Last week, a proposal representing the first use of CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) in humans passed a key federal review. The Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee at the U.S. National Institutes of Health, which a federal safety and ethics panel, unanimously approved the experiment. CRISPR is a genome-editing tool that allows researchers to […]
A new study, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, lends weight to the notion that male pattern baldness and prostate cancer may be linked. Prostate cancer is the second most common cancer among men. Emerging evidence suggests that prostate cancer and male pattern baldness – progressive scalp hair-loss in a distinct pattern – are […]
Scientists have found that for laboratory rats with human breast tumors, exposure to dim light at night made the tumors resistant to the breast cancer drug tamoxifen. The new findings, appearing in the journal Cancer Research, are the first to show that a significant correlation exists between melatonin levels and the effectiveness of tamoxifen. “Resistance […]
Why do people still spend extended periods in the sun when the dangers of skin cancer are so well recognized? A new study from Massachusetts General Hospital adds important support to the theory that ultraviolet (UV) light can actually be addictive. “Our study identified an organic pathway encoded in skin whereby UV radiation causes the […]
New research looking at the biological processes involved in breast cancer development has strengthened the argument for a potential link between alcohol consumption and progression of the disease. The findings, published in Breast Cancer Research, offer a possible way to improve outcomes for patients in the later stages of the disease. Conducted by scientists from […]
A new way to look at cancer – by tracing its evolutionary roots to the dawn of multicellular life more than a billion years ago – could transform cancer therapy by linking cancer’s beginnings to the origin of life and the developmental processes of embryos. The new work, by researchers from Arizona State University and […]
Cambridge University researchers have published a paper in Nature Chemistry showing that four-stranded “quadruple helix” DNA structures exist within the human genome. The new discovery coincides with the 60th anniversary of Watson and Crick’s first description of the interweaving double helix DNA structure – the chemical code for all life. Studies over the last couple […]
In an intriguing new study published in theJournal of Biological Chemistry, scientists investigating cholesterol’s binding properties within cells say that cholesterol appears to inhibit or stop cancer growth. The new findings are supported by previous unrelated research that showed how natural compounds that are chemically similar to cholesterol can kill a broad spectrum of different […]
Observational data from a new study published in the journal Cancer reveal that men who had been circumcised before their first sexual intercourse were 15 percent less likely to develop prostate cancer than uncircumcised men. The authors of the new work, from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, suggest that circumcision can hinder infection and […]
UC Berkeley molecular biologists propose that carcinogenesis – the generation of cancer – is just another form of speciation, the evolution of new species. “Cancer is comparable to a bacterial level of complexity, but still autonomous, that is, it doesn’t depend on other cells for survival; it doesn’t follow orders like other cells in the […]
