(Press-News.org) JUNE 2025 TIP SHEET
Alcohol & Cancer
Sobering Truth: Alcohol-Fueled Cancer Deaths Rising Across U.S. (Video Available)
Sylvester researchers have become the first to look at trends in alcohol-linked cancer mortality across the U.S. Their findings, presented last month at ASCO 2025, found that alcohol-related cancer deaths nationwide nearly doubled between 1990 and 2021. Moreover, the highest burden fell on men over 55, whose alcohol-linked cancer mortality rose by more than 1% a year between 2007 and 2021. “That’s a big and concerning rise,” said Chinmay Jani, M.D., Sylvester hematology and oncology fellow, who led the study and presented the results.
New Alcohol Consumption Guidelines Anticipated from HHS and USDA
As the alcohol industry is coming under increasing scrutiny regarding the elevated health risks that alcohol consumption presents, updated guidelines are expected soon from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. According to this Reuters article, the long-standing recommendation of no more than one drink per day for women or two drinks per day for men may be replaced in the new guidelines with other, less specific language. According to Tracy Crane, Ph.D., RDN, director of lifestyle medicine, digital health and cancer prevention at Sylvester, many people are surprised to learn that drinking any amount of alcohol is associated with an increased risk of developing several types of cancer. However, research suggests that alcohol consumption is one cancer risk factor – along with diet, exercise and other lifestyle modifications – that we can modify.
Blood Cancer
New Standard Emerges for Treating Multiple Myeloma (Video Available)
A new, four-drug combination is both highly effective and safe in treating patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma, according to findings from the Sylvester-led ADVANCE clinical trial presented recently at ASCO 2025. The trial tested adding the drug daratumumab to the standard three-part regimen called KRd. “This study shows that daratumumab added to KRd is a new standard of care for those patients who had previously been candidates for just KRd,” said C. Ola Landgren, MD, PhD, director, Sylvester Myeloma Institute and lead study author.
Brain Cancer
Brain Cancer Patients Find Hope With New Drug
A new drug tested as part of an international clinical trial conducted at Sylvester and collaborating organizations is offering hope for patients with low-grade gliomas. The drug, vorasidenib, was given to patients whose brain tumors showed mutations with the IDH1 or IDH2 genes. About 80% of patients with grade 2 gliomas have these mutations. “The results of this clinical trial are changing the way we treat gliomas,” explained Macarena de la Fuente, M.D., chief of neuro-oncology and co-director of the Sylvester Brain Tumor Institute. “My colleagues in the field and I are very excited about this development.”
Prostate Cancer
Using Years of Clinical Data to Improve Prostate Cancer Treatment
Patients with immediate- to high-risk prostate cancer face significant risks after completing treatment, including relapse and a myriad of side effects from hormone therapy. That’s prompted Sylvester researchers to use years of clinical data to create a new approach that could reshape future treatment. Their work, funded by a $2.6 million, five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health, seeks to develop and test a model using MRI techniques and liquid biopsy markers to guide treatment decisions.
Sylvester Researcher Receives Endowed Chair For Work Tackling Prostate Cancer
Kerry Burnstein, PhD, renowned researcher, educator and mentor who serves as an esteemed member of Sylvester Cancer, has been honored with the prestigious J. Enloe Dodson Chair in Cancer Research. Burnstein’s endowed chair will provide funding to advance her research in androgen receptor signaling and experimental therapeutics to battle a lethal and incurable stage of the disease known as castration-resistant prostate cancer.
Colorectal Cancer
Gene Hunt Leads to Potential Colorectal Cancer Treatment, Research Award
Sylvester physician-scientist Justin Taylor, M.D., has released a preclinical study highlighting a possible new way to treat colorectal cancer and, in doing so, has secured a prestigious Stanley J. Glaser Foundation Research Award to continue his work. Taylor’s study, which appeared online first in Cancer Research, showed that the XPO1-targeting drug selinexor shrank tumors in preclinical models when used with the chemotherapy drug irinotecan, a current colorectal cancer therapy.
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The Center for Space Exploration Research at the University of California, Davis, has partnered with Proteus Space to launch a US government-sponsored satellite into space with a custom AI-enabled payload in a brand-new, first-ever rapid design-to-deployment small satellite.
The team will launch the satellite and payload in October 2025 from Vanderberg, CA. From the time the project was fully approved, the design and launch will occur within an unprecedented 13 months. (The normal pace for small satellites is often measured in years.)
The UC Davis-designed ...
SYDNEY, Australia - A new study involving 121 former elite rowers from Australia has revealed one in five develops atrial fibrillation (AFib).
This common heart rhythm condition can lead to stroke and heart failure in some individuals, but the researchers identified new genetic and clinical tools that enable early preventive strategies.
Researchers also found the retired rowers, who include former Olympians, are almost seven times more likely to develop AFib than the general population – despite having far fewer AFib risk factors like high ...
A common medication already used for autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis is effective for patients with giant cell arteritis, according to findings from a team at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania published in the New England Journal of Medicine. Causing the body’s immune system to attack blood vessels in the head, neck, and other areas, giant cell arteritis often leads to headaches, vision loss, and even aortic aneurysms. But nearly half of patients taking upadacitinib in a new Phase 3 clinical trial achieved sustained remission— while reducing their dependence on glucocorticoids (typically called “steroids”), ...
EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE UNTIL 4:00 P.M. ET, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 25, 2025
MINNEAPOLIS — People living in more disadvantaged neighborhoods may be more likely to have biomarkers for inflammation and Alzheimer’s disease, according to a study published June 25, 2025, in Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. The study does not prove that neighborhood factors cause these biomarkers: it only shows an association.
“Studies have shown that living in less advantaged neighborhoods may increase your risk for Alzheimer’s ...
EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE UNTIL 4:00 P.M. ET, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 25, 2025
MINNEAPOLIS — The American Academy of Neurology (AAN) has issued a position statement on therapies for neurological conditions that have limited evidence or no approved use by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The statement is published June 25, 2025, in Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. The statement includes guiding principles for discussions with patients and policymakers about these therapies. Although the statement includes illustrative examples, it does not provide clinical recommendations ...
CINCINNATI – Scientists from Cincinnati Children’s and colleagues based in Japan report achieving a major step forward in organoid technology--producing liver tissue that grows its own internal blood vessels.
This significant advance could lead to new ways to help people living with hemophilia and other coagulation disorders while also taking another step closer to producing transplantable repair tissues for people with damaged livers.
The study, led by Takanori Takebe, MD, PhD, director ...
BOSTON, MA – June 25, 2025 – The Lupus Research Alliance (LRA) proudly awarded the 2025 Lupus Insight Prize today to highly respected immunologist Deepak Rao, MD, PhD, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School. The Prize recognizes Dr. Rao’s pioneering and widely reported findings published in Nature, which reveal a previously unknown imbalance in key immune cells that contribute to lupus. The study sheds light on how this imbalance arises and identifies a potential target for restoring immune system regulation in people with the disease.
Dr. Rao was honored today at the Federation of Clinical Immunology Societies (FOCIS) 2025 meeting in ...
Los Angeles, CA – June 25, 2025 - The Terasaki Institute for Biomedical Innovation (TIBI) is proud to announce that Dr. Yangzhi Zhu, Assistant Professor at TIBI, has been honored with the 2024 Biosensors Young Investigator Award.
This prestigious award recognizes early-career researchers who have made outstanding contributions to the field of biosensors. All nominations were evaluated by a distinguished committee led by the journal’s Editor-in-Chief, Prof. Dr. Giovanna Marrazza.
Dr. Zhu’s research focuses on the development of flexible biosensors and wearable bioelectronics for diagnostic and therapeutic applications. His lab leads interdisciplinary efforts ...
Imagine a future in which people with disabilities can walk on their own, thanks to robotic legs. A new project from Northern Arizona University is accelerating that future with an open-source robotic exoskeleton.
Right now, developing these complex electromechanical systems is expensive and time-consuming, which likely stops a lot of research before it ever starts. But that may soon change: Years of research from NAU associate professor Zach Lerner’s Biomechatronics Lab has led to the first comprehensive open-source exoskeleton framework, made freely available to anyone worldwide. It will help overcome several huge obstacles for potential ...
In the Andes, the rise of agriculture to replace foraging was not the result of hardship and resource scarcity, but instead a time of economic resilience and innovation, according to a study published June 25, 2025 in the open-access journal PLOS One by Luis Flores-Blanco of the University of California Davis and Arizona State University, U.S., and colleagues.
The transition from foraging to farming was a major shift in human history that laid the foundations for the expansion of modern civilization. The current prevailing ...
