Recent News
- High volume production for graphene
- New model: Peak Oil earlier – 2014
- Found: Another molecule needed at the origin of life
- For real: A new way to produce electricity
- New: Single molecule sensor array
- Finally(?)…artificially making blood stem cells in quantity
- Update: Chinese space station
- Looking at the strange face of antimatter
- Life on Mars, if it exists, is below the surface
- A different kind of lens for time
- Oh please, “skinput”
- Update: More Moon water
- Cutting cancer cell immortality short
- First time: Watching the unfolding story of proteins in living cells
- Newly named: Copernicum (element 112)
Tag Archives: cancer
Giving Roger Ebert a voice
The Pulitzer prize-winning movie critic, Roger Ebert, lost his voice to cancer several years ago. He is one among many thousands of people a year who lose their ability to speak from disease or injury. There are some technology fixes for replacing the physical reproduction capability. (See SciTechStory: Replacing the larynx with a palatometer) However, [...]
Posted in Impact: Computer Power Also tagged Ebert, Hawking, movies, Oprah, vocal chords, voice production Leave a comment
Personalized monitoring of cancer recovery
Step by step the treatment of cancer becomes more personalized. The latest advance, in research from John’s Hopkins University (Baltimore, USA), uses a full-genome DNA sequence of a patient’s cancer to determine its ‘signature.’ Thereafter, in screens of blood tests, that signature – usually consisting of the more obvious chunks of rearranged DNA rather than [...]
Posted in News: Major Disease Cures Also tagged chromosomes, CT scan, DNA sequence, Pare test Leave a comment
Two new cancer-killing nanoparticles
To use an overworked phrase, it’s a paradigm shift: Cancer research is learning how to ‘think small’ with the potential of nanotechnology – nanoparticles specifically. It’s a shift because medical science has been accustomed to cancer-fighting techniques on the level of bringing cannons to kill a fly. Where doctors once treated cancer with a body-wide [...]
Posted in News: Nanomedicine Also tagged chemotherapy, nanobubbles, nanomedicine, nanoparticles Leave a comment
Why do some cancers resist treatment?
Sometimes one of the most important things about research is the questions it provokes. In this case, the question “Why do some cancers resist treatment?” comes out of research that has found a plausible answer. The work involved a standing question in stem cell research – How does the body regulate the two different kinds [...]
Brain cancer genome sequenced
The cost of sequencing a human genome has come down, way down; and the value of doing it is going up. Here’s a very good example: scientists at the University of California Los Angeles (USA) recently completed the sequencing of the DNA from a type of brain cancer cell line, a glioblastoma known as U87. [...]
Posted in News: Major Disease Cure Also tagged brain, DNA, GBM, genetic, genome, glioblastoma, U87 Leave a comment
Formerly, one brain cancer…now it’s four
One of the things that makes cancer so difficult to ‘cure’ is that it has so many forms. Perhaps most difficult of all, as scientists are learning, are cancers such as the most common and usually fatal brain cancer glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). As a new study at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill, USA) [...]
Posted in News: Major Disease Cures Also tagged brain tumor, GBM, gene expression, glioblastoma multiforme Leave a comment
Cancer cause found in cell communication
The link between stress and cancer has been known (or supposed) for many years, but specific evidence has been spotty. A new study by researchers at Yale University and reported in Nature magazine, probed the causes of cancer related to two genes (RAS and scribble), and discovered two not so good pieces of news: Cancerous [...]
Posted in News: Major Disease Cure Also tagged JNK pathway, mutations, RAS, scribble, stress Leave a comment
Also tracking: Science and tech disappointments
Turning the year to a new decade is bound to produce a wide variety of retrospectives. Lists are always popular. I came across an interesting list the other day at the Scientific American site: 10 Science Letdowns of the New Millennium by Katherine Harmon. The original is presented as a slide show. Why, I’m not [...]
Posted in Impact: General Also tagged alternative energy, anti-science, brain, cars, climate change, electric cars, evolution, exobiology, genetics, global warming, HIV, neurology, paleontology, power grid, science, space, technology 1 Comment
Throat surgery the robotic way
Think about having your throat slit, ear to ear – even for removal of cancer. Rather not? That’s what doctors at University of Pennsylvania (USA) thought, especially since this kind of highly invasive throat surgery often makes breathing, eating, and speaking difficult for weeks after the operation. Their response: develop a robotic procedure that makes [...]
Posted in News: Medical Robotics Also tagged da Vinci Surgical System, FDA, medical robotics, otolaryngology, throat Leave a comment
Nanosensors testing blood for cancer markers
Testing lab samples of blood is one thing; there’s lots of control achieved by isolating components of the blood before testing. Testing whole blood, unfiltered and with all components in their usual mix, is another thing. The thing is; testing whole blood is what’s required in the real world. Whole blood is complicated by the [...]
Posted in News: Nanomedicine Also tagged antigens, biomarker, blood, nanomedicine, nanotechnology, nanowire Leave a comment
Powerful peptide penetrates cancer cells
All too often cancer treatments are like taking a howitzer to a hunting party. The treatment might get the cancer, but there’s often a lot of collateral damage. That’s why, almost from the beginning of cancer research, the goal has been to find ways of stopping cancer without harming the rest of the body. Not [...]
Posted in News: Major Disease Cures Also tagged iRGD, major disease cures, molecular biology, nanotechnology, nanoworms, peptides Leave a comment
First Implant: anti-cancer vaccine device in mice
Although implanting drug administering devices in living animals is not new, a successful implementation for treating cancer is new. A team of scientists at Harvard University (USA) have developed a disk-like implant, which carries targeted cancer antigens.
Posted in News: Body Implant Also tagged antigen, bioengineering, body implant, drug delivery device, immunology Leave a comment
Stapling peptides to drug the undruggable
Turning specific genes on and off is something Nature does routinely. Not so for scientists. In particular, a class of proteins that control whether certain genes are activated or not, so called transcription factors, have been considered unreachable. Because of their complex folded configurations, transcription proteins are highly resistant to modification and have been considered [...]
Posted in News: Major Disease Cures Also tagged gene expression, genes, NOTCH, peptides, proteins, signaling pathways Leave a comment
Study confirms telomere’s role in living longer
Confirmation is a vital part of the scientific process. In this case confirmation involves our knowledge of telomeres. We know that telomeres, the short strip of DNA found at the ends of chromosomes, play a big role in protecting the DNA from gene loss during the many replications within a cell. One of the 2009 [...]
Posted in News: Extending Lifespan Also tagged cell biology, DNA, genetics, lifespan, living longer, old-age, replication, senescence, telomeres Leave a comment
Nanoparticles for cancer drug delivery
You’re going to see many stories of drug delivery methods using nanotechnology. Some methods are still quite theoretical; others have already reached the testing stage in animals. Note, however, that so far none have been given the green light for human testing, which says something about the nascent status of the nano-medical field. Much of [...]
Posted in News: Nano-medicine Also tagged drug-delivery, E. coli, nano-medicine, nanoparticles, nanotechnology Leave a comment
Protecting healthy cells during radiation therapy
Treatment of cancer with radiation therapy is very common, but always hazardous because the radiation usually kills healthy cells as well. Here’s one promising approach to reducing the risk…
Can we stimulate repair of old muscles?
Yes, we probably can stimulate more repair of muscle cells in older people.
Berkeley — A study led by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, has identified critical biochemical pathways linked to the aging of human muscle. By manipulating these pathways, the researchers were able to turn back the clock on old human muscle, [...]
Posted in News: Longer Life Also tagged aging, biochemistry, gerontology, muscles, pathways, stem cells Leave a comment
Hand-held cancer detection device
Trekkers will remember Dr. McCoy carrying a hand-held device which could instantly diagnose (and often treat) diseases. We aren’t there yet, but this development is indicative of where we’re going:
University of Toronto researchers have used nanomaterials to develop a microchip sensitive enough to quickly determine the type and severity of a patient’s cancer so that [...]
Posted in News: Nano-medicine Also tagged biomarkers, DNA, electrical engineering, interdisciplinary, microbiology, microchip, nanotechnology 1 Comment
Cutting cancer cell immortality short