New medication treats drug-resistant prostate cancer in the laboratory
NCI Cancer Center News
(Posted: 06/18/2013) - A new drug called pyrvinium pamoate inhibits aggressive forms of prostate cancer that are resistant to standard drugs, according to a study conducted in an animal model by the City of Hope, Beckman Research Institute, in Duarte, Calif. The results were presented at The Endocrine Society's 95th Annual Meeting in San Francisco.

Observation is safe, cost-saving in low-risk prostate cancer
NCI Cancer Center News
(Posted: 06/18/2013) - Many men with low-risk, localized prostate cancers can safely choose active surveillance or “watchful waiting” instead of undergoing immediate treatment and have better quality of life while reducing health care costs, according to a study by researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Massachusetts General Hospital.

Reforms speed initiation of NCI-sponsored clinical trials
NCI News Note
(Posted: 06/17/2013) - The process of opening a cancer clinical trial for patient accrual often takes years, and research has shown that trials which are slow to register patients often fail to finish. Following a thorough review, NCI’s Operational Efficiency Working Group produced a series of recommendations that are now being implemented.

Diabetes drug points the way to overcoming drug resistance in melanoma
NCI Cancer Center News
(Posted: 06/17/2013) - Advanced metastatic melanoma is a disease that has proven difficult to eradicate. Despite the success of melanoma-targeting drugs, tumors inevitably become drug resistant and return, more aggressive than before. In the current issue of the journal Cancer Cell, researchers at The Wistar Institute describe how they increase the effectiveness of anti-melanoma drugs by combining anticancer therapies with diabetes drugs. Their studies, conducted in cell and animal models of melanoma, demonstrate that the combined therapy could destroy a subset of drug-resistant cells within a tumor.

NIH scientists find promising biomarker for predicting HPV-related oropharynx cancer
NCI Press Release
(Posted: 06/17/2013) - Researchers have found that antibodies against the human papillomavirus (HPV) may help identify individuals who are at greatly increased risk of HPV-related cancer of the oropharynx, which is a portion of the throat that contains the tonsils.

Genetic variations may help identify best candidates for preventive breast cancer drugs
NCI Cancer Center News
(Posted: 06/14/2013) - Newly discovered genetic variations may help predict breast cancer risk in women who receive preventive breast cancer therapy with the selective estrogen receptor modulator drugs tamoxifen and raloxifene, a Mayo Clinic-led study has found. The study is published in the journal Cancer Discovery.

Protein protects against breast cancer recurrence in animal model
NCI Cancer Center News
(Posted: 06/14/2013) - Precisely what causes breast cancer recurrence has been poorly understood. But now a piece of the puzzle has fallen into place: Researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania (home of the Abramson Cancer Center) have identified a key molecular player in recurrent breast cancer – a finding that suggests potential new therapeutic strategies. The study, performed in an animal model, implicates the tumor suppressor protein Par-4 in recurrent breast cancer.

Developmental protein plays role in spread of cancer
NCI Cancer Center News
(Posted: 06/14/2013) - A protein used by embryo cells during early development, and recently found in many different types of cancer, apparently serves as a switch regulating the spread of cancer, known as metastasis, report researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center in the June 15, 2013 issue of the journal Cancer Research.

Bladder cancer recurrence and mortality could improve with better treatment compliance
NCI Cancer Center News
(Posted: 06/12/2013) - Researchers at UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center have found that the burden of bladder cancer on the population is very high, and that more intense surveillance and treatment in the first two years after diagnosis could reduce the number of patients whose cancer returns after treatment and lower the death rate from this disease. The study was published online ahead of press in the journal Cancer.

Researchers discover how normal breast precursor cells may be genetically vulnerable to developing into cancer
NCI Cancer Center News
(Posted: 06/12/2013) - Researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine and its Melvin and Bren Simon Cancer Center, along with colleagues from the Terry Fox Laboratory, BC Cancer Agency in Vancouver, Canada, have discovered how normal breast precursor cells may be genetically vulnerable to developing into cancer. Their study identified a rare and critical subset of normal human breast cells, luminal progenitors, that possess extremely short chromosome ends known as telomeres. Telomeres are the very end regions of chromosomes that serve as protective caps to prevent DNA-damaging events such as fusion of the end of one chromosome with the end of another.