Earlier this year, a novel drug became the first agent to receive U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval for patients with multiple myeloma who have exhausted all types of currently available therapies, including proteasome inhibitors, immunomodulatory drugs and monoclonal antibodies. A clinical trial found that 26.2 percent of such patients responded with significant shrinkage … Read more
Medically reviewed by David M. Weinstock, MD, and Eric Jacobsen, MD By banding together to study the basic biology and vulnerabilities of T-cell lymphoma, scientists at several major cancer research centers have sparked a surge of clinical trials of promising treatments for the disease. The string of new trials, some already open, some expected to … Read more
Medically reviewed by Rachael Grace, MD In the mid-1960s, David G. Nathan, MD, president emeritus of Dana-Farber and, at that time, a hematologist at Boston Children’s Hospital, published some of the first reports on a rare, inherited type of anemia caused by the breakdown of red blood cells because of a lack of a key … Read more
In 1992, when he launched his own Dana-Farber laboratory, William G. Kaelin, Jr, MD, was well-positioned to make potentially landmark discoveries. As a physician, he had an encyclopedic knowledge of human diseases, including rare genetic conditions like von Hippel-Lindau (VHL) disease, which is associated with an elevated risk of benign and malignant tumors, particularly in the kidney. … Read more
Medically reviewed by Catherine J. Wu, MD Within every human cell, a fateful balance prevails. The mitochondria — where nutrients from food are converted into fuel for the cell — serve as a kind of jury box where pro-survival proteins contend with proteins that favor cell death. In the ebb and flow of these proteins, … Read more
William G. Kaelin, Jr., MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, won a Nobel Prize in Medicine on Oct. 7 for deciphering the mechanism that enables cells to sense and adapt to changes in oxygen abundance. Kaelin participated in a live Q&A with Stat on Oct. 17. Below are highlights. What are the most important applications of … Read more
There was always a good chance William G. Kaelin Jr., MD, and two other scientists working on the same problem would share a Nobel Prize, as they did on Oct. 7, for deciphering the mechanism that enables cells to sense and adapt to changes in oxygen abundance. The three had already been honored with two major awards … Read more
Medically reviewed by Jun Qi, PhD Cancer is extremely clever at finding ways to survive, so even the most successful new drugs tend to become less effective over time as the tumors develop resistance. Often, cancer cells become resistant because of changes in the cells’ genetic code, allowing them to counteract or sidestep the drugs’ … Read more
Medically reviewed by Andrew Lane, MD, PhD Dana-Farber scientists had a perfectly reasonable theory of why acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and blastic plasmacytoid dendritic cell neoplasm (BPDCN) sometimes become resistant to the targeted drug tagraxofusp. Cancer, however, can flout even the best theories. An account of the discovery of the true source of resistance to … Read more
Dana-Farber scientists recently uncovered a potential vulnerability in a form of ovarian cancer notoriously resistant to chemotherapy. Now they’ve opened a clinical trial involving a drug that targets that susceptibility in patients with the disease. The impetus for their research is a type of ovarian cancer with excess copies of the cyclinE1 gene (abbreviated CCNE1). … Read more
Bone marrow transplantation, which was first developed in the 1970s, was conceived as a way of dealing with the effects of high-dose chemotherapy for leukemia, lymphoma, and other blood-related diseases. The large doses killed diseased blood cells throughout the body but also destroyed the bone marrow, birthplace of new blood cells. By transplanting bone marrow … Read more
Medically reviewed by Natalie Collins, MD, PhD New treatments that spur the immune system against cancer have entered the clinic to combat some forms of pediatric blood cancers, such as acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). One form of immunotherapy, CAR T cells, has been approved for children and young adults with ALL. In treating solid tumors … Read more
Medically reviewed by Matthew Davids, MD, MMSc Chemoimmunotherapy combined with a targeted drug given for two years has achieved undetectable minimal residual disease (MRD) for a high proportion of younger patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), Dana-Farber scientists report. The phase 2 clinical trial results are so favorable that they represent a step toward “a … Read more
Medically reviewed by David Livingston, MD It’s been known for decades that a mutated BRCA1 gene in a woman’s breast cells sharply increases her lifetime risk of breast cancer. What has eluded scientists, however, is a detailed understanding of how the loss of BRCA1 function leads normal breast cells down the path to malignancy. Now, … Read more
Medically reviewed by Alexander Gusev, PhD A team of Dana-Farber scientists and their associates has identified 34 genes associated with an increased risk of developing earliest-stage ovarian cancer. The findings, published in the journal Nature Genetics, will both help identify women who have the highest risk of developing ovarian cancer and pave the way for identifying … Read more
Medically reviewed by Pasi A Jänne, MD, PhD Imagine inserting a key to shut off an engine only to find that it no longer fits — that the configuration of the lock has been changed without notice. Scientists developing targeted therapies to treat cancer often face a similar conundrum. Targeted therapies derive their effectiveness from … Read more
In a surprising rebuttal of previous findings, a new study shows that African Americans with multiple myeloma have an overall higher survival rate than Caucasians with the disease when all patients have equal access to cutting-edge therapies. The results raise questions about the biology of this type of cancer. Multiple myeloma, a cancer that arises … Read more
Medically reviewed by Kornelia Polyak, MD, PhD In the jostling, jockeying mob of cell populations within a malignant tumor, the most inconspicuous groups can be the most dangerous. In a new study, Dana-Farber scientists show that in some breast cancers, two small factions of cells cooperate to drive metastasis but don’t directly interact with each … Read more
Scientists have discovered a previously unknown mechanism in mice that influences their ability to feel pain. The discovery suggests the possibility of new approaches to treating pain in humans that are an alternative to opioid drugs. The scientists, reporting in the journal Science, found that the production of prostaglandins in white blood cells depends on … Read more
Designed to subvert tumor cells from within, a growing number of cancer drugs have also been found to have other talents. In the last few years, scientists have discovered that targeted drugs known as CDK4/6 inhibitors and certain chemotherapy agents not only hamper the internal workings of cancer cells but can also make them the … Read more