New gene-based blood tests can detect skin cancers
New York, April 3 (IANS) Researchers have found that two new gene-based blood tests can reliably detect previously unidentifiable forms of one of the most aggressive forms of skin cancer.
Having quick and accurate monitoring tools for all types of metastatic melanoma, the medical term for the disease, may make it easier for physicians to detect early signs of cancer recurrence, the researchers said.
The new blood tests, which take only 48 hours, are currently only available for research purposes.
“Our goal is to use these tests to make more informed treatment decisions and, specifically, to identify as early as possible when a treatment has stopped working, cancer growth has resumed, and the patient needs to switch therapy,” said senior study investigator and dermatologist David Polsky, Professor at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York.
The new tools are the first to identify melanoma DNA in the blood of patients whose cancer is spreading and who lack defects in either the BRAF or NRAS genes, already known to drive cancer growth, the study authors said.
The new tests monitor blood levels of DNA fragments, known as circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA), that are released into the blood when tumour cells die and break apart, said Polsky who presented his team’s latest findings at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research in Washington, DC.
Specifically, the tests detect evidence of changes in the chemical building blocks (or mutations) of a gene that controls telomerase reverse transcriptase (TERT), a protein that helps cancer cells maintain the physical structure of their chromosomes.
The blood tests, developed in conjunction with Bio-Rad Laboratories in Hercules, California, may have advantages over current methods for monitoring the disease because the tests avoid the radiation exposure that comes with CT scans, and the tests can be performed more easily and more often, Polsky said.
Common plastic chemical may increase breast cancer risk
New York, April 3 (IANS) An endocrine-disrupting chemical commonly found in polycarbonate hard plastics, currency bills and thermal paper receipts may potentially interfere with the body’s hormones to increase the aggressiveness of breast cancer, a new study has showed.
Bisphenol S (BPS), a substitute for the chemical bisphenol A (BPA) in the plastic industry, acts like estrogen in multiplying breast cancer cells.
Most breast cancers are estrogen receptor positive, and, according to the National Cancer Institute, 55 to 65 per cent of women who inherit a harmful mutation in the BRCA1 gene — will develop breast cancer.
“If a woman has a mutated BRAC1 gene and uses products containing BPS, her risk for developing breast cancer may increase further,” said principal investigator, Sumi Dinda, Associate Professor at Oakland University in Michigan.
“Despite hopes for a safer alternative to BPA, studies have shown BPS to exhibit similar estrogen-mimicking behaviour to BPA,” Dinda added.
The results were presented at ENDO 2017, the Endocrine Society’s 99th annual meeting in Orlando.
For the study, the team used two commercially available breast cancer cell lines obtained from women with estrogen-receptor-positive breast cancer, to expose the cancer cells to varying strengths of BPS or to an inactive substance as a control.
Compared with the control, BPS heightened the protein expression in estrogen receptor and BRCA1 after 24 hours, as did estrogen.
After a six-day treatment with BPS, the breast cancer cells in both cell lines reportedly increased in number by 12 per cent at the lowest dose (4 micromolars) and by 60 per cent at eight micromolars.