Patients with cancer of the larynx are likely to retain their voice and avoid surgery if they are treated simultaneously with chemotherapy and radiotherapy, say investigators who have conducted a nationwide study.
The findings are so significant they should become the new standard of care for stage III and IV laryngeal cancer, says one of the study’s lead investigators, Moshe Maor, M.D., professor of radiation oncology at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center.
Authors of a study published on THE LANCET’S website today (www.thelancet.com) highlight how statins (cholesterol-lowering drugs) could offer protection against cardiovascular disease for people who have undergone kidney transplantation.
Kidney-transplant patients are at an increased risk of premature cardiovascular disease; many transplant recipients have pre-existing cardiovascular disease at the time of transplantation and immunosuppressive therapy may aggravate existing risk factors or p
Research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis suggests that the accurate diagnosis of early stage endometrial cancer requires that the abdominal lymph nodes always be removed and checked for signs of cancer. The recommendation extends even to women with tumors that seem to have the smallest risk of spread. The study will be presented June 2 at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) meeting in Chicago, Ill.
The study indicates that by examining the lymph nodes i
What if there were a magical chamber that could divulge the secrets of anything that was placed inside of it? Pacific Northwest National Laboratory has developed such a chamber—and while it won’t divulge all secrets, it discloses key information about chemicals and compounds.
That information may be useful in addressing a wide range of issues that affect the environment and quality of life—everything from sick building syndrome and industrial emissions monitoring and control to sensor testi
The future of proteomics is in good hands with one of the most powerful and versatile mass spectrometers being developed by scientists and engineers from the William R. Wiley Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory.
The high-throughput Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance (FTICR) mass spectrometer and automated liquid chromatography (LC) system is a breakthrough in mass spectrometry capable of improving the understanding of protein production, function and interactions at the cellul
Explores abandoned mine
Carnegie Mellon University researchers, working with the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and the U.S. Department of Labor’s Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA), will demonstrate a prototype, autonomous wheeled robot today as it explores and maps a 3,500-foot corridor of an abandoned coal mine near New Eagle in southwestern Pennsylvania.
Named Groundhog, the robot was developed by students in the Robotics Institut
Scientists from the RIKEN Tsukuba Institute (Japan) have developed a valuable new experimental system for tissue-specific RNAi knockdown in mammalian cells and organisms – a discovery that will markedly advance the functional characterization of genes involved in development and disease.
Discovered in the late nineties, RNA intereference (RNAi) refers to the introduction of double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) into a cell, where it induces the degradation of complementary mRNA, and thereby suppresse
Most breast cancer patients with more than 10 nodes that are affected by the cancer have a poor prognosis, yet some survive long-term. Physicians now believe that certain genes in the breast cancer tissue, removed at diagnosis, can help them predict which patients will survive.
With this information, doctors can recommend the most appropriate therapy for an individual patient, for example sparing a woman with a poor prognosis the rigors that accompany aggressive chemotherapy, and enabling h
University of Pittsburgh researchers report results of first U.S. comparison study at the American Transplant Congress
A new organ preservation solution offers comparable results to a solution currently in widespread use but it is more cost-effective and has several logistical advantages that makes it more practical for keeping donated livers viable before being transplanted, conclude University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) researchers who performed the first U.S. study to comp
Discovery may help design effective therapies for the genetic disease that mainly affects Ashkenazi Jews
An interdisciplinary team of Weizmann Institute scientists has solved the three-dimensional structure of an enzyme called glucocerebrosidase. Mutations occurring in this enzyme cause Gaucher disease, a genetic illness that mainly affects Ashkenazi Jews. The Institute study, published recently in EMBO Reports, may lead to the design of effective new therapies for treating the disea
By combining genes from three separate organisms into a single bacterial factory, University of California, Berkeley, chemical engineers have developed a simpler, less expensive way to make an antimalaria “miracle” drug that is urgently needed in Third World countries.
The drug, artemisinin, is one of the most promising next-generation antimalarials because of its effectiveness against strains of the malaria parasite now resistant to front-line drugs. It is now too expensive for broad use i
Study results presented at the 39th annual meeting for the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) by Chandra P. Belani, M.D., professor of medicine, University of Pittsburgh and co-director, Lung Cancer Program, University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute (UPCI), demonstrate that a new therapeutic radiation strategy for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) – the most common form of the disease – leads to improved survival for lung cancer patients with locally advanced disease.
n the study
Researchers at the Breast Care Center at Baylor College of Medicine and The Methodist Hospital have developed a new test to predict which breast cancer tumors will respond to chemotherapy, potentially reducing unnecessary treatment for women with breast cancer, according to data presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting in Chicago.
Using novel DNA array technology, the study identified differences in the gene patterns from tumor samples that predict which patients
An experimental cancer drug named bevacizumab (trade name Avastin) is the first “anti-angiogenesis” drug to prove that it can shrink tumors and extend survival in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer, according to a national clinical trial led by researchers at the Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Bevacizumab is known as an anti-angiogenesis drug because it blocks the formation of blood vessels in tumors (a process called angiogenesis) and thus inhibits their growth.
Patien
Research led by scientists at the U of T and Caprion Pharmaceuticals have uncovered the basis for a diagnostic, immunotherapy and vaccine, providing a way to detect and treat the brain-wasting damage of infectious prions like those found in mad cow disease and its human version, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease.
Dr. Neil Cashman, a principal investigator at U of T’s Centre for Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases and professor in the Department of Medicine (neurology) and a Caprion founder,
As more is learned about how cancer develops, scientists have begun designing new drugs that directly target cancer cells, leaving healthy ones intact. Having fewer side effects, some of these drugs work by blocking growth signaling processes within cancer cells, while others enlist the body’s immune system to recognize and mount an attack against the cancer cell. But regardless of how they work, most of these drugs are designed to treat a specific cancer and cannot be used to treat other tumor type
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