Uncovering pancreatic cancer’s genetic tricks

NSW: Understanding how tumours reprogram their metabolism to make the raw materials for building new cells is a burgeoning area in the search for new cancer therapies. Yet the underlying genetic changes that allow pancreatic cancer cells to reprogram their metabolism are not well understood. Now, a UNSW-led research team have discovered that while individual pancreatic tumours share common metabolic pathways to meet the needs of rapid cell growth, each finds a unique genetic solution to drive this adaptation.

Tumour protein could hold key to pancreatic cancer survival

Melbourne: A diagnosis of pancreatic cancer is often a death sentence because current chemotherapies have little impact on the disease. But research led by the University of Melbourne reported in the International Journal of Cancer, could eventually improve treatments with the identification of a protein that appears to help tumour cells become more aggressive. In Australia this year, some 3,200 new cases of Pancreatic cancer will be diagnosed, and 2,900 patients will die of the disease. 

Australian researchers reveal genetic links underlying neuroendocrine pancreatic cancer

Melbourne: An Australian-led international research effort has revealed that genetic changes normally linked to breast, colon and ovarian cancers could also drive a rare form of pancreatic cancer.  Researchers found as many as one in five patients with pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours (PanNETs) had a clear genetic predisposition for their cancers, even though they had no family history of the disease. The findings, published today in the journal Nature, offer the prospect of one day being able to identify people at risk of these cancers, as well as aggressive forms of the disease, and who might respond to current or new targeted therapies. 

Diabetes Drug vs. Cancer

Harvard: Considerable evidence has indicated that a drug used for more than 50 years to treat Type 2 diabetes can also prevent or slow the growth of certain cancers. But the mechanism behind metformin’s anticancer effects has been unknown. Now, a team of Harvard Medical School investigators at Massachusetts General Hospital has identified a pathway that appears to underlie metformin’s ability both to block the growth of human cancer cells and to extend the lifespan of the C. elegans roundworm. Their findings imply that this single genetic pathway plays an important role in a wide range of organisms.

Liquid Biopsy Using ctDNA Takes Aim at Pancreatic Cancer

Clinicalomics: Investigators from Sorbonne University in Paris have now assessed the feasibility and the prognostic value of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) in pancreatic adenocarcinoma, a significant advance in a hard-to-diagnose disease that is expected to become the second leading cause of cancer death in the U.S. by 2030. There remain several challenges to conducting translational research on pancreatic cancer, including the difficulty in obtaining tumor samples from patients, since most studies have been limited to patients with the resectable disease until now. However, only 10% to 15% of patients with pancreatic adenocarcinoma have resectable disease at diagnosis—making identification of robust prognostic or predictive biomarkers critical for all patients with pancreatic adenocarcinoma, whatever the stage of the disease.

New treatment doubles progression-free survival in some pancreatic cancer patients

Fred Hutch: Combining chemotherapy with an experimental enzyme that lowers pressure within tumors seems to double the amount of time certain patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer have before their disease progresses, suggests an interim analysis of data from an ongoing phase 2 trial. However, the trial must be completed before any definitive conclusions can be drawn, cautioned study principal investigator and pancreatic cancer expert Dr. Sunil Hingorani of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.

MRI Screening Program for Individuals at High Risk of Pancreatic Cancer

JAMA: An MRI-based protocol for the surveillance of individuals at risk for developing pancreatic cancer seems to detect cancer or premalignant lesions with good accuracy. A magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-based screening program for individuals at high risk (family history) of pancreatic cancer identified pancreatic lesions in 16 of 40 (40 percent) of patients, of whom 5 five underwent surgery, according to a report published online by JAMA Surgery. Pancreatic cancer is a leading cause of cancer death and can be considered a global lethal disease because incidence and mortality rates are nearly identical. Although treatment has improved, the surgery rate in patients with ductal adenocarcinoma is around 30 percent and the five-year survival rate is less than 20 percent. In about 10 percent of all patients with pancreatic cancer, it is possible to find a family history, according to the study background.

Taiwan Genomics Research Team Discovers IL-17RB Antibody Blocks Migration of Pancreatic Cancer

Academia Sinica: A research team led by Academician Wen-Hwa Lee, a Distinguished Research Fellow from the Genomics Research Center, Academia Sinica and the President of China Medical University of Taiwan, recently discovered a protein (IL-17B receptor, IL-17RB) that is strongly associated with migration of pancreatic cancer to other organs after surgery. Using an antibody against IL-17RB, the researchers were able to block tumor metastasis and improve the survival of mice. Pancreatic cancer has an extremely high mortality rate due to its aggressive nature. These findings shed light on a key mechanism underling the highly aggressive nature of pancreatic cancer and also provide a possibility for a future therapy. The discovery was published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine (JEM) on March 3, 2015.

Surface molecule promotes pancreatic cancer aggressiveness

German Cancer Research Center: A protein on the surface of pancreatic cancer cells promotes metastasis and the ability to initiate new tumors, as scientists from the German Cancer Research Center have now reported. When the researchers used a specific agent to block this surface protein in mice, tumors grew more slowly and formed fewer metastases.

New biomarkers to spot pancreatic cancer early

University College. UK: Pancreatic cancer could be diagnosed up to two years earlier by screening for two tumour markers found in blood, according to research published in Clinical Cancer Research. The study, conducted by researchers from UCL, UCL Hospital Foundation Trust and the University of Liverpool, suggests that these biomarkers could be used as an early screening tool for those at high risk of pancreatic cancer.

Grant bolsters pancreatic cancer drug discovery

Vanderbilt. US: The Lustgarten Foundation has awarded a $1.5 million Research Investigator Grant to Stephen Fesik, Ph.D., professor of Biochemistry, Pharmacology and Chemistry, for research designed to discover new drugs for the treatment of pancreatic cancer. This is Fesik’s second three-year award from the Lustgarten Foundation in support of his research targeting K-Ras, a protein mutated in 90 percent of pancreatic cancer cases, as well as other forms of cancer.Fesik is among 13 scientists nominated by their peers for significant achievements in the field of pancreatic cancer research who will receive a total of $19.5 million in research funding from the foundation.

New revolutionary culturing technique for liver and pancreas

Utrecht University. Netherlands: Researchers from Utrecht University, the Hubrecht Institute and the University Medical Center (UMC) Utrecht successfully developed a culturing system for human liver stem cells as well as stem cells from pancreatic cancer. They describe the development of these culturing systems in two articles in this week’s edition of Cell magazine.

Modified Pancreatic-Cancer Regimen Maintains Effectiveness While Reducing Side Effects and Cost

Ohio State University. US: A simple change to a two-drug therapy for metastatic pancreatic cancer provides similar cancer control while significantly improving quality of life and reducing the cost of care, according to data collected by The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James.)

Pancreatic cancer

NIH. US: Pancreatic cancer is a disease in which malignant (cancer) cells form in the tissues of the pancreas.The pancreas is a gland about 6 inches long that is shaped like a thin pear lying on its side. The wider end of the pancreas is called the head, the middle section is called the body, and the narrow end is called the tail. The pancreas lies between the stomach and the spine.

New Technology Discovers Unknown Risk Genes for Pancreatic Cancer

German Cancer Research Center: Cancer is a complex disease of the genes. The reasons why a tumor develops are often unknown. An international team of researchers from the German Cancer Consortium (DKTK) and the Welcome Trust Sanger Institute has now developed a technique that can identify causes of cancer invisible to genetic sequencing. The technique has uncovered large sets of previously unknown pancreatic cancer genes. It is hoped that this study will boost research into a disease that is still poorly understood and for which five-year survival rates have stood at around 5 per cent for the past four decades.

Researchers Find Cancer Biopsies Do Not Promote Cancer Spread

Mayo Clinic US: A study of more than 2,000 patients by researchers at Mayo Clinic’s campus in Jacksonville, Florida, has dispelled the myth that cancer biopsies cause cancer to spread. In the Jan. 9 online issue of Gut, they show that patients who received a biopsy had a better outcome and longer survival than patients who did not have a biopsy.The researchers studied pancreatic cancer, but the findings likely apply to other cancers because diagnostic technique used in this study — fine needle aspiration — is commonly used across tumor types, says the study’s senior investigator and gastroenterologist Michael Wallace, M.D., M.P.H., professor of medicine.

More than 300 million people in at least 70 countries use smokeless tobacco

CDC. US: The first-ever report on the global use and public health impact of smokeless tobacco finds that more than 300 million people in at least 70 countries use these harmful products. The report, Smokeless Tobacco and Public Health: A Global Perspective, is being released today by the CDC and the National Cancer Institute at the National Conference on Smoking or Health in Mumbai, India. Thirty-two leading experts from around the world contributed to the report.The serious health effects of smokeless tobacco have been documented. As the report explains, there is sufficient evidence to conclude that smokeless tobacco causes oral cancer, esophageal cancer, and pancreatic cancer in humans.