Cancer News and Research

Latest Cancer News and Research

Designed drug for combined hormone and chemotherapy treatment

The search for new drugs to fight cancer remains at the top of the to do list for pharmaceutical researchers. A recent variation is polymer chemotherapy agents, drugs that have been attached to a "backbone" of long chain molecules.

9 Jun 2005

Lorus Therapeutics receives patent allowance to protect novel anticancer drug

Lorus Therapeutics today announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, GeneSense Technologies Inc. (GeneSense), has received notice from the European Patent Office of its intention to grant GeneSense's application for a patent of its novel antisense drug, GTI-2501.

9 Jun 2005

MabThera highly effective in treating rheumatoid arthritis

Results from the DANCER study presented today revealed that MabThera significantly improves symptoms in heavily treated patients who are affected by moderate-to-severe rheumatoid arthritis (RA), a painful and debilitating disease of the joints.

9 Jun 2005

Female gynecologists use more estrogen than the average woman

After studies appeared showing that treating menopausal complaints with estrogen entailed not wholly positive health effects, the prescription of such preparations declined.

9 Jun 2005

MicroRNAs play an important role in human cancer

Over the past few years, scientists have discovered that a new class of genetic regulators called "microRNAs" influences normal human growth and development. Now, researchers have found that microRNAs also play an important role in human cancer. The findings are published in today's issue of the journal Nature (June 9).

9 Jun 2005

New study shows tiny RNAs intimately associated with cancer

In discoveries that may open a new chapter in understanding and diagnosing cancer, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) investigators and their colleagues have established that tiny microRNAs provide a novel genetic route to the initiation of some forms of cancer.

9 Jun 2005

Rituximab provides new hope for people with lupus

Rheumatologists at the Annual European Congress of Rheumatology in Vienna, Austria heard today (Thursday 9 June) that rituximab is the first drug in a quarter of a century that is making a real impact, and an alternative to previous standard treatments of high-dose steroids, and chemotherapy.

9 Jun 2005

Density of breast tissue can directly influence tumour development

New research suggests that there is a direct relationship between the density of breast tissue, and the risk of developing tumours in dense areas of the breast.

8 Jun 2005

Researchers link aberrant 'microRNA' expression to human cancer

8 Jun 2005

New understanding of microRNAs

Ribonucleic acid, or RNA, has long been thought to be important only to translate a gene's DNA into the proteins that are cells' workhorses. But new evidence shows that tiny bits of RNA not used to make proteins actually play central roles in normal biology and in the development of cancers.

8 Jun 2005

Novel targets found for the development of drugs to complement, or replace, statins

A team of investigators from the Uppsala Branch of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research (LICR) and Harvard Medical School has uncovered novel targets for the development of drugs that would potentially complement, or replace, statins in treating heart disease.

8 Jun 2005

New device has the potential to significantly reduce sequencing of the human genome

The sequencing of the human genome was only the beginning of a much more complex task – deciphering the secrets of cellular chemistry and the mechanisms of disease. While the genome serves as a blueprint to understanding the body, proteins represent the materials that carry out these plans.

8 Jun 2005

Virulizin granted orphan drug status in Europe

Lorus Therapeutics has announced that the EMEA (European Medicines Agency) has given a positive opinion on Lorus' application for orphan drug status to Virulizin, the company's lead anticancer drug for the treatment of pancreatic cancer.

8 Jun 2005

Bone Care International issued new patent

Bone Care International has announced that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has issued to it U.S. Patent Number 6,903,083 entitled "Stabilized hydroxyvitamin D."

8 Jun 2005

Possible new treatment for chemobrain using the drug dexmethyphenidate (d-MPH)

Patients who take medication for cancer often find themselves with a new problem when their treatment ends.

8 Jun 2005

Omega-3 combined with propofol may lead to new drugs to treat breast cancer

Omega-3, the fatty acid found in oily fish, could be combined with a commonly used anesthetic to develop drugs to treat breast cancer, according to research published in the journal Breast Cancer Research.

8 Jun 2005

Baby born to woman following an ovary transplant from her sister

Doctors in St. Louis say a woman whose ovaries stopped working when she was a teenager, after an ovary transplant from her identical twin sister, has given birth to a baby girl.

8 Jun 2005

Breast cancer risk nothing like as bad as most women think

While no one would argue that breast cancer is a significant health threat, a new study has found that most women have an exaggerated view of their risk.

7 Jun 2005

Drinking alcohol may lower risk of developing non-Hodgkin's lymphoma

People who drink alcohol may have a lower risk of developing non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL) - a type of cancer that affects the lymphatic system, suggests a study published online by The Lancet Oncology.

6 Jun 2005

New series of human drug targets available to all researchers

The Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC), an Anglo-Canadian charitable consortium of public and private agencies including Oxford University, announced recently that it has delivered its first 50 human and malaria protein structures into the public domain on budget and two months ahead of schedule.

6 Jun 2005