Research teams led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Cancer Center investigators are publishing two important studies regarding use of the targeted cancer drug crizotinib for treatment of advanced lung cancer driven by specific genetic mutations. The first reports the final results of a global, phase 3 trial showing that crizotinib is superior to standard chemotherapy for treatment of advanced ALK-positive non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The second paper describes the first report of resistance to crizotinib treatment in a patient with ROS1-positive NSCLC and ...

Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai researchers will present several landmark studies at the 2013 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) meeting May 31-June 4, 2013 in Chicago, including data on the likelihood of spousal human papillomavirus (HPV) oral infection, new gene signatures in melanoma, and issues with high readmission rates after cancer surgery. Highlights of Mount Sinai research at ASCO: Oral HPV Not Prevalent in Spouses of People with HPV-Positive Throat Cancer (Under Embargo Until 6:30 AM CDT on Saturday, June 1, 2013) In the first study of its ...

BOSTON––Thousands of patients with an advanced form of lung cancer that carries a specific dysfunctional gene are likely to fare better if treated with a targeted therapy than with traditional chemotherapy, report Dana-Farber Cancer Institute researchers and a team of international collaborators. In a trial involving patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose tumor cells harbored an abnormal ALK gene, those who received the oral drug crizotinib, which acts directly on ALK, went a median time of 7.7 months before their disease began to worsen, compared to 3 ...

CHICAGO, JUNE 1, 2013 — The experimental drug selumetinib is the first targeted therapy to demonstrate significant clinical benefit for patients with metastatic uveal melanoma, according to new Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center research presented on Saturday, June 1, at the 49th annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). The findings are potentially practice-changing for a historically "untreatable disease." Though uveal melanoma is rare — there are only 2,500 cases diagnosed in the United States each year — about half of patients will develop ...

Spouses and long-term partners of patients with mouth and throat cancers related to infection with the human papilloma virus (HPV) appear to have no increased prevalence of oral HPV infections, according to results of a multicenter, pilot study led by Johns Hopkins investigators. The study's results suggest that long-term couples need not change their sexual practices, say the scientists. "While we can't guarantee that the partners of patients will not develop oral HPV infections or cancers, we can reassure them that our study found they had no increased prevalence of ...

Acidifying oceans could dramatically impact the world's squid species, according to a new study led by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) researchers and soon to be published in the journal PLOS ONE. Because squid are both ecologically and commercially important, that impact may have far-reaching effects on the ocean environment and coastal economies, the researchers report. "Squid are at the center of the ocean ecosystem—nearly all animals are eating or eaten by squid," says WHOI biologist T. Aran Mooney, a co-author of the study. "So if anything happens to ...

SAN FRANCISCO -- Peripheral arterial disease is a common circulation problem in which reduced blood flow can lead to complications that jeopardize the limbs, possibly even requiring amputation. Procedures known as revascularization have reduced the need for amputations 40 percent over two decades, Mayo Clinic research shows. The findings were among several studies presented at the Society for Vascular Surgery annual meeting in San Francisco. In the amputation study, Mayo researchers analyzed patients in the Rochester Epidemiology Project, a National Institutes of ...

Exposure to general anaesthesia increases the risk of dementia in the elderly by 35%, says new research presented at Euroanaesthesia, the annual congress of the European Society of Anaesthesiology (ESA). The research is by Dr Francois Sztark, INSERM and University of Bordeaux, France, and colleagues. Postoperative cognitive dysfunction, or POCD, could be associated with dementia several years later. POCD is a common complication in elderly patients after major surgery. It has been proposed that there is an association between POCD and the development of dementia due ...

Marine conservationists from Plymouth University, and the Universidad Federal da Bahia in Brazil, have spent more than 17 years analysing the diversity and density of coral colonies off the coast of South America. That coincided with the catastrophic El Niño event of 1997-98, creating an opportunity for the first detailed assessment of the long-term impact a major environmental incident of this nature can have on coral assemblages. Professor Martin Attrill, Director of Plymouth University's Marine Institute, said: "Coral reefs are perhaps the most diverse marine ecosystem ...

An international team of researchers – led by principal investigator Paul S. Mischel, MD, a member of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research and professor in the Department of Pathology at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine – has found that a singular gene mutation helps brain cancer cells to not just survive, but grow tumors rapidly by altering the splicing of genes that control cellular metabolism. The findings are published online in the journal Cell Metabolism. Mischel, who heads the Ludwig Institute's molecular pathology laboratory based ...

Researchers at the University of Georgia, Athens, have identified a strong link between the prevalence and load of certain food-borne pathogens on poultry farms, and later downstream at the processing plant. They report their findings in a manuscript published ahead of print in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology. "This study suggests that reducing foodborne pathogen loads on broiler chicken farms would help to reduce pathogen loads at processing, and may ultimately help to reduce the risk of foodborne illness," says Roy Berghaus, an author on the study. ...

A major question in ecology has centered on the role of microbes in regulating ecosystem function. Now, in research published ahead of print in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology, Brajesh Singh of the University of Western Sydney, Australia, and collaborators show how changes in the populations of methanotrophic bacteria can have consequences for methane mitigation at ecosystem levels. "Ecological theories developed for macro-ecology can explain the microbial regulation of the methane cycle," says Singh. In the study, as grasslands, bogs, and moors ...

Philadelphia, PA—Recurrent infection is a common feature of persistent viral diseases. It includes episodes of high viral production interspersed by periods of relative quiescence. These quiescent or silent stages are hard to study with experimental models. Mathematical analysis can help fill in the gaps. In a paper titled Conditions for Transient Viremia in Deterministic in-Host Models: Viral Blips Need No Exogenous Trigger, published last month in the SIAM Journal on Applied Mathematics, authors Wenjing Zhang, Lindi M. Wahl, and Pei Yu present a model to study persistent ...

Philadelphia, PA—The first few hours to days following exposure to human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) can be of critical importance in determining if infection occurs in a patient. But the low numbers of viruses and infected cells at this stage makes it very difficult to study these events in humans or animal models. Theoretical mathematical models can help analyze viral dynamics in this early phase, and hence offer insights into therapeutic and prevention strategies, as evidenced by a paper published last month in the SIAM Journal on Applied Mathematics. In a paper ...

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite detected dozens of fires burning in western Mexico on May 30, 2013. The fires are outlined in red. The location, widespread nature, and number of fires suggest that these fires were deliberately set to manage land. Farmers often use fire to return nutrients to the soil and to clear the ground of unwanted plants. While fire helps enhance crops and grasses for pasture, the fires also produce smoke that degrades air quality. Although the smoke hits hardest right around the area being burned, ...

Food insecurity increases the risk of death among injection drug users living with HIV/AIDS even when they are receiving life-prolonging antiretroviral therapy (ART), according to a new study involving Simon Fraser University. The study, recently published in the peer-reviewed science journal, PLoS One, examines the impact of food insecurity and hunger on survival among injection drug users. Food insecurity is defined by the United Nations' World Food Programme as having insufficient access to adequate quantity and quality of food. Researchers found that drug users who ...

Orange, Calif., May 31, 2013 — Any breast cancer surgeon who regularly performs lumpectomies confronts the question "Did I get it all?" Thirty to 60 percent of the time in the U.S., the answer is "no," requiring the patient to undergo a second surgery to remove the remaining tumor. Surgeons at UC Irvine Medical Center are the first in the country to use a device that reduces by half the need to reoperate and cut out breast cancer cells missed during an initial lumpectomy. The MarginProbe System lets the surgeon immediately assess whether cancer cells remain on the margins ...

NEW YORK — With so much on the line for job seekers in this difficult economic climate, a lot of new hires might be wondering how — or whether at all — to negotiate salary when offered a new position. A recently published study on the art of negotiation by two professors at Columbia Business School could help these new hires — and all negotiators — seal a stronger deal than before. Research conducted by Professors Malia Mason and Daniel Ames and doctoral students Alice Lee and Elizabeth Wiley finds that asking for a specific and precise dollar amount versus a rounded-off ...

VIDEO: NOAA's GOES-14 satellite captured Hurricane Barbara's landfall in southwestern Mexico and movement across land, northward toward the Gulf of Mexico. This 43 second animation of NOAA's GOES-14 satellite observations from... Click here for more information. NOAA's GOES-14 satellite captured Hurricane Barbara's landfall in southwestern Mexico and movement across land, northward toward the Gulf of Mexico. This 43 second animation of NOAA's GOES-14 satellite observations ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – A virus that infects most Americans but that usually remains dormant in the body might speed the progression of an aggressive form of brain cancer when particular genes are shut off in tumor cells, new research shows. The animal study by researchers at the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James) and at Dana Farber Cancer Institute suggests that cytomegalovirus (CMV) might significantly accelerate the development and progression of glioblastoma, a deadly ...

CHICAGO, IL — Many glioblastoma patients treated with bevacizumab (Avastin®) have significant deterioration in neurocognitive function, symptoms and quality of life. Not only that, the changes often predict treatment outcomes, according to new research from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. The findings from the large national multi-center Phase III trial, RTOG 0825, were presented today at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. Glioblastoma is the most frequent and aggressive type of brain tumor. Despite slight gains, tumors ...

The American Thoracic Society has released new clinical practice guidelines on sleep apnea, sleepiness, and driving risk on non-commercial drivers. The new guidelines, which are an update of a 1994 ATS statement on this topic, appear in the June 1, 2013 American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. "Up to 20 percent of crashes that occur on monotonous roads can be attributed to sleepiness, and the most common medical cause of excessive daytime sleepiness is obstructive sleep apnea (OSA)," said Kingman P. Strohl, MD, program director, sleep medicine, University ...

Madison, Wis. — Genetically engineered immune cells seem to promote healing in mice infected with a neurological disease similar to multiple sclerosis (MS), cleaning up lesions and allowing the mice to regain use of their legs and tails. The new finding, by a team of University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health researchers, suggests that immune cells could be engineered to create a new type of treatment for people with MS. Currently, there are few good medications for MS, an autoimmune inflammatory disease that affects some 400,000 people in the United ...

In March of this year, Australian-based business, JumpHigher Science (JHS), launched what is predicted as the start of a new generation in high performance training systems, and specifically, vertical jump training systems. It seems as though the days for a "one size fits all" approach to online, goal-specific programs are gone. Now, companies like JumpHigher Science are recognising the need to provide options for their clients to make it easier to train, wherever and whenever. The highlight of the program is a 12-week program that anyone can undertake, regardless ...

Soft4Boost releases a new skinable audio program - Soft4Boost Ringtone Creator. The program offers a multilingual interface that is available in English, French, Russian, Hungarian, German, Spanish, and Italian. Soft4Boost today announced the launch of own Ringtone Creator, a software program which helps users quickly create a new ringtone. Whatever it is: a song, a piece of music, a speech in a movie, or a fun clip, a funny sound, or even a human voice or any audio file, all can be used to create a new and unique ringtone. With Soft4Boost Ringtone Creator, it only ...