Cancer News and Discussions

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Time_Traveller
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Researchers develop world's first blood test for real-time monitoring of cancer treatment success (w/video)
Jun 07, 2021

Cancer patients who are undergoing targeted therapy can look forward to a new blood test that could tell their doctors whether the treatment is working, within one day after the start of the treatment. This will significantly speed up the evaluation process and enable doctors to make adjustments to the treatment plan, if necessary, to improve patients’ chances of recovery.

Unlike conventional chemotherapies that interfere with all rapidly dividing cells and can cause widespread damage to cells, targeted medicines attack specific molecules that instruct cancer cells to grow and spread and in turn, block the abnormal growth of the cancer. Despite the specific nature of targeted drugs, current clinical evaluation of their treatment in solid tumours primarily relies on either tumour volumetric imaging, which is insensitive and delayed, or invasive tissue biopsies.

Assistant Professor Shao Huilin and her research team from the Department of Biomedical Engineering and Institute for Health Innovation & Technology (iHealthtech) at the National University of Singapore (NUS) have developed a technology that is accurate, less invasive and significantly brings forward the evaluation window, by using liquid biopsies.
https://www.nanowerk.com/nanotechnology ... =58172.php
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Prostate cancer: Thousands of men to benefit from new drug approved for use on NHS

Tuesday 8 June 2021

Thousands of men are set to benefit from a new prostate cancer drug which has been approved for use on the NHS.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) has recommended enzalutamide as an option for treating some types of the disease.

[...]

Angela Culhane, chief executive at Prostate Cancer UK, said: "This is fantastic news for thousands of men with advanced prostate cancer, especially those who have additional illnesses that make them unsuitable for chemotherapy.

"It finally guarantees them access to a treatment which is just as effective as chemotherapy and can give them back precious time with their families."

There are an estimated 8,500 men who will be able to access the drug, which works by blocking the effect of the hormone testosterone on prostate cancer cells.

https://news.sky.com/story/prostate-can ... s-12327450
weatheriscool
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Using light to monitor cancer
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-06-cancer.html
by Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne
Researchers at EPFL have developed a technology based on nanophotonics and data science to detect and monitor cancer biomarkers at an early stage. Their research is published in Nature Communications.

Medical doctors examine body fluids of their patients, such as blood, urine, saliva, or nasal swabs, for diagnostics. This is because substances in such biofluids may provide vital information about one's health state. Biosensors are emerging devices capable of analyzing such biosamples and look for substances indicative of disease. COVID-19 tests are the most current examples of biosensors. From body fluids, they can detect various substances such as the biomolecules on the surface of the virus (proteins), viral genetic material (RNA/DNA), or even the body's immune response to the virus (antibodies). These biological substances, which may mark the presence of a disease, are called biomarkers.
weatheriscool
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'Tiny first responders' use powers for good against skin cancer
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-06- ... ancer.html
by University of Queensland
Researchers investigating a group of microscopic cells have discovered they can put the brakes on the rapid development of melanoma lesions.

A team at the University of Queensland and collaborators from WEHI and Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre have taken a close look at the Group 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2) which are crucial for initiating and orchestrating immune responses.

UQ Diamantina Institute's Professor Gabrielle Belz said their aim was to understand more about the function of these relatively recently identified cells, and their roles in melanoma.

"We wanted to investigate how ILC2 contribute to melanoma formation, because we already knew these cells harbored functions that could either suppress or stimulate production of cancerous tumors," Professor Belz said.
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Yuli Ban
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We might genuinely be within five to ten years of conquering cancer. And not even in the Newsweek "Cancer cure found?!" clickbait (page bait?) sense.

Of course cancer is still a bit too horrible of a monster sometimes. That 30-day timeline to create an mRNA treatment to tackle it? For something like lung cancer or melanoma, that would be just fine. But for something like pancreatic cancer, it might not do any good. I've heard cases where a person is diagnosed with pancreatic cancer on day 1 and is dead by day 14. So things would have to be seriously scaled up. Like "treatment ready in 48 hours" fast.
And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future
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First Multi-Cancer Blood Test Available Now

June 15, 2021

Medicine has made great strides in fighting cancer, but it remains one of the most lethal diseases in the world. Even when therapy is successful, cancer can have a devastating effect on the patient’s quality of life and remaining lifespan. While many novel therapeutical approaches are being explored, including immunotherapy, the next major success could lie in better diagnostics.

Cancer is much more treatable at early stages (the average 5-year survival rate is 91% for early-stage cancer and only 26% for late-stage cancer) [1] but also much harder to detect. Only a handful of cancers have an approved early detection method, which can be invasive or uncomfortable, such as colonoscopy. This makes people apprehensive about taking the test and results in fewer early detections. One of the rare exceptions is prostate cancer, which can be detected by the PSA (prostate-specific antigen) blood marker, but this does not change the overall picture: most cancer types currently lack a recommended early screening option, invasive or otherwise.

A multi-cancer blood test addresses two major problems. First, it is no more invasive than a regular blood test, so people have fewer reasons to avoid it. Second, a single test can detect dozens of types of cancer, rather than one specific type.

GRAIL’s test, Galleri, is based on analyzing the methylation patterns of circulating cell-free DNA (cfDNA), which consists of degraded DNA molecules.

Read more: https://www.lifespan.io/news/first-mult ... lable-now/
weatheriscool
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New drugs may kill and limit reproduction of bowel cancer cells

by Hudson Institute of Medical Research
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-06- ... ancer.html
Drugs that are being trialed to treat leukemia could also be used to fight bowel cancer after a breakthrough by Hudson Institute of Medical Research scientists.

In a world-first, researchers found that the drugs could potentially be used to fight bowel cancer, using Nobel Prize-winning genetic screening technology CRISPR.

The researchers were using CRISPR to identify new targets for bowel cancer tumors when they realized that the gene KMT2A—usually associated with Acute Myeloid Leukemia—promotes bowel cancer. It does this by fuelling uncontrolled growth of the tumor, and encouraging the cancer cells ability to 'self-renew," preventing the tumor from regression or differentiation.

They then trialed two agents that inhibit KMT2A and found that these block bowel cancer growth and self-renewal, with very little damage to normal cells. These inhibitors are very similar to others which are currently in clinical trials to treat leukemia.
weatheriscool
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Immunosuppression drug could reduce chemotherapy resistance
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-06- ... tance.html
by Will Doss, Northwestern University

A drug currently used to prevent organ rejection in transplants could also reduce chemotherapy resistance in glioblastoma, according to a Northwestern Medicine study published in Brain.

The drug prevents glioblastoma cells from using molecular plasticity to circumvent chemotherapy, and Northwestern Medicine investigators are currently working to translate these findings to the clinic, according to Atique Ahmed, Ph.D., associate professor of Neurological Surgery and senior author of the study.

"These cancer cells are very adaptable, and this is one reason why they resist our current therapies," said Ahmed. "Because we are repurposing an already approved drug, this could speed up the clinical testing."
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Yuli Ban
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Messenger RNA Vaccines: Beckoning of a New Era in Cancer Immunotherapy
Messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines are a relatively new class of vaccines. They combine the potential of mRNA to encode for almost any protein with an excellent safety profile and a flexible production process. During the last decade, the mRNA vaccine approach has been increasingly recognized and viewed as a versatile tool for the development of new innovative therapeutics not only in infectious disease settings but also in cancer. mRNA vaccines traditionally consist of a messenger RNA synthesized by in vitro transcription using a bacteriophage RNA polymerase and a template DNA that encodes the antigen(s) of interest. Once administered and internalized by host cells, the mRNA transcripts are translated directly in the cytoplasm of the cell. The resulting antigens are presented to the immune system cells to stimulate an immune response. Dendritic cells (DCs) can be utilized as a carrier by delivering tumor-associated antigen mRNAs or total tumor RNA to their cytoplasm; then, the mRNA-loaded DCs can be delivered to the host to elicit a specific immune response. Recently, 2 mRNA vaccines were approved for the first time for human use—to prevent COVID-19 infection—bringing excitement for the future possibilities of this approach for cancer immunotherapy as well as for preventing other infectious diseases.
And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future
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Yuli Ban
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Breakthrough mRNA vaccine developed for cancer immunotherapy by Chinese scientists
Research involving messenger RNA (mRNA) has accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic, and scientists are now reporting a new vaccine for cancer immunotherapy.

Similar to COVID-19 vaccines, Chinese scientists have developed a new mRNA vaccine that activates the immune system to attack a protein made by tumour cells instead of the protein produced by the coronavirus.

Crucially, this mRNA is contained in a breakthrough hydrogel developed by the team from the Chinese National Centre for Nanoscience and Technology, that, when injected into mice with melanoma, slowly released the RNA which successfully caused tumours to shrink and prevented them from metastasising.

And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future
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