groups of patients," says senior study author, Dr. Charles Sawyers from Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. "To obtain a more comprehensive picture of prostate cancer genomics, we adopted an integrated comprehensive approach to analyze 218 primary and metastatic prostate cancer as well as 12 cell lines".

Dr. Sawyers and his colleagues observed that an integrative analysis revealed a much higher frequency of alterations in the androgen receptor pathway than previously suspected, including amplification or mutation of the NCOA2 gene, an amplifier of androgen receptor output. Importantly, the pattern of DNA copy number alterations defined subsets of low- and high-risk disease in primary samples, raising the possibility of a test that could predict who needs aggressive treatment versus watchful waiting......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

March 22, 2010, 7:38 PM CT

Infertility increases risk of prostate cancer

Infertile men have an increased risk of developing high grade prostate cancer, which is more likely to grow and spread quickly. That is the conclusion of a newly released study published early online in Cancer, a peer-evaluated journal of the American Cancer Society. The study's results suggest that because infertility appears to be an identifiable risk factor for prostate cancer, early screening appears to be warranted in infertile men.

Research focusing on the number of children a man has have pointed to male fertility's potential linked to risk for prostate cancer. However, studies on the topic have generated conflicting results: some have observed that men with children had a higher risk than childless men; some have observed that men with fewer children had a higher risk than men with more children; still others failed to identify any association between the number of children fathered and a man's risk for prostate cancer.

Because the number of children a man has may not accurately reflect his ability to cause a pregnancy, Thomas Walsh, MD, MS, of the University of Washington in Seattle and colleagues designed a more accurate study to evaluate the association between male infertility and prostate cancer. They studied the risk for prostate cancer in a group of 22,562 men reviewed for infertility from 1967 to 1998 in 15 California infertility centers. The occurence rate of prostate cancer in these men was compared with the incidence in a sample of men in the general population who were of similar ages and from similar geographic locations......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

March 12, 2010, 7:28 AM CT

Tool to study prostate cancer

Van Andel Research Institute (VARI) scientists have developed a new method to better study the cells that line and protect the prostate in relation to the development of cancer. Using the model, they observed that normal cells and cancer cells depend on different factors to survive, which could aid in discovering how to target cancer cells without affecting normal cells when developing therapys.

Prostate cancer is the most common form of cancer in men, with more than 192,000 new cases and more than 27,000 deaths published in the United States in 2009 (Source: National Cancer Institute).

"This new model will serve as a valuable tool for understanding secretory prostate epithelial cells, which until now have not been available for extensive analysis," said VARI Scientific Investigator Cindy Miranti, Ph.D., whose lab published its study in a recent issue of the Journal of Cell Science.

Epithelial cells line and protect the internal and external organs and structures of the body. The prostate contains two types of epithelial cells, basal and secretory, and prostate cancers arise from abnormal cells as they are converted from basal into secretory cells in the body.

Previous to this study, researchers were able to culture basal cells, but not secretory cells. Using the model, scientists observed that, unlike cancer cells, normal secretory cells are not dependent on the male sex hormone androgen for survival, but are dependent for survival on binding to each other via the protein E-cadherin......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

February 1, 2010, 7:37 AM CT

Any possible risk associated with low-dose radiation exposure

Scientists at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Clinical Center are incorporating radiation dose exposure reports into the electronic medical record, an effort that they hope will lead to an accurate evaluation of whether any cancer risk is linked to low-dose radiation exposure from medical imaging tests, as per an article in the recent issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology (JACR). The electronic medical record allows for the storage, retrieval, and manipulation of one's medical records.

There is much controversy surrounding diagnostic medical radiation exposure. "One widely publicized appraisal of medical radiation exposure suggested that about 1.5 to 2 percent of all cancers in the USA might be caused by the clinical use of CT alone," said David A. Bluemke, MD, main author of the article and director of Radiology and Imaging Sciences at the NIH Clinical Center. "Since there is no epidemiologic data directly relating Computerized axial tomography scanning to cancer deaths, scientific evaluation must instead rely on the relationship between radiation exposure and death rates from Japanese atomic bomb survivors. While the legitimacy of this approach remains debated, radiologists as well as clinicians may rightfully be confused by the ongoing controversy. Patients seeking medical help may legitimately question the rationale of, and any risks from, diagnostic radiology tests," said Bluemke......... Posted by: Emily      Read more         Source

November 5, 2009, 8:25 AM CT

Does green tea prevent cancer?

Eventhough researchers are reluctant to officially endorse green tea as a cancer prevention method, evidence continues to grow about its protective effects, including results of a newly released study published in Cancer Prevention Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research, which suggests some reduction in oral cancer.

Vassiliki Papadimitrakopoulo, M.D., professor of medicine in the Department of Thoracic/Head and Neck Medical Oncology at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, and his colleagues tested green tea extract taken orally for three months at three doses among 41 patients: 500 mg/m2, 750 mg/m2 or 1,000 mg/m2.

The scientists assessed clinical response in oral pre-cancerous lesions and found 58.8 percent of patients at the highest doses displayed clinical response, compared with 18.2 percent among those taking placebo. They also observed a trend toward improved histology, and a trend towards improvement in a handful of biomarkers that appears to be important in predicting cancer development.

Patients were followed for 27.5 months and at the end of the study period, 15 developed oral cancer. Eventhough there was no difference in oral cancer development overall between those who took green tea and those who did not, patients who presented with mild to moderate dysplasia had a longer time to develop oral cancer if they took green tea extract......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

October 7, 2009, 8:07 PM CT

Study on Genetic Impact of Radiation

Scientists at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center are helping to lead a massive international study on the possible genetic effects of radiation and cancer drug exposures on future generations. The study's principal researchers are meeting this week at the OU Health Sciences Center to discuss their recent findings, which will be presented at an upcoming meeting of the American Society of Human Genetics.

The study, which combines cancer survivors in the United States and Scandinavia, is looking at potential genetic consequences of reproductive organs exposed to curative treatment by drugs or radiation. Researchers want to determine whether radiation and chemotherapy before conception increases the occurrence of birth defects, stillbirths and specific conditions such as Down syndrome. They also want to know if radiation therapy leads to cancer or DNA damage in the patients' offspring. It is the first and largest study of its kind.

In Denmark and Finland, scientists have been able to identify all cancer survivors since 1943 and 1952, respectively, who had cancer before age 35. They also documented the nearly 20,000 children produced by the survivors. Researchers now want to compare their findings with patients in the United States.

"So far, the results have been encouraging," said John J. Mulvihill, M.D., one of the leaders of the study and a renowned geneticist at the OU College of Medicine and the OU Cancer Institute. "This study is important for a number of reasons, but most notably for cancer survivors who need reassurances that their children will not be affected by their chemotherapy and radiation therapy. This research also will help families in Hiroshima and Chernobyl where residents were exposed to high levels of radiation as children and young adults"......... Posted by: Emily      Read more         Source

October 1, 2009, 6:59 AM CT

Molecular imaging for endometrial cancer

A promising new molecular imaging technique may provide physicians and patients with a noninvasive way to learn more information about a type of cancer of the uterus lining called "endometrial carcinoma"one of the most common cancerous female tumors. This research was presented as per a research findings reported in the recent issue of The Journal of Nuclear Medicine

"Endometrial carcinoma is one of the most common female cancerous tumors," says Hidehiko Okazawa, M.D., Ph.D., professor in the division of medical imaging at the biomedical imaging research center at the University of Fukui in Japan and one of the lead scientists of the study. "The method of positron emission tomography (PET) imaging we used in the study is noninvasive, and it has tremendous potential to save women with endometrial carcinoma from undergoing unnecessary operations and biopsies that could sabotage their reproductive potential".

If the disease is caught early enough, the five-year survival rate is higher than 90% for patients with endometrial carcinoma. PET imaging may provide physicians with a tool that lets them recognize the extent of the disease before it reaches advanced stages.

This study shows that PET is a promising molecular imaging technique for personalized treatment. Molecular imaging and nuclear medicine provide the possibility of determining the invasiveness and aggressiveness of cancerous tumors in the uterus earlier on, before disease progresses. With this technique, physicians gain the advantage of a more precise diagnosis along with the ability to better predict the tumor's growth patterns and plan for the most appropriate therapeutic therapy strategy......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

August 26, 2009, 11:00 PM CT

Small peptide found to stop lung cancer

In new animal research done by researchers at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, researchers have discovered a therapy effective in mice at blocking the growth and shrinking the size of lung cancer tumors, one of the leading causes of cancer death in the world.

The study, recently published in Molecular Cancer Therapeutics, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research, is the first to show that therapy with a specific peptide, angiotensin-(1-7), reduces lung tumor growth by inhibiting blood vessel formation.

"If you're diagnosed with lung cancer today, you've got a 15 percent chance of surviving five years and that's just devastating," said co-lead investigator Patricia E. Gallagher, Ph.D., director of the Molecular Biology Core Laboratory in the High blood pressure and Vascular Research Center at the School of Medicine. "Those other 85 people 85 percent they're not going to see their kids graduate. They're not going to see their children get married".

The lung cancer survival rate has changed little in the past 30 years, said Gallagher's co-lead investigator, E. Ann Tallant, Ph.D., a professor in the High blood pressure and Vascular Research Center a fact that motivates them in their research.

Peptides, found in all animals, are compounds formed by linking one or more amino acids together through the sharing of electrons. They are among the building blocks of life. Peptides can perform a wide range of functions in the body, depending on which amino acids are involved. Some can regulate hormones, for example, while others can have an antibiotic function......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

April 27, 2009, 5:18 AM CT

Robotic surgery for kidney cancer

Robotic trained surgeons at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia presented a new and novel approach to surgically treat urothelial cancer (in the lining of the bladder or kidney) today at the American Urological Association's Annual Meeting. Using da Vinci robot-assisted technology, urologic cancer surgeons perform complicated urologic cases using minimally invasive surgery.

Standard therapy for ureteral cancer is surgical resection of the tumor, called a distal ureterectomy, or removal of the entire kidney, called a nephro-ureterectomy. Depending on the experience of the surgeon, this procedure can be performed using open surgery, while others may elect a laparoscopic approach. In either instance, the surgeon's experience is vital for preserving function of the kidney.

"A minimally invasive approach to this procedure is challenging for even the most experienced laparoscopist. This is due to the technical challenge of re-implanting the ureter into the bladder," says Rosalia Viterbo, MD, robotic surgeon at Fox Chase and co-author on the study. "Robotic assistance can make a minimally invasive approach more technically feasible."

In this video abstract, Fox Chase urologic cancer surgeons, Viterbo and her colleague David Y.T. Chen, MD, demonstrate the four-arm technique for robot assisted distal ureterectomy......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

April 27, 2009, 5:04 AM CT

Risks associated with prostate cancer therapy

Patients with prostate cancer who undergo treatment to decrease testosterone levels increase their risk of developing bone- and heart-related side effects in comparison to patients who do not take these medications, as per a new analysis. Reported in the June 1, 2009 issue of CANCER, a peer-evaluated journal of the American Cancer Society, the study indicates that preventive measures and careful scrutiny of patients' health can keep men from experiencing these potentially serious consequences.

While medical therapys that decrease testosterone levelscalled androgen deprivation treatment (ADT)are important and effective therapies for men with prostate cancer, they can cause a variety of side effects including skeletal and cardiovascular complications, sexual dysfunction, periodontal disease, and mood disorders.

Bone and heart complications are among the most serious side effects linked to ADT, but the actual risk patients have of developing these effects is unknown. Lockwood Taylor, MPH, of the University of Texas Health Science Center and his colleagues conducted a study to assess this risk by analyzing all of the literature correlation to side effects from ADT published between 1996 and mid-2008. They found 14 studies (8 bone-related, 6 heart-related) that were suitable for analysis......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

April 24, 2009, 4:59 AM CT

New mediator of smoking recruits

Freiburg, Gera number of Current research suggests that smoking increases the production of osteopontin in the lungs, which contributes to the development of smoking-related lung disease. The related report by Prasse et al, "Essential role of osteopontin in smoking-related interstitial lung diseases," appears in the May 2009 issue of The American Journal of Pathology

Nearly one billion people worldwide smoke tobacco products. Long-term exposure to compounds found in smoke can lead to both cardiovascular and lung disease. Eventhough lung exposure to cigarette smoke leads to immune cell recruitment and tissue fibrosis, how cigarette smoke causes these changes is largely unknown.

To determine if osteopontin, a molecule that attracts immune cells, mediates cell recruitment in smokers, Prasse et al compared osteopontin levels from smokers with different types of lung diseases, healthy smokers, and healthy non-smokers. They found high levels of osteopontin expression in patients with interstitial lung disease, whereas healthy smokers had lower levels, and healthy non-smokers produced no osteopontin. Osteopontin expression could be stimulated directly by nicotine therapy. In addition, expressing osteopontin in rat lung resulted in recruitment of immune cells, resulting in symptoms similar to smoking-related interstitial lung diseases. These results indicate that osteopontin appears to be pathogenic in smoking-initiated lung disease......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

Thu, 02 Apr 2009 03:54:18 GMT

Low-Sugar Vegetable Juice For Diabetics

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A low-calorie, low-sugar vegetable juice for diabetics have been developed by Chinese scientists. The said vegetable juice uses lactic acid-producing bacteria (LAB) - a known probiotics - to remove carbohydrates while retaining the juice's good taste, vitamins and other nutrients.

"The process significantly removes sugar but retains the nutritional content of the juice's raw materials," Xiuqi Liu, of Jilin University in Changchun, said in an American Chemical Society news release.

Liu and colleague Heqin Xing found that LAB-induced fermentation reduced sugar content in the vegetable juice by changing carbohydrates into lactic acid. The increased acidity of the juice inhibits the growth of other bacteria, which extends the shelf life of the juice.

The product will be in the market within a year. I'm sure more people, especially diabetics, are looking forward to it. I can't wait myself. Posted by: Gloria Gamat      Read more     Source

February 12, 2009, 6:04 AM CT

Metabolite culprit for aggressive prostate cancer?

Scientists from the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center have identified a panel of small molecules, or metabolites, that appear to indicate aggressive prostate cancer.

The finding could lead to a simple test that would help doctors determine which prostate cancers are slow-growing and which require immediate, aggressive therapy.

Results of the study appear in the Feb. 12 issue of Nature

"One of the biggest challenges we face in prostate cancer is determining if the cancer is aggressive. We end up overtreating our patients because physicians don't know which tumors will be slow-growing. With this research, we have identified a potential marker for the aggressive tumors," says senior study author Arul Chinnaiyan, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Michigan Center for Translational Pathology and S.P. Hicks Endowed Professor of Pathology at the U-M Medical School.

The scientists looked at 1,126 metabolites across 262 samples of tissue, blood or urine linked to non-malignant prostate tissue, early stage prostate cancer and advanced, or metastatic, prostate cancer. They mapped the alterations in metabolites and identified about 10 that were present more often in prostate cancer than in the non-malignant cells and were present most often in the advanced cancer samples......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

February 4, 2009, 6:15 AM CT

Those women who need radiation

One-fifth of women who should receive radiation after a mastectomy are not getting this potentially lifesaving therapy, as per a newly released study from scientists at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center.

The study looked at 396 women who were treated with a mastectomy for breast cancer. The scientists observed that 19 percent of women who fell clearly within guidelines recommending radiation therapy after the mastectomy did not receive that therapy.

Results of the study appear online in the journal Cancer and would be reported in the March 15 issue.

Post-mastectomy radiation is known to decrease the risk of cancer returning in the chest wall and has been shown to reduce mortality in high-risk patients, but there's been some debate within the cancer community about who is likely to benefit most. Current guidelines recommend radiation after mastectomy for women who had especially large tumors or cancer in four or more of their nearby lymph nodes. Even women with fewer positive lymph nodes should strongly consider radiation therapy.

"There's an identifiable high-risk group for whom there's absolutely no debate -- they need radiation after their mastectomy. Even in this group for whom it's crystal clear, we observed that only four-fifths were treated. That's not good enough. This is a potentially lifesaving therapy," says lead study author Reshma Jagsi, M.D., D.Phil., assistant professor of radiation oncology at the U-M Medical School......... Posted by: Jessica      Read more         Source

Thu, 29 Jan 2009 06:16:44 GMT

An introduction to genomics: New TED Talk

Barry Schuler talks about genomics in a new TED talk.

What is genomics? How will it affect our lives? In this intriguing primer on the genomics revolution, entrepreneur Barry Schuler says we can at least expect healthier, tastier food. He suggests we start with the pinot noir grape, to build better wines.

Posted by: Bertalan      Read more     Source