Scientists have shown how accelerated biological aging measured by an epigenetic clock may increase the risk of bowel cancer, according to a new report.

A new approach could cut the time it takes to alter patients‘ immune cells for infusion back into the body to find and attack cancer. The cell manufacturing process for this type of immunotherapy that was pioneered at Penn — CAR T cell therapy — typically takes nine to 14 days. In a pre-clinical study, scientists have abbreviated this process and generated functional CAR T cells with enhanced anti-tumor potency in just 24 hours.

Researchers discovered that two distinct classes of fibroblast cells accumulate in pancreatic tumors and play opposing roles to promote and restrain pancreatic cancer growth. Appropriately targeting these cells may offer options to improve treatment outcomes.

Lack of access to health care, social determinants of health, preexisting comorbidities and reduced access to clinical research are common to both cancer and COVID-19 in Black individuals. Together these two diseases create a perfect storm in this population, a new study indicates.

A new study creates a detailed ‚atlas‘ of the various cell types and their gene activities within the highly specialized fallopian tube, paving the way for new research into infertility and other diseases affecting this organ, including some cancers.

The current treatment of patients diagnosed with advanced or metastatic head and neck cancer (HNC) is ineffective. Researchers have investigated and validated a potential treatment combination against the aggressive disease driven by hyper-activation of a specific signaling pathway, which is found in over 40 percent of HNC patients.

Adding an anti-inflammatory medication to immunotherapy and standard chemotherapy drugs may provide long-term suppression of aggressive bladder tumor growth, according to a proof-of-concept study.

With help from the best tweezers in the world a team of researchers has shed new light on a fundamental mechanism in all living cells that helps them explore their surroundings and even invade tissue. Their discovery could have implications for research into cancer, neurological disorders and much else.

Thanks to antiretroviral therapy, HIV infection is no longer the life sentence it once was. But despite the effectiveness of drugs to manage and treat the virus, it can never be fully eliminated from the human body, lingering in some cells deep in different human tissues where it goes unnoticed by the immune system. Now, new research by University of Alberta immunologist Shokrollah Elahi reveals a possible answer to the mystery of why infected people can’t get rid of HIV altogether. Elahi and his team found that in HIV patients, killer T cells — a type of white blood cells responsible for identifying and destroying cells infected with viruses — have very little to none of a protein called CD73. Because CD73 is responsible for migration and cell movement into the tissue, the lack of the protein compromises the ability of killer T cells to find and eliminate HIV-infected cells, explained Elahi.

Scientists have now created a powerful new method for generating protein drugs. Using computers, they designed molecules that can target important proteins in the body, such as the insulin receptor, as well as vulnerable proteins on the surface of viruses. This solves a long-standing challenge in drug development and may lead to new treatments for cancer, diabetes, infection, inflammation, and beyond.

Researchers have discovered another way tumor cells transfer genetic material to other cells in their microenvironment, causing cancer to spread.

The A2A receptor regulates how vigorously the innate immune system attacks diseased cells. Researchers have now been able to show for the first time how an important inhibitor binds to the receptor. In the future, the results will facilitate the targeted search for molecules that give the innate immune system more punch. These could for instance be used in the fight against cancer, but also against brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease.

Half of all women experience a false positive mammogram after 10 years of annual breast cancer screening with 3D mammography, a UC Davis-led study estimates. This risk was lower for women who had mammograms every other year. 3D screening showed slightly lower false positive results than standard mammography.

Treatment for glioma has long relied on MRI imaging to track tumor markers and treatment response. But new findings suggest a new method could provide additional data about tumor markers before changes appear on an MRI, indicating possible strategies to help clinicians address this aggressive form of cancer.

Researchers have developed a novel method to identify aggressive early-stage lung cancers and target drugs known as aurora kinase inhibitors to tumors that are especially likely to respond to them. The findings could lead to great advances in treatment for lung adenocarcinoma, the most common type of lung cancer.

Artificial sweeteners reduce added sugar content and corresponding calories while maintaining sweetness. A new study suggests that some artificial sweeteners are associated with increased cancer risk.

Researchers found that the cells of humans and animals who have recovered from tuberculosis had prematurely aged up to 12 to 14 years. It’s possible that this premature cellular aging is one reason why survivors of tuberculosis have a high risk of mortality.

Researchers have developed an implantable biotechnology that produces and releases CAR-T cells for attacking cancerous tumors. In a proof-of-concept study involving lymphoma in mice, the researchers found that treatment with the implants was faster and more effective than conventional CAR-T cell cancer treatment.

Pancreatic cancer is notoriously difficult to cure or even treat. Now, a new strategy has succeeded in making pancreatic tumors visible to the immune systems of mice and vulnerable to immune attack, reducing cancer metastases by 87%.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved a novel therapy for patients with metastatic or inoperable melanoma, an aggressive type of skin cancer.

Invading armies need a steady supply of fuel and armaments. That’s just as true when the invaders are cells, such as when tumor cells break away and spread to other parts of the body in a process called metastasis — the most deadly part of cancer. Now, a study in C. elegans worms provides new insight into how invading cells deploy fuel to the front lines of invasion to power their break-through machinery.

The findings of a new study suggest that a ketogenic diet — which is low in carbohydrates and protein, but high in fat — helps to kill pancreatic cancer cells when combined with a triple-drug therapy. In laboratory experiments, the ketogenic diet decreased glucose (sugar) levels in the tumor, suggesting the diet helped starve the cancer. In addition, this diet elevated ketone bodies produced by the liver, which put additional stress on the cancer cells.

Scientists have identified variants in two genes that are associated with accelerated aging in childhood cancer survivors.

Just one dose of a new nanoparticle-based COVID-19 vaccine was enough to produce an immune response in animals on track with vaccines currently in clinical use. And with minor changes, researchers hope the same vaccine platform could target other infectious diseases.

The appearance of ovarian lesions on ultrasound is an effective predictor of cancer risk that can help women avoid unnecessary surgery, according to a new study.