Tag Archives: professor

Microchip reveals how tumor cells transition to invasion

Using a microengineered device that acts as an obstacle course for cells, researchers have shed new light on a cellular metamorphosis thought to play a role in tumor cell invasion throughout the body. The epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) is a process in which epithelial cells, which tend to stick together within a tissue, change into mesenchymal cells, which can disperse and migrate individually. EMT is a beneficial process in developing embryos, allowing cells to travel throughout the embryo and establish specialized tissues. But recently it has been suggested that EMT might also play a role in cancer metastasis, allowing cancer cells to escape from tumor masses and colonize distant organs…

New mouse model points to therapy for liver disease

Development of effective new therapies for preventing or treating NASH has been stymied by limited small animal models for the disease. In a paper published online in Cancer Cell, scientists at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine describe a novel mouse model that closely resembles human NASH and use it to demonstrate that interference with a key inflammatory protein inhibits both the development of NASH and its progression to liver cancer. “These findings strongly call for clinical testing of relevant drugs in human NASH and its complications,” said senior author Michael Karin, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Pharmacology in UC San Diego’s Laboratory of Gene Regulation and Signal Transduction. “Our research has shown that, at least in this mouse model, chemical compounds that include already clinically approved drugs that inhibit protein aggregation can also be used to prevent NASH caused by a high fat diet.” The increasing prevalence of NAFLD is linked to the nation’s on-going obesity epidemic. …

New ways to treat solid tumors using protein

As EphA3 is present in normal organs only during embryonic development but is expressed in blood cancers and in solid tumors, this antibody-based approach may be a suitable candidate treatment for solid tumors. The researchers from Monash University and Ludwig Cancer Research, in Australia, and KaloBios Pharmaceuticals, in the US, have had their findings published in the journal Cancer Research…

NSAIDs may lower breast cancer recurrence rate in overweight, obese women — ScienceDaily

“Our studies suggest that limiting inflammatory signaling may be an effective, less toxic approach to altering the cancer-promoting effects of obesity and improving patient response to hormone therapy,” said Linda A. deGraffenried, PhD, associate professor of nutritional sciences at The University of Texas in Austin. The study found that women whose body mass index (BMI) was greater than 30 and had estrogen receptor alpha (ERα)-positive breast cancer had a 52 percent lower rate of recurrence and a 28-month delay in time to recurrence if they were taking aspirin or other NSAIDs. “These results suggest that NSAIDs may improve response to hormone therapy, thereby allowing more women to remain on hormone therapy rather than needing to change to chemotherapy and deal with the associated side effects and complications,” said deGraffenried…

Researchers identify priority targets for immunotherapy in epithelial ovarian cancer

Epithelial ovarian cancer is the most lethal gynecologic cancer in women and has a relapse rate of 85%. “The MAGE family of proteins is part of a class of CTAs that may serve as a target for directed immunotherapy in ovarian cancer and other types of cancer,” said senior author Kunle Odunsi, MD, PhD, FRCOG, FACOG, M. Steven Piver Professor of Gynecologic Oncology and Executive Director of the Center for Immunotherapy at RPCI. “To achieve the important goal of tumor-directed immunity for ovarian cancer immunotherapy, it is critical to determine the extent to which this family of CTA molecules is expressed in these tumor cells.” Dr…

Calcium isotope analysis used to predict myeloma progression

The researchers tested a new approach to detecting bone loss in cancer patients by using calcium isotope analysis to predict whether myeloma patients are at risk for developing bone lesions, a hallmark of the disease. They believe they have a promising technique that could be used to chart the progression of multiple myeloma, a lethal disease that eventually impacts a patient’s bones. The method could help tailor therapies to protect bone better and also act as a way to monitor for possible disease progression or recurrence. “Multiple myeloma is a blood cancer that can cause painful and debilitating bone lesions,” said Gwyneth Gordon, an Associate Research Scientist in ASU’s School of Earth and Space Exploration, and co-lead author of the study…

New analysis reveals tumor weaknesses in epigenetics

Analyzing these modifications can provide important clues to the type of tumor a patient has, and how it will respond to different drugs. For example, patients with glioblastoma, a type of brain tumor, respond well to a certain class of drugs known as alkylating agents if the DNA-repair gene MGMT is silenced by epigenetic modification…