Tag Archives: development

Natural killer cells battle pediatric leukemia

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the most common cancer of childhood. This disease hinders the development of healthy blood cells while cancer cells proliferate. Currently, children with ALL receive chemotherapy for two to three years, exposing them to significant side effects including changes in normal development and future fertility. As a way to avoid these adverse effects, investigators have been researching how to supercharge the body’s innate cancer-fighting ability — a technique called immunotherapy…

Natural (born) killer cells battle pediatric leukemia

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the most common cancer of childhood. This disease hinders the development of healthy blood cells while cancer cells proliferate. Currently, children with ALL receive chemotherapy for two to three years, exposing them to significant side effects including changes in normal development and future fertility. …

Researchers identify a mechanism that stops progression of abnormal cells into cancer

Although the link between abnormal cells and tumor suppressor pathways — like that mediated by the well known p53 gene — has been firmly established, the critical steps in between are not well understood. According to the authors, whose work appears in Cell, this work completes at least one of the missing links. Normal human cells contain 23 pairs of chromosomes, but this number doubles to 46 pairs as a cell prepares to divide…

How breast cancer usurps powers of mammary stem cells — ScienceDaily

Writing in the August 11, 2014 issue of Developmental Cell, David A. Cheresh, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Pathology and vice-chair for research and development, Jay Desgrosellier, PhD, assistant professor of pathology and colleagues specifically identified a key molecular pathway associated with aggressive breast cancers that is also required for mammary stem cells to promote lactation development during pregnancy. “By understanding a fundamental mechanism of mammary gland development during pregnancy, we have gained a rare insight into how aggressive breast cancer might be treated,” said Cheresh. …

Scientists unlock key to blood vessel formation

Professor David Beech, of the School of Medicine at the University of Leeds, who led the research, said: “Blood vessel networks are not already pre-constructed but emerge rather like a river system. Vessels do not develop until the blood is already flowing and they are created in response to the amount of flow. This gene, Piezo1, provides the instructions for sensors that tell the body that blood is flowing correctly and gives the signal to form new vessel structures. …

Gene likely to promote childhood cancers pinpointed by researchers

“We and others have found that Lin28b — a gene that is normally turned on in fetal but not adult tissues — is expressed in several childhood cancers, including neuroblastoma, Wilms’ tumor and hepatoblastoma, a type of cancer that accounts for nearly 80 percent of all liver tumors in children,” said Dr. Hao Zhu, a principal investigator at CRI, and Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and Internal Medicine at UT Southwestern Medical Center. “In our study, we found that overproduction of Lin28b specifically causes hepatoblastoma, while blocking Lin28b impairs the cancer’s growth…

Breakthroughs made in ovarian cancer research

There are three predominant cancers that affect women — breast, ovarian and womb cancer. Of the three, ovarian cancer is of the greatest concern as it is usually diagnosed only at an advanced stage due to the absence of clear early warning symptoms. Successful treatment is difficult at this late stage, resulting in high mortality rates. Ovarian cancer has increased in prevalence in Singapore as well as other developed countries recently…

Study shines new light on genetic alterations of aggressive breast cancer subtype

The study, led by Dr. Xiaosong Wang, assistant professor of medicine — hematology and oncology and of molecular and cellular biology at Baylor, published today in Nature Communications and focused on the more aggressive molecular subtype of the estrogen-receptor positive breast cancer known as luminal B breast cancer. “While expressing the estrogen receptor, the luminal B breast cancers usually have higher tumor grade, larger tumor size, and poor prognosis, with most cases difficult to treat by endocrine therapy,” said Wang, the lead and corresponding author on the report. “We wanted to gain a deeper understanding about the genetic alterations underlying this particular form of breast cancer, because we do not know about what malfunctions potentially cause this form to be more aggressive.” In the study, Wang and colleagues identified a particular gene fusion on the estrogen receptor itself (hybrid gene formed from two previously separate genes) that was preferentially present in a subset of samples of tumors that were luminal B and ER-positive. …