Tag Archives: breast cancer

Breakthrough Technique Images Breast Tumors in 3-D with Great Clarity, Reduced Radiation

By Guest PostOctober 23, 2012Health, Science3d picture, alberto mittone, aniko sztrokay, blind evaluation, bone, breakthrough, breast cancer, breast tissue, computing algorithm, ct scanner, digital, dual view, equally sloped tomography, est, european, european colleague, france, Germany, image, jianwei miao, ludwig maximilians university, mammogram, mammography, maximilian reiser, oscillation, paola coan, patient, paul claude diemoz, radiation, radiation facility, researcher, scientist, screening, sergei gasilov, susanne liebhardt, synchrotron, technique, three-dimensional, tomography, tumor, ucla, united states, xray, yunzhe zhao, zhifeng huang

Like cleaning the lenses of a foggy pair of glasses, scientists are now able to use a technique developed by UCLA researchers and their European colleagues to produce three-dimensional images of breast tissue that are two to three times sharper than those made using current CT scanners at hospitals. The technique also uses a lower dose of X-ray radiation than a mammogram.

These higher-quality images could allow breast tumors to be detected earlier and with much greater accuracy. One in eight women in the United States will be diagnosed with breast cancer during her lifetime.

The research is published the week of Oct. 22 in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (more…)

New Insights into How Genetic Differences among Individuals Influence Breast Cancer Risk from Low-Dose Radiation

By Guest PostOctober 17, 2012Health, Scienceandy wyrobek, antoine snijders, berkeley lab, breast cancer, cancer risk, cellular, cellular proliferation, chemical therapy, ct scan, department, dna repair, energy, gene, genetic makeup, gland cancer, immune response, ionizing radiation, joe gray, low dose, mammary tissue, mechanism, mice, non radiation, radiotherapy, resistance, risk, scientist, strain, survival outcome, therapy, tissue mechanism, tissue stress, woman

Berkeley Lab research could lead to new ways to ID women who have higher risk of breast cancer from low-dose radiation

Scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have identified tissue mechanisms that may influence a woman’s susceptibility or resistance to breast cancer after exposure to low-dose ionizing radiation, such as the levels used in full-body CT scans and radiotherapy.

The research could lead to new ways to identify women who have higher or lower risks of breast cancer from low-dose radiation. Such a predictive tool could help guide the treatment of cancer patients who may be better served by non-radiation therapies. (more…)

Protein Linked to Therapy Resistance in Breast Cancer

By Guest PostSeptember 17, 2012Health, Science3d, assay, berkeley lab, breast cancer, cancer drug, cancer therapy, egfr tkis, fam83a, family, gene, malignant phenotype, marc lenburg, mina bissell, molecular alteration, oncogenes, paraic kenny, phenotypic reversion, phosphorylation, protein, ren xu, roland meier, saori furuta, sun young lee, tumors

Berkeley Lab Researchers Identify Possible New Oncogene and Future Therapy Target

A gene that may possibly belong to an entire new family of oncogenes has been linked by researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) with breast cancer resistance to a well-regarded and widely used cancer therapy.

One of the world’s leading breast cancer researchers, Mina Bissell, Distinguished Scientist with Berkeley Lab’s Life Sciences Division, led a study in which a protein known as FAM83A was linked to resistance to the cancer drugs known as EGFR-TKIs (Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor-Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitors). Not only may this discovery explain the clinical correlation between a high expression of FAM83A and a poor prognosis for breast cancer patients, it may also provide a new target for future therapies. (more…)

Researchers Find Potential Cancer Roadblock

By Guest PostAugust 2, 2012Health, Sciencebrain, breast cancer, cancer roadblock, cell, cell migration, cep 1347, cephalon, drug, invasion, jian chen, kathy gallo, liver, lungs, metastasizes, michigan state university, mixed lineage kinase, mlk inhibitor, mlk3, mlk3 pathway, phosphates, protein

EAST LANSING, Mich. — By identifying a key protein that tells certain breast cancer cells when and how to move, researchers at Michigan State University hope to better understand the process by which breast cancer spreads, or metastasizes.

When breast cancer metastasizes, cancer cells break away from a primary tumor and move to other organs in the body, including the lungs, liver and brain. In work published recently in the journal Cancer Research, MSU researchers Kathy Gallo and Jian Chen show a protein called MLK3 (mixed lineage kinase 3) is a critical driver of breast cancer cell migration and invasion. (more…)

Study: Heart Damage after Chemo Linked to Stress in Cardiac Cells

By Guest PostMay 22, 2012Healthblocking, breast cancer, cancer cell, cardiac damage, cardiomyocytes, cellular level, chemotherapy, doxorubicin, drug, gene, govindasamy ilangovan, heart, heart muscle cells, heat shock factor 1, hsf 1, karthikeyan krishnamurthy, kaushik vedam, mdr1, multidrug resistance 1, nf kb, ohio state university, protein, ragu kanagasabai

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Blocking a protein in the heart that is produced under stressful conditions could be a strategy to prevent cardiac damage that results from chemotherapy, a new study suggests.

Previous research has suggested that up to a quarter of patients who receive the common chemotherapy drug doxorubicin are at risk of developing heart failure later in life. Exactly how that heart damage is done remains unclear.

In this study, scientists identified a protein called heat shock factor-1 (HSF-1) as a likely source of chemotherapy-related heart damage in mice and cell cultures. Heat shock factor-1 is known to be induced by stress – in this case, the chemotherapy treatment itself. (more…)

New Findings in Breast Cancer

By Guest PostApril 20, 2012Health, Sciencebasal like cell, berkeley lab, breast cancer, breast tumor, gcnt1, glycans, glycoprotein gene, invasive tumor, jiyoung kim, lobules, luminal cells, malignant, milk ducts, milk mucin, mina bissell, mm, mm glycan, new findings, ole william petersen, petersen bissell collaboration, protein cd271, rene villadsen, stem cell, sugar molecule, tumorigenic, university of copenhagen

Results from Berkeley Lab and University of Copenhagen Collaboration Contradict Current Views on Cancer Stem Cells

New findings in breast cancer research by an international team of scientists contradict the prevailing belief that only basal-like cells with stem cell qualities can form invasive tumors. Research led by Ole William Petersen at the University of Copenhagen (CU) and Mina Bissell of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and has shown that luminal-like cells with no detectable stem cell qualities can generate larger tumors than their basal-like counterparts. This may hold important implications for the diagnosis and the treatment of breast cancer as well as future personalized cancer medicine.

“It is fashionable to think of breast cancer as a disease that can be treated if cancer stem cells are killed off, but we are reporting a sub-population of cancer cells that have no obvious stem cell properties and yet can be tumorigenic and highly aggressive,” Bissell says. “The existence of these additional sub-populations of tumorigenic cells tells us that the entire tumor needs to be eradicated, not just one sub-population of basal-like cells.” (more…)

Stress About Wife’s Breast Cancer Can Harm A Man’s Health

By Guest PostApril 18, 2012Healthbreast cancer, cancer diagnosis, caroline dorfman, coughing, disease, gastrointestinal problems, hae chung yang, headaches, Health, immune dysregulation, kristen carpenter, laura simonelli, men, nausea, negative effect, ohio state, ohio state university, physical symptom, sharla wells di gregorio, stress assessment, stress symptom, symptom, treatment, weaker immune, william carson, wive

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Caring for a wife with breast cancer can have a measurable negative effect on men’s health, even years after the cancer diagnosis and completion of treatment, according to recent research.

Men who reported the highest levels of stress in relation to their wives’ cancer were at the highest risk for physical symptoms and weaker immune responses, the study showed. (more…)

Protein ‘Jailbreak’ Helps Cancer Cells Live

By Guest PostMarch 28, 2012Scienceacetylation, breast cancer, brown university, cancer cell, cbp, cell, crm1, hasbro childrens hospital, hdac6, jailbreak, matthew riolo, michael holloway, nucleus, proteins survivin, rachel altura, survivin, yan cheng, zachary cooper

Researchers at Brown University and Hasbro Children’s Hospital have traced the molecular interactions that allow the protein survivin to escape the nucleus of a breast cancer cell and prolong the cell’s life. The study may help in the development of better therapies and prognostics.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — If the fight against breast cancer were a criminal investigation, then the proteins survivin, HDAC6, CBP, and CRM1 would be among the shadier figures. In that vein, a study to be published in the March 30 Journal of Biological Chemistry is the police report that reveals a key moment for keeping cancer cells alive: survivin’s jailbreak from the nucleus, aided and abetted by the other proteins. The research highlights that a protein’s location in a cell affects its impact on disease, and offers clear new leads for the investigation. (more…)