Tag Archives: king

Chromosomal abnormalities may explain increased cancer risk in type 2 diabetes

Their work was published on July 14, 2013 on the Nature Genetics website. There are more than 200 million diabetics worldwide, and one in three suffer from vascular or nerve complications. In 2012, two studies published in Nature Genetics showed that large chromosomal clonal mosaic events (CMEs)(2) affecting large portions of chromosomes (or even their totality), could be observed in the DNA of blood or saliva cells from some ageing individuals. These studies also suggested that CMEs could predict the risk of cancer, and notably leukemia, in these individuals. …

Tide is turning in skin cancer battle

Now it seems each week yields important new discoveries about the deadly skin cancer. "I’ve been doing this for 30 years, and now is by any measure the most exciting time for melanoma research," said Brian Nickoloff, director of the Nicholas V. Perricone, M.D., Division of Dermatology and Cutaneous Sciences at Michigan State University’s College of Human Medicine. …

Ground-breaking new method of ‘starving’ cancer cells

Chris Proud, Professor of Cellular Regulation in Biological Sciences at the University of Southampton says: "Cancer cells grow and divide much more rapidly than normal cells, meaning they have a much higher demand for and are often starved of, nutrients and oxygen. We have discovered that a cellular component, eEF2K, plays a critical role in allowing cancer cells to survive nutrient starvation, whilst normal, healthy cells do not usually require eEF2K in order to survive. Therefore, by blocking the function of eEF2K, we should be able to kill cancer cells, without harming normal, healthy cells in the process." Almost all cells in the human body contain the same basic components, meaning that to attack one of them in a cancer cell, that component will also be affected in normal cells…

People with Alzheimer’s disease may have lower risk of cancer and vice versa

"Since the number of cases of both Alzheimer’s disease and cancer increase exponentially as people age, understanding the mechanisms behind this relationship may help us better develop new treatments for both diseases," said study author Massimo Musicco, MD, of the National Research Council of Italy in Milan. The study involved 204,468 people age 60 and older in northern Italy during a six-year period…

Protein targeted for cancer drug development is essential for normal heart function

The protein, MCL1, is currently the focus of widespread cancer drug development efforts. MCL1 is best known as an inhibitor of death via the cell’s suicide pathway in a process called apoptosis. The protein is elevated in a variety of cancers, and a number of MCL1 inhibitors are in the cancer drug development pipeline worldwide. The protein has also been linked to drug resistance in cancer patients. …

Suspicions confirmed: Brain tumors in children have a common cause

The findings are published in the latest issue of the journal Nature Genetics. Brain cancer is the primary cause of cancer mortality in children. Even in cases when the cancer is cured, young patients suffer from the stress of a treatment that can be harmful to the developing brain. In a search for new target structures that would create more gentle treatments, cancer researchers are systematically analyzing all alterations in the genetic material of these tumors…

‘Scent device’ could help detect bladder cancer

There are currently no reliable biomarkers to screen patients for bladder cancer in the same way that there are for breast and cervical cancers. Previous research has suggested that a particular odour in the urine could be detected by dogs trained to recognise the scent, indicating that methods of diagnoses could be based on the smell of certain gases. The team have now built a device, called ODOREADER ® that contains a sensor which responds to chemicals in gas emitted from urine…