cancer therapies

(University of Illinois at Chicago) Researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Pharmacy are collaborating with the Ohio State University and two otherorganizations to discover new cancer therapies derived from naturalsources such as pond scum and plants from tropical rainforests.

(Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres) The effective treatment of many forms of cancer continues to pose a major problem for medicine.

Many tumors fail to respond to standard forms of chemotherapy or become resistant to the medication. Scientists at the Helmholtz Center for Infection Research in Braunschweig, the Hannover Medical School and Leibniz-Universität in Hanover have now discovered a chemical mechanism with which a natural substance -- argyrin -- destroys tumors.

Today, the researchers publish their findings in the renowned scientific journal Cancer Cell.

(Society for Experimental Biology) Scientists from Aberdeen, Luxembourg and the South Pacific have studied the properties of natural products derived from animals found in Fijian waters, and shown that not only may certain compounds have potential use in anti-cancer therapies, but others may also be useful for improving drug delivery, currently one of the most significant problems faced by medical researchers.

(University of Rochester Medical Center) Pinpointing new targets for cancer treatments is as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack, yet a University of Rochester team has discovered an entire novel class of genes they believe will lead to a greater understanding of cancer cell function and the next generation of effective and less harmful therapies for patients.

(Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center) In a paradoxical discovery, a research team led by investigators at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center has found that a tumor suppressor protein known as PML appears to be the factor that enables leukemia initiating cells to maintain their quiescence -- the inert state that protects them from being destroyed by cancer therapies.

Certain biases may exist in observational studies that compare outcomes of different cancer therapies, making the results questionable.

That is the conclusion of a new study published in the June 1, 2008 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society.

As potential cancer therapies proliferate, researchers and clinicians are striving to measure their effectiveness and to more accurately predict which patients will receive the most benefit.

At the American Association for Cancer Research 2008 Annual Meeting, April 12-16, 2008, researchers present data on a new role for MRI in brain cancer, how doctors can more effectively measure response to commonly used cancer drugs, and a unique method for predicting the risk of breast cancer spread.

Two recent studies by researchers at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center provide a potential mechanism by which investigational anti-cancer compounds known as HDAC inhibitors specifically damage cancer cells as well as clues about possible adverse effects of these compounds -- findings with important implications for their clinical use as cancer therapies.

Cutting-edge breakthroughs in molecular targeting, translational cancer research and cancer prevention will take center stage when more than 17,000 scientists from around the world gather at the San Diego Convention Center, April 12-16, for the 2008 Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research.

Key data presented at the meeting will include late-breaking clinical trial findings related to high-profile, potentially life-saving cancer therapies in the pipeline.

This double issue of Cell Transplantation highlights the efforts of Japanese researchers who are working toward using stem cell transplantation to benefit those who suffer from diabetes, cancer, and other debilitating diseases.

The scientists are working toward three important goals: overcoming the shortage of human pancreatic islet tissue, building a bioartifical pancreas, and determining whether cancer stem cells in tumors can be targeted and destroyed in order to provide new, more effective cancer therapies.