Brain Tumor

"Obese men have more blood circulating throughout their bodies than normal weight men, and as a result, the concentration of prostate-specific antigen, or PSA, in the blood — the gold standard for detecting prostate cancer — can become diluted," said Stephen Freedland, M.D., a Duke urologist and senior researcher on the study.* "We’ve known for [...]

In prostate tumors samples taken from African-American and Caucasian men, the researchers found that two proteins are overproduced in 90 percent of tumor cells from the African-Americans studied. These structural proteins, called hnRNP-H1 and SAFB-2, in part comprise the nuclear matrix, the mesh of molecules that serves as the supporting "skeleton" of the cell’s nucleus. [...]

"Since we are manipulating the target gene itself, we can ask, ‘What will happen?’ If we turn it off, what happens? That recapitulates the effect of a specific drug," said Dr. David Spencer, professor of immunology at BCM. "By turning the gene on and off at various time points, we can define a ‘susceptibility window’ [...]

Several studies have documented increased survival when androgen (male sex hormone) suppression therapy (AST) is combined with external beam radiation therapy (RT) compared with RT alone in the treatment of unfavorable localized and locally advanced prostate cancer. However, comorbid (co-existing) illnesses may increase the negative effects of specific anti-cancer treatments such as AST, altering the [...]

A significant proportion of human prostate cancers carry a chromosomal rearrangement that results in the overexpression of the ETS transcription factor ERG, a protein that controls gene expression. Until now, the functional significance of this event has been poorly understood. Studying prostate cells in transgenic mice, Vasioukhin, Nelson and colleagues at the Hutchinson Center and [...]

Having high levels of male sex hormones, known as androgens, has long been hypothesized as a risk factor for prostate cancer. Nearly two dozen prospective studies have examined the relationship between circulating sex hormones and prostate cancer risk, but the results have been inconsistent. Andrew Roddam, D.Phil., of the University of Oxford in England and [...]

In an article published in the February 2008 journal, The Prostate, epidemiologist Edwin van Wijngaarden, Ph.D., reports that PSA levels were 22 percent higher among American men who had zinc levels below the median (less than 12.67 mg/daily) and cadmium levels above the median. (PSA is a protein produced by the cells of the prostate [...]

Previously, the team’s research has shown that a single PSA test at age 50 or younger could predict the presence of prostate cancer in men up to 25 years in advance of diagnosis. "This latest study is a unique, natural experiment to test whether we can predict advanced prostate cancer many years before it is [...]

The finding echoes earlier results on PSA concentrations found in obese and overweight men with prostate cancer and highlights the need to reconsider PSA threshold values for heavier patients, and to encourage those patients to get serious about losing weight. "A study released last year from our group showed that obese and overweight men with [...]

"Discovery of common variations is very exciting. Building on this finding we may be able to identify men at highest risk for prostate cancer, diagnose the disease earlier, and hopefully prevent it all together. One of the next steps is to understand the mechanism by which genetic variation exerts its effect on cancer risk," said [...]