Sep 28, 2018

In August of 2013, eight months into his volunteer deployment in Afghanistan, Michael Mai noticed a small lump between his neck and shoulder. The former world-class hammer thrower initially brushed it off as nothing but was later diagnosed with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL). Mai came to NIH and received treatment from Mark Roschewski, M.D., Clinical Director of the Lymphoid Malignancies Branch, that ultimately cleared him of the disease. Read more...

Sep 25, 2018

Kenneth Kraemer, M.D., Senior Investigator in the Laboratory of Cancer Biology and Genetics, has received the 2018 Environmental Mutagenesis and Genomics Society (EMGS) Award. The annual award is given in recognition of outstanding research contributions in environmental mutagenisis. Dr. Kraemer is presenting the plenary lecture at the 2018 EMGS Annual Meeting on September 25, 2018, in San Antonio, Texas. Read more...

Sep 19, 2018

Barry O’Keefe, Ph.D., Acting Chief of the Molecular Targets Program and Chief of the Natural Products Branch of the Division of Cancer Treatment and Diagnosis, was featured in a ShareAmerica article. Dr. O’Keefe, along with an international team of scientists, worked together to figure out how to combine three HIV-blocking proteins into ordinary seeds of rice that could be turned into an ointment to prevent HIV infections. In the article, Dr. O’Keefe discusses natural products, particularly a powerful protein in marine red algae from New Zealand that he first showed in 2005 could work to kill HIV-related microbes. Read more...

Sep 18, 2018

Center for Cancer Research investigators led by James Kochenderfer, M.D., of the Experimental Transplantation and Immunology Branch, are conducting a clinical trial to test a new chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy in patients whose multiple myeloma has persisted or relapsed despite standard therapy. Their goal is to develop a CAR T-cell therapy that provides lasting remission of a disease that remains highly resistant to current treatments. Read more...

Sep 17, 2018

Nirali N. Shah, M.D., MHSc, Associate Research Physician in the Pediatric Oncology Branch, was recently featured in a follow-up story to a previous NPR “Shots” blog post. The post follows Aaron, a 20-year-old man from Lucedale, Mississippi, in an early-stage CAR-T clinical trial. This post revealed how Aaron responded to his latest round of treatment.  Read more...

Sep 14, 2018

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved moxetumomab pasudotox for the treatment of some patients with hairy cell leukemia (HCL). A CCR researcher team led by Ira Pastan, M.D., Senior Investigator in the Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB), discovered the drug, which was later licensed to MedImmune/AstraZeneca for clinical development. Robert Kreitman, M.D., Senior Investigator in LMB, led the clinical trials that showed moxetumomab to be an effective option for patients with relapsed or refractory HCL. Read more...

Sep 10, 2018

Elaine S. Jaffe, M.D., Senior Investigator in the Laboratory of Pathology, will be giving the Paulette Shriey Pritchett Endowed Lecture in Pathology at the University of Alabama-Birmingham (UAB) on September 17. This endowed lecture series is named in honor of Dr. Paulette Shirey Pritchett, a highly respected member of the UAB Pathology Department who unexpectedly passed away on August 4, 1984. Read more...

Sep 7, 2018

A laboratory study comparing the microbiome of human lung cancer tissue with non-cancerous lung tissue found higher amounts of specific types of bacteria in lung cancer tissue from smokers, especially tissue comprised of squamous non-small cells with mutations that turn off the TP53 tumor-suppressor gene. This finding could point the way to using bacteria in the microbiome of smokers as biomarkers for early detection of the disease. Read more...

Sep 4, 2018

September is leukemia and lymphoma awareness month. Lymphoma is a broad term for cancer that begins in cells of the lymph system. The two main types are Hodgkin lymphoma and non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL). Leukemia is a broad term for cancers of the blood cells. The type of leukemia depends on the type of blood cell that becomes cancer and whether it grows quickly or slowly. To learn more about our leukemia and lymphoma research, click here.

Aug 29, 2018

The HIV Dynamics and Replication Program, Center for Cancer Research, NCI, is organizing this half-day conference to showcase the latest findings in the broad field of viral persistence. A major barrier to the successful eradication of many viral infections, including HIV, herpes viruses, Ebola virus and others, persistence is governed by a complex web of viral and cellular factors acting at the level of individuals and populations. An in-depth discussion of how viruses persist while hosts resist should lead to new strategies aimed at eliminating viruses entrenched in humans. Read more...