Cell phone’s radiation, a possible carcinogen…

A couple hours ago as I talked to my parents on the phone about how interesting this course has been throughout the quarter, my father pointed out to me that a friend of his had told him about prolonged cell phone use leading to some type of brain cancer. I was really skeptical at first about this information, but I knew that there could be some kind of relation between cell phone use and cancer because of the electromagnetic radiation (on the electromagnetic spectrum between FM radio waves and microwave) transmitted by the antennas.

Your Cell Phone and Cancer

Just calling dibs, on this story just in case, will write the blog when im not busy getting the presentation ready.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/05/31/who.cell.phones/

Ethics in Bone Marrow Transplant

There are many reasons for having children, but the most peculiar reason to have another baby is to save an already sick child. Before I start talking about the article, here is some background information about leukemia. Leukemia is a cancer of the blood and bone marrow. The identifying characteristic of the disease is the out of control accumulation of blood cells.

There are four types: acute myelogenous, acute lymphocytic, chronic myelogenous, and chronic lymphocytic. Acute means advance quickly and chronic means progress slowly. Myelogenous refers to marrow cells that are precursors to red blood cells, platelets, and some white blood cells. Lymphocytic refers to marrow cells that lead to lymphocytes. The broad overview of the disease mechanism is that the cancerous cells originate in the bone marrow, undergo a change, and divide until they overcrowd the healthy, normal cells.

Adaptive Therapy for an Adaptive Disease

At the moment, the future of cancer research seems to be centered in the field of targeted chemotherapy. However, it is evident that currently neither conventional nor targeted chemotherapies will suffice against resilient tumors. Conventional therapies generally aim for maximum cell death in the shortest amount of time using fixed regimens of drugs designed to eliminate as much of the tumor mass as possible under tolerable levels of toxicity to the patient. However, our perception of cancer has begun to change.

Finding Pancreatic Cancer's Kryptonite

I have spent a good portion of the past three months researching pancreatic cancer as part of this course. Over this period of time, I've learned so much about the causes, risks, treatments, and prognoses of the disease, and to be honest, the overall outlook is pretty bleak. 80% of patients die within a year a diagnosis, and 95% die within five years. The cancer itself is incredibly hard to detect, and according to The Hirschberg Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research, "fewer than 10% of patients' tumors are confined to the pancreas at the time of diagnosis." Metastatic tumors are even more detrimental to one's health, and are difficult to operate on- often requiring removal of surrounding organs' tissues.

Is EGCG, an antioxidant, the cure for cancer...?

As I explain in my last blog entry, green tea’s polyphenols (i.e. EGCG) are being studied intensively because of their possible cancer fighting activity in cancer cells. In laboratory experiments with animals, it has been shown that EGCG might be able to inhibit limitless replication potential, evasion of programmed death, sustained angiogenesis, and tumor cell invasiveness in cancer cells. Various studied have shown that EGCG might possibly “inhibit mitogen activation protein kinases, the activation of activator protein-1, and cell transformation” (Hou et al.).

Endoxifen: The New Breast Cancer Treatment?

Thanna and Katelyn's presentation on the effects of Tamoxifen prompted my curiosity concerning a metabolite of Tamoxifen, Endoxifen. As we learned in their presentation, Tamoxifen is metabolized into Endoxifen within the body through the activity of cytochrome P450 enzymes, namely CYP3A4 and CYP2D6. Unfortunately, women who are deficient in this enzyme are unable to reap the full benefits of Tamoxifen.

Sunscreen and Skin Cancer in Patients After Transplant

From the pervious blog, we learned that there is a high risk of getting skin cancer, -especially squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) and basal cell carcinoma (BCC)- for organ transplant recipients (OTR). That is mainly because of taking immunosuppressant medications after surgery. Now, the question is: Can we decrease the rate of skin cancer after transplant surgery? Is there any specific prevention method for skin cancer in OTR patients? Is sunscreen preventive?

Studies show that: “After a transplant, there is generally a lag time of 3-7 years before skin cancers begin to develop. This period of time may vary depending upon individual risk factors. The longer a person takes immunosuppressant medications, the greater the risk of skin cancer. In temperate climates 40% of fairskinnned patients develop skin cancer within 20 years after transplantation. In warmer climates, up to 70% of fair-skinned patients develop skin cancer within 20 years after transplant. Therefore, Sun protection is one of the best ways to prevent skin cancer. Unfortunately only 54% of transplant patients remember receiving skin cancer education and only 40% regularly use sunscreen.”

Next-Generation Chemotherapy Delivery

When Dr. Schwartz gave her wonderful guest lecture in class a few weeks ago, she discussed at length some of the obstacles to drug development research. One of these issues, delivery, was especially intriguing to me, because there was definitive progress to make in the area. Until doctors are able to deliver chemicals directly to the tumor and no where else in the body, delivery can be improved. This prompted me to look into some of the new and up-and-coming technologies in the area.

From http://www.a1-diamond.com/images/diamond.jpg

Living With Cancer

We've focused on the molecular, cellular, and medicinal aspects of cancer in this class quite a bit. What we haven't focused on is the human element. Since most of the class wants to be medical doctors, we, as students, have an interest in the human element or we wouldn't be in this class, attempting to understand how cancer works.

We've learned the hallmarks of cancer, how cancer develops, grows, and metastasizes. We learned the genetic causes of cancer and explored how tumor suppressor genes and oncogenes make the cell cycle go haywire. We looked at treatments: radiation, surgery, and chemotherapy.

But what happens after treatment? Not every cancer is immediately fatal. Most cancer patients make a slow transition from being a cancer victim to cancer survivor. In 2005, the Institute of Medicine focused on this journey in a report. Accompanying that report was a short film.

Can Supplements be Harmful to Your Health?

Recently I have added many additional supplements into my diets and in doing so I like to do my research on the effects of these supplements. While doing so I found some alarming accusations and studies that supported that a few of the supplements that I take could lead to cancer, usually kidney, liver, and colon cancer to be specific. Most of the arguments made sense seeing as how most of them argued that the body would have a harder time processing these supplements then regular food and this would stress these organs, which would lead to cancer. I will list a few of the supplements that I did research on and talk about if this theory is true or not.

The Safer Cigarette

I found the most fascinating article. The article is about the elevated risk of lung cancer in American men compared to Japanese men. It is interesting article because there is a higher smoking prevalence in Japanese men, but they have a lower risk of lung cancer compared to American men.

Exporting Death

I am big fan of the Daily Show and I was watching a segment about asbestos. At the end of the segment I realized that I do not know what is asbestos. The only thing that I know about asbestos is that it causes mesothelioma and I know that because of the law attorney commercials about asbestos. So, I did some research what is asbestos. Apparently asbestos is a mineral fiber that is used in building construction materials for insulation and fire-retardant. Asbestos is commonly seen as a white material, but it can be brown or blue in its natural state. However, this material is a carcinogen.

Eating Our Way Out of Cancer with Strawberries

In the Health section of ABC News, I found an article—Could Cancer Prevention Be As Easy As Eating Strawberries?—claiming that consuming strawberries may help to prevent esophageal cancer because an experiment seemed to prove so. In the experiment, researchers administered 60 grams of freeze-dried strawberries daily for 6 months to 36 patients with precancerous lesions. Afterwards, it was observed that the “growth of lesions slowed significantly in 29 out of the 36 [patients].” Below is a video of ABC’s coverage on the experiment. While ABC, the researchers, as well as I, find the effects of eating strawberries very fascinating, further study is absolutely necessary to draw concrete conclusions [1].

Man's Best Friend: How Purebreds Can Help Understand Cancer

Each year the American Kennel Club hosts the AKC/Eukanuba National Championship for owners or purebred dogs to come and compete. Awards such as the Canine Excellence award not only earn you and your dog a fancy shining metal, but the winner also receives a cash of $1000. Not a bad reason to want to own a purebred. It turns out though that purebreds are much more valuable than a family pet or award winning competitor in dog shows. Studying the genetic genomes of purebred dogs can help in the fight against cancer by allowing scientists to better understand which genes are associated with specific cancers as well as other diseases.

They betrayed us! White Blood Cells that is...

A Cancer biologist at Yale University, John Pawelek, might have found a very interesting thought on how cancers metastasize. While reading a cancer journal he came across an idea suggested by Czech scientists stating that tumor cells and white blood cells fuse together to make a hybrid. At the time he was reading a book by Lynn Margulis, an evolutionary biologist, who suggested the idea that ancient cells engulfed each other in order to improve the chances for survival. He was interested by the connection and thus started researching and experimenting with cancer and white blood cells. In 15 years of studies, he was able to confirm that cancer cells do in fact fuse with white blood cells, also known as macrophages, and become highly metastatic. He took weak metastatic cancer cell and fused them with mouse white blood cells. The results were astonishing.

Heat Shock Proteins and Cancer

A research paper—“Thermal Biology of the Deep-sea Vent Annelid Paralvinella grasslei: In Vivo Studies”— from Animal Physiology class found worms living in hot deep-sea vents, that can reach about 100°C at times, to produce HSP70 in response to their extreme environment. HSP70 stands for a family of heat shock proteins which protect the worms by preventing their proteins from being denatured in stressful conditions. Immediately, I found this information to be very interesting. If we as humans also produce heat shock proteins—which we do, can they help us fight against cancer by protecting our proteins from damage? Cancer often involves genetic mutations and thus protein malfunctions; can heat shock proteins possibly play a role somewhere in scheme of the Central Dogma of Biology?

You Wouldn't Want Your Kids to Get Cancer Too.

Researchers at the Mayo Clinic have developed a new screening procedure to detect whether colorectal cancer patients under 50 have Lynch Syndrome. Lynch Syndrome, formerly known as hereditary nonpolyposis colorectal cancer, causes anywhere from 3,200 to 11,200 new cases a year of colorectal cancer. It often causes earlier onset of colorectal polyps which are more likely to become cancerous than in people without Lynch Syndrome. Lynch Syndrome is a dominant genetic disorder that disrupts the genes any of the MLH1, MSH2, MSH6, and PMS2 genes. These genes are involved in repairing DNA that was copied wrong during replication. Since DNA repair is an important part of the cell cycle, with defects in any of these genes, mitosis will continue despite the mistakes in the newly synthesized DNA. This often leads to mutations in the daughter cell and over time, these mutations will lead to tumor growth.

Vitamin E Supplements: Good, Bad or Neither?

When I turned on the T.V. the other day, the Dr. Oz Show was on. Usually the show doesn’t interest me but today he had a segment called “5 Wrong Turns That Lead To Cancer”. His number one most common thing that we do that leads to cancer was taking too much vitamin E supplements. I instantly became interested since I often take supplements.
He explained that vitamin E is a known antioxidant, but large amounts of vitamin E will act as an anti-antioxidant and damage DNA which leads to cancer. A recent study says moderate to high doses of vitamin E led to a "slight but significant increase" in lung cancer risk. Even the American Cancer Society recommends that cancer patients avoid the use of supplements.

Are You Eating Your Way to Cancer?

Recently I have had to monitor and adjust my diet, and a part of doing this is doing research on the kinds of food that I eat. While doing came across a very alarming web post. In the post it listed a few food additives and preservatives that have been linked to being carcinogens. Many food that we eat each day are filled with these substances and you very well not even know about it and it has even passed FDA inspections. First I would like to point out that these reports are highly debated and there are many disagreements on a few of these additives/preservatives being linked to cancer.