A massive effort led by the Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium has produced the most comprehensive map of cancer genomics to date. The work was published in a series of papers appearing in a special issue of Nature entitled, “Cancer Catalogued: Whole-genome sequences for 38 types of tumour.”…

Cancer research is rapidly advancing and mortality from the disease is dropping, but not all patients are benefiting equally. One recent review found that enrollment in pivotal trials leading to U.S. regulatory approval of immune checkpoint inhibitors showed poor representation of minority ethnic groups. Black patients constituted less than 4%…

Investigators at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, in conjunction with researchers at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, have discovered that a metabolic imbalance in some cancer patients following treatment with a checkpoint inhibitor drug, nivolumab, is associated with resistance to the immunotherapy agent and shorter survival. Findings from the…

Investigators at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) and Beth-Israel Deaconess Medical Center believe they have found a kidney cancer biomarker—kidney-injury-molecule-1 (KIM-1)—which can be detected in both blood and urine, a discovery that could yield a liquid biopsy test for both disease risk and projected kidney cancer survival. Findings from the…

Angsana Molecular & Diagnostics said today its RNA-based fusions cancer panel will be used for screening TRK, ROS1 and ALK fusions in Ignyta’s Phase II registration clinical trial for its anti-tumor candidate entrectinib. Angsana will be a partner molecular test laboratory for Ignyta’s STARTRK-2 trial, working with the drug developer…

A new collaborative study led by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine has not only helped to restructure the taxonomy of kidney cancer, it has also uncovered some new actionable therapeutic targets. The new study was a comprehensive molecular analysis of almost 900 kidney cancer cases that found substantial molecular…

When it comes to studying and treating cancer, scientists and clinicians often think of applying two key areas of knowledge: the immune system and genomics. The combination of those fields—immunogenomics—is not quite a new field, but it is on the rise. Even in 2015, Robert Holt, PhD, scientific co-director of…

A benign nail abnormality may lead to the diagnosis of a rare inherited disorder that increases the risk of developing cancerous tumors of the skin, eyes, kidneys and the tissue that lines the chest and abdomen (e.g., the mesothelium). The condition, known as BAP1 tumor predisposition syndrome, is caused by…

In a clinical trial, researchers at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, MA, have demonstrated that administering the immunotherapy drug pembrolizumab after surgery can significantly improve overall survival rates for patients with a high risk of recurring kidney cancer. Published in the New England Journal of Medicine, the study’s findings…

Researchers from Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine have discovered that the signaling molecule chemokine-like factor (CKLF) plays a key role in promoting immunosuppression and tumor aggression in neuroblastoma and potentially in other tumors with abnormal activation of the MYCN oncoprotein. “The MYCN oncoprotein drives the initiation, progression,…

More people could benefit from personalized cancer immunotherapy using a newly developed discovery platform that can identify novel biomarkers and targets for treatment. The “identify-prioritize-validate” (IPV) pipeline offers a more accessible and reliable way to identify neoantigen proteins that are produced by genetic mutations in a tumor and the immune…

Three therapeutic regulatory approvals in less than a year signal that the promise of the human microbiome may finally be paying off. All of the approved therapies focus on treating recurrent Clostridium difficile infection, but what is next for the field? With promising oncology-related trial results from a number of…

Astellas and Poseida Therapeutics have announced a deal around Poseida’s MUC1C-ALLO1, an allogeneic CAR-T cell therapy in Phase I for multiple solid tumor indications. Astellas will invest a total of $50 million, including $25 million to acquire shares of common stock of Poseida at $3.00 per share in a private…

New immunotherapies offer many cancer patients a better chance at survival, but some cancers are notoriously resistant to these targeted treatments.  In particular, colorectal cancers (CRC) are challenging to treat because of common KRAS mutations, which drive aggressive, treatment resistant and metastatic forms of disease. Now researchers at the University…

A new means of identifying molecular pathways for which combination treatments of checkpoint inhibitors and new drugs could effectively block programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) has been demonstrated in a just-published study Researchers based at Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Cancer and Blood Disorders Center report that they have used CRISPR/Cas9 genome-editing…