Cancer Frontline

Prostate Cancer Stem Cells Emerge from Low-PSA Cells

By Scott Merville on May 3, 2012 3:06 PM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)
While discussion continues over the value of screening healthy men for prostate cancer by testing for levels of prostate specific antigen (PSA) in their blood, scientists have found another use for PSA.

Prostate cancer cells that express low levels of the protein give rise to cancer stem cells that are both hard to kill with existing drugs and highly capable of generating cancer cells on a large scale.

A team of scientists led by MD Anderson's Dean Tang, Ph.D., professor in MD Anderson's Department of Molecular Carcinogenesis, reports its findings about low-PSA prostate cancer cells today in the May edition of Cell Stem Cell.

"Using a new technique, we were able for the first time to separate low-PSA and high-PSA prostate cancer cells, which led to the discovery of a low-PSA population of cancer stem cells that appears to be an important source of castration-resistant prostate cancer," says Tang.



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Runners, Walkers Join Research Journey for Ovarian Cancer Cures

By Scott Merville on May 1, 2012 8:03 AM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)
When 3,000 participants lineup Saturday for the 15th annual Sprint for Life 5K Run/Walk and Sprint for Sprouts Kids' Run they'll take thousands of strides to carry ovarian cancer research forward.

The race supports the Blanton-Davis Ovarian Cancer Research Program at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, which provides crucial funding for common resources, such as a tumor bank, and for grants to launch cutting-edge research ideas that need initial help to develop into full-blown projects.

On the video below, Blanton-Davis Ovarian Cancer Research Program Director Anil Sood, M.D., discusses one such project, which led to the discovery of an important connection between high blood platelet levels and the severity of ovarian cancer, that was supported by the program.


Continue reading Runners, Walkers Join Research Journey for Ovarian Cancer Cures .

Study Finds Pain Relief Treatment Slightly Improves Over 20 Years

By MD Anderson Staff Writer on April 23, 2012 5:39 PM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

By Laura Sussman

More than one third of patients with invasive cancer are undertreated for their pain, with minorities twice as likely to not receive appropriate medication, according to new MD Anderson-led research.  

The study published in Journal of Clinical Oncology, is the largest prospective evaluation of cancer pain and related symptoms ever conducted in an outpatient setting.

Almost 20 years ago, Charles Cleeland, Ph.D., professor and chair of the Department of Symptom Research at MD Anderson, published the first comprehensive study to look at the adequacy of pain management in cancer care.

"We've known for years that the undertreatment of pain is a significant public health problem in the cancer treatment process, and that minorities are at greatest risk for not receiving appropriate pain care," said Cleeland, the JCO's study's senior author. "This new research tells us that our progress has been limited, with only a 10 percent overall reduction in inadequacy of pain management from our findings almost two decades ago."

 

Read more about the study on chron.com, and watch lead author Michael Fisch, M.D., associate professor and chair of the Department of General Oncology, discuss the significance of the findings with ABC News.

 

Additional information

Paper in JCO

MD Anderson news release

Continue reading Study Finds Pain Relief Treatment Slightly Improves Over 20 Years.

Researchers Find Potential Drug for Preventing, Treating Radiation Sickness

By Scott Merville on April 12, 2012 11:25 AM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)
An antibody created at MD Anderson blocks the life-threatening gastrointestinal damage caused by high levels of radiation - so far in mice, but with potential for human use.

"If additional research confirms these findings, the antibody we call 2A2 could be deployed both for military and civilian use to prevent radiation sickness," says Wadih Arap, M.D., Ph.D., professor in MD Anderson's David H. Koch Center for Applied Research of Genitourinary Cancers.

Radiation gastrointestinal syndrome occurs after radiation exposure destroys specialized cells called crypt or villus units that generate the epithelial cells that line the GI tract.  With the protective lining compromised, patients suffer vomiting, diarrhea, dehydration, systemic infection and in extreme cases, septic shock and death.

Research by Richard Kolesnick, M.D., and colleagues at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York found that a protein called ceramide is a central player in this radiation-induced destruction. 

Irradiation causes ceramide, a lipid protein that triggers programmed cell death, to gather on the surface of blood vessels that serve the GI lining and order those cells to commit suicide, or apoptosis.

Arap and Renata Pasqualini, Ph.D., also professor in the Koch Center and colleagues tackled the problem of developing an antibody to block ceramide.
Continue reading Researchers Find Potential Drug for Preventing, Treating Radiation Sickness.

Guang Peng Wins Landon Foundation-AACR INNOVATOR Award

By Scott Merville on April 3, 2012 2:00 PM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)
Drpeng.jpgA creative plan to identify new drugs to prevent cancer has earned an MD Anderson scientist a prominent national award to support her research.

Guang Peng,  M.D., Ph.D., an assistant professor in the Department of Clinical Cancer Prevention, is the winner of the Fifth Annual Landon Foundation-AACR INNOVATOR Award for Cancer Prevention Research.

The American Association for Cancer Research will honor Peng and the Landon award winners for personalized cancer medicine and international collaboration at a reception and dinner tonight during the AACR's annual meeting in Chicago.

"Guang Peng is a superstar, a force to reckon with in cancer prevention," says Powel Brown, M.D., Ph.D., chair of the Department of Clinical Cancer Prevention.  "Her enthusiasm is boundless and infectious.  Most importantly, she's an outstanding basic scientist who is devoted to cancer prevention. 

"She brings a fresh approach and new creativity to the field," Brown said.  "It's a delight to work with her."

Continue reading Guang Peng Wins Landon Foundation-AACR INNOVATOR Award .

Evidence Backs BRAF Inhibitor, Immunotherapy for Advanced Melanoma

By MD Anderson Staff Writer on April 3, 2012 9:34 AM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)
By Leslie Loddeke, Publications Coordinator, Melanoma Medical Oncology Department

 drPatrick Hwu.jpgPatrick Hwu, M.D., head of MD Anderson's Department of Melanoma Medical Oncology,  presented evidence supporting the combination of BRAF inhibitors with immune therapy to treat advanced melanoma this morning at the 2012 American Association for Cancer Research annual meeting in Chicago.

Hwu chaired one of the meeting's three plenary sessions, titled "Immune Therapies: The Future Is Now."  He presented results of research conducted with Gregory Lizée, Ph.D., and Chengwen Liu, in his department.

Patients with advanced melanoma have a median survival of less than a year. Targeted therapy with BRAF inhibitors has shown promising response rates above 50 percent, but with less than 7-month median response duration, while immunotherapies such as interleukin-2 or anti-CTLA-4 can induce long-term survival in some, but have low response rates.

Continue reading Evidence Backs BRAF Inhibitor, Immunotherapy for Advanced Melanoma.

Breast Cancer Vaccine Activates Immune System in Clinical Trial

By Scott Merville on April 2, 2012 4:11 PM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)
mittendorf2.jpgA vaccine that targets the HER2 protein has triggered immune responses among patients in a phase II clinical trial to prevent recurrence of breast cancer.

Researchers  at the AACR Annual Meeting 2012 presented early evidence of response in the trial, which enrolls women who are at high risk of recurrence after initial treatment and will follow them for at least three years.

The vaccine, called AE37, is a synthetic hybrid of a peptide derived from the HER2 protein, which is the target of the successful drug Herceptin. Only about 20 percent of breast cancer patients have high levels of HER2 in their tumors that are required for Herceptin to work.

"AE37 is active against HER2 at even low levels of expression of this protein, extending the population eligible for treatment to 60% of breast cancer patients or more," said principal investigator Elizabeth Mittendorf, M.D., assistant professor in MD Anderson's Department of Surgical Oncology.
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Changes in 4 Proteins Could Guide New Approaches to Breast Cancer

By Scott Merville on March 31, 2012 11:59 PM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

Abnormal activation or production of four proteins involved in translation, the final step of creating other proteins, are associated with reduced survival among patients with hormone receptor-positive breast cancer.

Meric-Bernstam.jpg

Findings presented at the AACR Annual Meeting 2012 in Chicago, if validated in additional research, could lead to new prognostic indicators, new targets for drugs, and better selection of patients for existing therapies.

All of the aberrantly activated translational proteins are regulated by the PI3K/mTOR molecular signaling pathway, which has been implicated in development and progression of various cancers and in resistance to standard endocrine therapy in estrogen-receptor positive breast cancer.

"These data underline the importance of the PI3K/mTOR pathway in hormone receptor-positive breast cancer," says Funda Meric-Bernstam, M.D., professor in MD Anderson's Department of Surgical Oncology and medical director of the Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Institute for Personalized Cancer Therapy.

Continue reading Changes in 4 Proteins Could Guide New Approaches to Breast Cancer.

Teaming Up Two Drugs Helps Ewing's Sarcoma Patients

By Scott Merville on March 31, 2012 12:05 PM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

Naing.jpg A combination of two targeted therapies reduces tumors in treatment-resistant Ewing's sarcoma, a bone cancer that mainly strikes children, adolescents and young adults.

Results of the phase I  clinical trial of the paired drugs were announced today at a news briefing at the AACR Annual Meeting 2012 by Aung Naing, M.D., assistant professor in MD Anderson's Department of Investigational Cancer Therapeutics. He presents the study Monday during the meeting's session on late-breaking clinical trials.

"These patients had been heavily, heavily pre-treated and are quite resistant to most other treatments," Naing said. "So we are encouraged that 5 of 17 patients with Ewing's sarcoma, about 29 percent, responded to the treatment, with two achieving complete responses."

One complete response lasted 27 months. Two of three patients with desmoplastic small-round-cell tumors also responded.                                                    

Researchers used a combination of cixutumumab, a human IgG1 monoclonal antibody that targets insulin growth factor receptor 1 (IGF-1R), and temsirolimus, an agent that inhibits mTOR, the mammalian target of rapamycin.

Continue reading Teaming Up Two Drugs Helps Ewing's Sarcoma Patients.

AACR Awards Pasqualini Caring for Carcinoid Grant at Annual Meeting

By Scott Merville on March 30, 2012 12:42 PM | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)
renataPasqualini.jpgAn innovative approach to targeting the blood vessels that support neuroendocrine tumors of the pancreas has earned the support of a major grant in the field.

The American Association for Cancer Research will award Renata Pasqualini, Ph.D., MD Anderson's David H. Koch Center for Applied Research of Genitourinary Cancers with the 2012 Caring for Carcinoid Foundation-AACR Grant for Carcinoid Tumor and Pancreatic Neuroendocrine Tumor Research.

The grant will be given during a reception Tuesday, April 3 at the AACR Annual Meeting 2012 in Chicago.

Created in partnership between AACR and the Caring for Carcinoid Foundation, the two-year grant of $250,000 ($125,000 per year) supports investigators as they develop and study new ideas and innovative approaches that have direct application and relevance to carcinoid tumors or pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors.
Continue reading AACR Awards Pasqualini Caring for Carcinoid Grant at Annual Meeting.

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