UCSF’s Elizabeth Blackburn joins an elite group of women scientists that has received the Nobel Prize in Medicine. Her award brings the number of female recipients to 10, out of a total of 195 scientists who have received the award since it was established in 1901. Watch the video of today’s Nobel press conference:
Updates from October, 2009 Hide threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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UCSF’s Elizabeth Blackburn Wins Nobel Prize in Medicine
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I-Spy Trial Offers Key Insights Into Locally Advanced Breast Cancer
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Dr. Laura Esserman, director of UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center’s Breast Care Center is spearheading the development of a clinical trials model designed to accelerate and improve the efficiency with which experimental breast cancer therapies are assessed. The strategy, which involves the use of molecular markers and MRI, utilizes “adaptive design,” in which drugs are assessed over the course of months – rather than decades – and the information used in real time to direct the course of a trial.
The series of studies are known as I-SPY (investigation of serial studies to predict therapeutic response with imaging and molecular analysis) and are being carried out in patients with locally advanced i.e., aggressive – breast cancer. The goals of I-SPY are to establish a clinical trials model that supports the identification of drugs targeting the molecular profiles of aggressive cancers, and to reduce the duration of the drug-assessment process from the current 15 to 20 years down to a few years.
Dr. Esserman’s team presents several findings at ASCO today. One provocative finding shows that large, locally advanced forms of breast cancer often emerge between regular mammogram exams. These “interval” cancers present an important opportunity for doctors and patients to take advantage of neoadjuvant therapies in advance of surgery, with the hope they would be responsive. The other finding is that using molecular markers, UCSF researchers identified a subset of patients who do well regardless of how they respond to neoadjuvant treatment. They also identified a subset with poor prognosis for whom response to neoadjuvant therapy is a good predictor of long term outcome.
Read the press release:
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Susan Desmond-Hellmann Named UCSF Chancellor
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Susan Desmond-Hellmann, one of FORTUNE’s Most Powerful Women in Business, will become the first woman to serve as UCSF chancellor. The appointment, unanimously approved by the UC Board of Regents today, takes effect August 3, 2009.
Desmond-Hellmann, 51, brings a deep clinical, research, and executive leadership background and commitment to high-quality patient care to the position of UCSF chancellor. She is a board-certified physician in internal medicine and medical oncology who has dedicated much of her career to cancer research. She was with South San Francisco-based Genentech for 14 years – as clinical scientist, chief medical officer, executive vice president and president – where she has overseen successful trials for therapeutic drugs, including Herceptin, Avastin and Rituxan, targeting a range of cancers and other diseases. Says Desmond-Hellman:
I began my career at UCSF, and my heart has never left it..My life’s work has been focused on making a difference for patients, and I cannot think of a better place than UCSF to carry that work forward. As the health needs of the world continue to change, UCSF will continue to play a pivotal role in developing solutions through its research, teaching and clinical care across all the health disciplines.
How to “Redirect” an Alzheimer’s Patient: Caregiver Tips
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How do you “redirect” a dementia patient who wants to “go home” or speak to someone who is no longer alive? How do you respond to a loved one who is living in a reality which isn’t yours? Here are a few tips that I posted yesterday on Defeat Dementia, a Facebook group which provides information and support to caregivers of dementia patients:
• Don’t worry about convincing her that her loved one has already passed away, but to pay attention to the emotion she is expressing.
• Sometimes it is helpful to encourage the patient to talk about her loved one. Try questions like “what did you do with your (mom) when you were little?”, “What do you want to say to your (mom)?”
• Perhaps having a photo of her loved one available that you can look at together, ask her to tell a story about her loved one, might be strategies that would satisfy her.
• If necessary, some caregivers have tried a white lie, like “Your (mother) lives someplace else now.” or “I can’t take you there today. Maybe tomorrow.”
• It’s helpful to try to stay in the patient’s reality, and the death of her loved one is no longer a part of her reality, so saying her (mother) is dead only confuses her.
Source: UCSF Memory and Aging Center
For more information, visit the Defeat Dementia website, join our Facebook Group, visit the UCSF Memory and Aging Channel on YouTube, or check out UCSF’s Memory and Aging Center website.
links for 2009-02-24
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New Theory About the Cause of Alzheimer’s Disease – a Prenatal Link?
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New research at Genentech provides a provocative theory about the cause of Alzheimer’s disease and suggests potential new targets for therapies to treat it, reports Ron Winslow in the February 19 issue of the Wall Street Journal.
The prevailing view about what causes Alzheimer’s disease is that deposits called beta amyloid accumulate in the brain, destroying nerve cells and ultimately, the patient’s memory. Now, new research shows there’s a very different way of looking at the disease.
The Genentech/Salk Institute team of researchers propose that a normal process in which excess nerve cells and nerve fibers are pruned from the brain during prenatal development is somehow reactivated in the adult brain and “hijacked” to cause the death of such cells in Alzheimer’s patients, writes Winslow.
According to Marc Tessier-Lavigne, executive vice president, research drug discovery at Genentech, the new findings offer evidence that “Alzheimer’s is not just bad luck, but rather it is the activation of a pathway that is there for development purposes.”
Genentech has identified potential drug candidates based on the findings and says that it may take many years for any potential treatment to be developed.
The research was published Thursday in the journal Nature.
NOTE: The photos of normal and dead nerve fibers above are from Dr. Tessier-Lavigne.
links for 2009-02-17
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Creating Designer Babies: the Smackdown Continues
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PGD, or pre-implantation genetic diagnosis is being used to screen embryos for diseases such as cancer, and it’s now being used to pick traits like gender, eye and hair color. Last month, the New Scientist reported that the first UK baby genetically selected to be free of a form of breast cancer caused by BRCA1 was born in London. Gautam Naik reported in February 12 issue of The Wall Street Journal that LA- based Fertility Institutes, will soon help couples select both gender and physical traits in a baby when they undergo fertility treatment. Dr. Jeff Steinberg, director of the clinic, claims that trait selection “is a service” that he intends “to offer soon.”
Are we going too far? You decide.
New Gene Therapy Targets Alzheimer’s
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A new approach to delivering gene therapy to the brain to treat neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, was revealed in research findings published in the February 4 online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
UCSF neuroscientist Dr. Krystof Bankiewicz has developed a promising way to get nerve cells to help disperse gene therapy to targeted brain cells. He uses a technique called convection-enhanced delivery. The fluid containing the gene therapy is injected under pressure, delivered in pulses. Says Bankiewicz:
For the first time, specific regions of the cortex can be supplied with therapeutic agents by targeting defined regions of the thalamus…Translational experiments now are in progress to evaluate the potential of this unique gene delivery technology for the treatment of cortical dementias such as Alzheimer’s disease…
Bankiewicz’s research at UCSF has a strong focus on the development of practical approaches to gene and cell replacement therapies; he synthesizes several individual technologies into powerful new approaches to the treatment of such serious disease as brain cancer and neurodegenerative disorders, including Parkinson’s disease.
Source: Science Cafe
