Synthetic molecules designed by two Hebrew University of Jerusalem researchers have succeeded in reducing and even eliminating the growth of human malignant tissues in mice, while having no toxic effects on normal tissue.

The gene that allows fireflies to flash is helping researchers track the effectiveness of anti-cancer drugs over time.

Heart damage from certain anti-cancer drugs no longer should be regarded as a rare or relatively unimportant complication, scientists in Italy have concluded in a new overview of research on the cardiotoxicity of anti-cancer drugs.

The first analysis of the genetic determinants of resistance to the anti-cancer drug methotrexate in childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) could offer a pathway to predicting such resistance and treatments to overcome it, according to a St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital study.

New scientific evidence is helping to build a compelling case for oncolytic viruses as a first-line and adjunctive treatment for many cancers.

A new study highlighted on the cover of this week's issue of Cancer Research finds that the anti-cancer drug Gleevec® is far more effective against a drug-resistant strain of cancer when the drug wraps the target with a molecular bandage that seals out water from a critical area. The research appears as a priority report in the journal's May 1 issue.

An international research team, led by investigators from the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Cancer Center and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute (DFCI), has found a new way that some lung tumors become resistant to treatment with targeted therapy drugs like Iressa and Tarceva.

The cancerous cells of some individuals with breast cancer lack expression of two cell surface proteins, the estrogen and progesterone receptors, and do not express increased amounts of HER2. Individuals with such breast cancer (known as triple-negative breast cancer) do not respond to treatment with commonly used chemotherapeutic drugs and their prognosis is relatively poor.

Integrating the use of drugs targeted to specific cancer proteins into current chemotherapy regimens to improve the efficacy of systemic treatment is an important clinical goal at Fox Chase Cancer Center.

Researchers at the Kimmel Cancer Center at Jefferson have identified a protein that they say is key to helping a quarter of all breast cancers spread. The finding, reported online the week of April 9, 2007 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could be a potential target for new drugs aimed at stopping or slowing the growth and progression of breast cancer.