Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Well, it's been a long time since I last wrote!

Busy winter--this past weekend my lab students presented their reserach at the New England Science Symposium at Harvard Medical School. Rafaela Penarreta gave a talk on her research on the use of a concentrated fern extract in pre-clinical studies of breast cancer solid tumors with different genetic signatures. Deanna Diamond, Laura Brustolon and Hua Wang presented posters. It was truly an amazing day!

In April our lab will be presenting research at the Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research to be held in Washington, DC--it looks like a wonderful spring awaits.

Who knows, I may start writing more often....

Welcome- a new semester

Welcome to all readers! A new semester begins- after a busy, but wonderful summer. I spent part of August in England. I gave a lecture at Cambridge University at the International Conference on Science and Society. It was a wonderful experience to give a presentation at this historic setting!

This Fall, I will post cancer research news from my lab and from the cancer research scientific community. In mid-September, I will present our research at a meeting on stem cells at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. I will keep you posted on this important area of research.

cancer metabolism

Monday, July 20, 2009

Just a brief thought for today....About a century ago Dr Otto Warburg noticed that cancer cells have a high rate of glycolysis (glucose metabolism) compared to normal cells which process glucose completely to CO2 and H20 by a complex process called oxidative phosphorylation...this high glucose utilization by tumor cells is called 'The Warburg Effect' after its discoverer.

solid tumor structure

Today's thought concerns an email question that came across my desk today... it concerned solid tumor structure and the effectiveness of anti-cancer agents.

Recent studies on the tumor 'micro-environment' indicate that the abnormal structural parameters of solid tumors may restrict drug uptake by individual tumor cells buried within the tumor. This is a problem of drug delivery...should the tumor micro-environment be manipulated by agents that breakdown solid tumor structure to increase the efficiency of drug delivery?

This is a complex question and speaks directly to the biophysical parameters associated with tumors and their effects on the efficacy of chemotherapeutic agents....no doubt it plays a role in defining drug resistance properties that limit the general effectiveness of chemotherapy.

what's new today

Hi readers

Right now we are studying the anti-cancer properties of ferns- we are studying ferns endogenous to the Northeast USA and have recently engaged the assistance of the NY Botanical garden who will provide samples of ferns from this region so that we can assess the individual species for potential anti-cancer activity in human solid tumor cell lines representative of many types of cancer.

More on this tomorrow....