Life Sciences & Biotechnology Update articles from December 2000

Life Sciences & Biotechnology Update archives from December 2000

HIGH-PERFORMANCE DISPLAYS FOR MAMMOGRAPHY.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Arizona) research program is directed toward the development of markedly improved high-performance displays, designed to enhance diagnosis in digital mammography. The activities center on the delivery and first use of the...

MULTIPLE-CAMERA BREAST IMAGER.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Arizona) report summarizes work involving: optimization of the geometry of the system configuration; emulating the system point-spread function; developing an algorithm to generate three-dimensional reconstructions;...

RADICAL DIFFERENCES IN BREAST CANCER SCREENING HABITS BETWEEN WHITE AND BLACK WOMEN.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Pennsylvania) report addresses radical differences in breast cancer screening habits between white and black women. Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer mortality in African-American women. Studies have reported...

BRCA1's ROLE IN NORMAL MAMMARY EPITHELIAL DEVELOPMENT AND TUMORIGENESIS.
December 1, 2000... This (University of North Carolina) report addresses the role of BRAC1 in normal mammary epithelial development and tumorigenesis. Breast cancer is the most common serious malignancy affecting women. It afflicts an estimated one in eight...

THE ROLE OF THE IAP GENE FAMILY IN BREAST CANCER.
December 1, 2000... Dysregulation of the control of both cellular proliferation and cell death contributes to tumor growth. Consistent with this hypothesis, overexpression of genes that block apoptosis is observed in tumors. Furthermore, upregulation of genes...

IDENTIFYING AND ISOLATING BREAST-CANCER-ASSOCIATED GENES ON CHROMOSOME 11.
December 1, 2000... This (Health Research Inc.) work addresses the identification and isolation of breast-cancer- associated genes on chromosome 11. There is a region on human chromosome 11, at pl 5.5, that has been associated with the breast cancer phenotype....

EPIDEMIOLOGICAL STUDY OF DIET AND LIFE-STYLE FACTORS AMONG HAWAIIAN-AMERICAN WOMEN HAVING BREAST CANCER.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Hawaii) report presents a cohort study of American women of Hawaiian ancestry who have one of the highest incidence rates of breast cancer in the world. It is designed to see if the type of dietary fat, specific sources of...

IDENTIFICATION AND LOCALIZATION OF GENES THAT RESTORE SENESCENCE IN BREAST CANCER CELLS.
December 1, 2000... Using a combination of positional and functional cloning, this (Temple University) work maps SEN 16 to a l00xb region at 16q24.3. Intact normal human chromosome 16, when transferred into immortal human (MCF & SKBR-3) and rat (LA7 & NMU)...

DIOXIN, PCB, AND ORGANOCHLORINE LEVELS IN BREAST ADIPOSE TISSUE FROM WOMEN WITH AND WITHOUT BEAST CANCER.
December 1, 2000... This (Public Health Institute) case-control study explores associations between breast cancer in San Francisco Bay Area women and body burdens of organochlorine chemicals, including dioxins, furans, PCBs, and pesticides. The selected...

A COMPREHENSIVE REPOSITORY FOR NORMAL AND TUMOR BREAST TISSUES AND CELLS.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center) documents details the establishment of a breast tissue repository containing over 250 individual breast specimens. In addition, cryopreserved and cultured cells from human breast tumor...

ANALYSIS OF GENETIC MARKERS TO CHARACTERIZE BREAST CANCER PROGRESSION.
December 1, 2000... This (Armed Forces Institute of Pathology) study characterizes breast cancer progression by analysis of genetic markers. The earliest events in the pathogenesis of breast cancer typically involve the loss of a normal growth regulatory...

CARCINOGEN-INDUCED MICROENVIRONMENT IN BREAST CANCER.
December 1, 2000... These (University of California) studies address the question of how abnormal stromal-epithelial interactions affect the progression of cancer cells. Studies in mouse mammary gland reveal that ionizing radiation, a known human breast...

BUTYRATE THERAPY FOR POORLY DIFFERENTIATED BREAST CANCER.
December 1, 2000... This (Dartmouth College) research program focuses on butyrate therapy for poorly differentiated breast cancer. The research is directed at providing a 24 hr regimen of butyric acidemia, which exceeds 5 mM butyrate while remaining below 5mM....

TARGETING THE MUTATED EPIDERMAL GROWTH FACTOR RECEPTOR.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Pennsylvania) project aims at developing specific and effective vaccines for immunotherapy of breast cancer. Mutated epidermal growth factor receptor (MEGF-R) is expressed on a high proportion of breast carcinoma lesions...

ENHANCING ANTI-TUMOR IMMUNITY USING NOVEL GENE THERAPY.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Maryland) report describes the immunogenicity of the transfected tumor cells that co-express I-Ad and B7.1 molecules, which is investigated in different ways. Experiments with both 66.1/Ad/B7 and 410.4/Ad/B7 clones...

THE SUPPRESSION OF VASCULAR GROWTH IN BREAST CANCER.
December 1, 2000... The growth of solid tumors is strictly dependent on new blood vessel formation. This relationship has led to interest in compounds/drugs with potential to block blood vessel growth, or angiogenesis, in tumors. Clinical trials are currently...

TARGETS FOR THERAPEUTIC INTERVENTION IN BREAST CANCER: D-Myc PROTEIN-PROTEIN AND PROTEIN-DNA INTERACTIONS.
December 1, 2000... Basic-helix-loop-helix (bHLH) transcription factor proteins are involved in cell growth and differentiation, and the bHLH protein c-Myc has been implicated in breast cancer. This (Center for Blood Research) work determines that the sequence...

RISK FACTORS AND INTERVENTION FOR BREAST CANCER FOLLOWING HODGKIN'S DISEASE.
December 1, 2000... Analysis of 1380 survivors of childhood Hodgkin's disease (HD) has shown a 75-fold increased risk of breast cancer. This (University of Minnesota) document details a proposal to identify a sub-population among survivors of HD who are at an...

ENHANCEMENT OF WELL-BEING DURING RECURRENCE OF BREAST CANCER.
December 1, 2000... Significant numbers of breast cancer patients will experience a recurrence of their disease. Breast cancer recurrence is a time of enormous crisis, with significant distress, depression, and symptomatology, and few effective coping...

CANCER PATIENT EXPECTATIONS FOR EXPERIENCING CHEMOTHERAPY-INDUCED NAUSEA AND VOMITING, AND SUBSEQUENT SYMPTOM DEVELOPMENT.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Rochester) report on a predoctoral training grant, describes work by a social psychology student and a former cancer patient intending to work with cancer control, on the psychosocial aspects of coping with cancer. Areas...

THE NATION'S LEADING CAUSES OF DEATH: CHRONIC DISEASES AND THEIR RISK FACTORS.
December 1, 2000... This extensive (National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion) document provides information on the burden of chronic diseases in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The first section provides a national...

BURN TREATMENT USING GROWTH HORMONE AND FGF-1/FIBRIN GLUE.
December 1, 2000... This (National Center for Injury Prevention and Control) study addresses acidic fibroblast growth factor incorporated into an adhesive fibrin scaffold, with systematically administered human growth hormone, which is used to speed up tissue...

STRATEGIES FOR PREVENTION OF DIABETES.
December 1, 2000... This document from Canada (Ontario Chief Medical Officer of Health) highlights the growing public health problem of diabetes. It identifies risk factors and recommends preventive strategies to individuals and families, communities, health...

ETIOLOGY OF PARKINSON'S DISEASE: STUDY OF ENVIRONMENTAL AND GENETIC INTERACTIONS.
December 1, 2000... This (University of Rochester) project studies environmental and genetic interactions in the etiology of Parkinson's disease. The scope of the project is to use transgenic mice and tissue culture methods to determine the role of...

ANALYSIS OF RISK FACTORS AND AN IMMUNOLOGIC AND NEUROPSYCHIATRIC ASSESSMENT OF SYMPTOMATIC PERSIAN GULF VETERANS.
December 1, 2000... This (Vistar Inc.) report addresses risk factors and an immunologic and neuropsychiatric assessment of symptomatic Persian Gulf War veterans. Veterans returning from the Persian Gulf report a myriad of complaints. Several hypotheses have...

USING A LOW-ENERGY LASER TO TREAT RETINAL INJURIES.
December 1, 2000... This translation from Israel (Weizmann Institute of Science) addresses the treatment of retinal injuries by low-energy laser. Injury to the central nervous system (CNS) in general, and to the visual system (retina or optic nerve) in...

RELATION OF GENES TO PROSTATE CANCER OCCURRENCE AND AGGRESSIVENESS.
December 1, 2000... This (Case Western Reserve University) program studies brothers having prostate cancer, in order to investigate the potential relation between genetic factors and the disease. The brothers are being recruited into the study from registries at...

CRYSTALLIZATION, X-RAY STRUCTURE DETERMINATION, AND STRUCTURE-BASED DRUG DESIGN, FOR TARGETED MALARIAL ENZYMES.
December 1, 2000... This (Army Medical Research and Materiel Command) work has successfully expressed at least six recombinant proteins of Plasmodium falciparum. The effort has crystallized and determined the structure of two of these proteins, the lactate...

ETHICAL ISSUES AND POLICY GUIDANCE FOR RESEARCH INVOLVING HUMAN BIOLOGICAL MATERIALS.
December 1, 2000... This (National Bioethics Advisory Commission) report contains the following contents: Privacy and the Analysis of Stored Tissues; An Ethical Framework for Biological Samples Policy; Research on Human Tissue; Religion Perspectives; Stored...

MEMBRANE-BASED FUNCTIONS INVOLVED IN THE ORIGIN OF CELLULAR LIFE.
December 1, 2000... The objective of this (NASA) work is to help explain how the earliest ancestors of contemporary cells (protocells) performed their essential functions employing only the molecules available in the protobiological milieu. The hypothesis is...

COST-BENEFITS ANALYSIS OF AEROSPACE HEALTH-MONITORING SYSTEM TECHNOLOGIES.
December 1, 2000... The subject of sensor-based structural health monitoring is very diverse and encompasses a wide-range of activities, including: initiatives and innovations involving the development of advanced sensor; signal processing; data analysis; and...