前沿科技及其它

Tumors usually reach secondary sites via blood vessels or lymphatic vessels. Two processes dependent upon cell migration speed metastasis by reducing the distance between the primary tumor and these vessels. The first process is invasion, in which cancer cells migrate toward the capil ...

The hollow fiber assay is a unique in vivo model that allows simultaneous evaluation of up to 6 different cell lines in 2 physiological separate compartments. It was developed by Hollingshead et al. (1) as a preliminary rapid screen for assessing novel putative chemotherapeutic compounds pr ...

Despite great advances in our understanding of the molecular basis of lung cancer, the efficacy of chemotherapy of lung cancer remains disappointingly low (1). Most of the drugs with established activity against lung cancer were developed using mice with transplantable solid tumors of e ...

The lung offers circulating tumor cells—after their initial development as primary tumors and their selection for metastasis to other organs of patients—several optimal conditions for survival and progression that may be unique to this organ. First, the lung is highly oxygenated and pr ...

Osteosarcoma (1,2) and Ewing’ s sarcoma (3,4) are the two most common primary bone tumors in children. The 2-yr metastasis-free survival rate is 60-65% (5-9) and 41% (10) in patients having osteosarcoma and Ewing’s sarcoma, respectively. These rates have not changed over the past 15 years despite nume ...

The combination of classical mouse genetics with mouse models derived from transgenic and gene-targeting technologies provides new opportunities to elucidate the functional roles of genes in normal and disease processes. Candidate disease genes can be systematically inacti ...

The p53 tumor suppressor gene is the most commonly mutated gene in cancer (1,2) and is mutated in 50% non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and 70% of small cell lung cancer (SCLC) (3). Mutations in p53 commonly reflect exposures to environmental carcinogens, e.g., cigarette smoke and lung cancer or aflato ...

A number of xenograft models have been developed for human lung cancer. These include subcutaneous (sc)-implant models and implantation under the renal capsule, but these models have not been sufficiently representative of the clinical situation (1). The studies of McLemore et al. (2,3) ha ...

In 1930, a German physician wrote a paper in which he most strongly suggested that smoking of cigarettes is a cause of lung cancer (1). In the same year, Mertens (2) published the results of a study in which he had exposed individual mice to cigarette smoke. He used a compressible rubber bulb to force cigarette sm ...

Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is a transmembrane glycoprotein of 170 kDa with an extracellular EGF-binding domain and intracellular domain possessing intrinsic tyrosine kinase activity (1-3). Overexpression of the EGFR has been reported in a wide range of human malignan ...

Lung cancer cells express receptor tyrosine kinases (RTKs) that may be important targets for therapies. RTKs are proto-oncogenes, which are key regulators for cell growth, differentiation, survival, or motility. More than 50 RTKs, in both lung and other tissues, have been identified (1). The r ...

Epigenetic DNA modification by aberrant methylation of cytosine residues is thought to be an important mechanism contributing to tumorigenesis. Methylation of cytosines normally occurs at distinct sites of the genome containing stretches of repeated CpG (CpG islands) often fou ...

There is compelling evidence that human lung cancers are characterized by disruption of several important physiological pathways that govern proliferation, apoptosis, intracellular signaling, and cell-cell interactions. Uncontrolled cellular proliferation is one of ...

Cellular DNA is continuously exposed to a variety of insults induced by different endogenous or exogenous agents, including ionizing radiation, ultraviolet (UV) light, chemicals, and by-products of oxidative stress (1). Damaged DNA, if not repaired, can cause cell death, aging and cancer. ...

Cancer cells continue cell division and proliferation until they kill the host. Human germline cells have the capacity to undergo repeated cell divisions for millions of years, living on in descendants. However, most normal somatic cells can divide no more than several dozens of times. Recent ...

Angiogenesis, the formation of new blood vessels from the endothelium, develops in response to metabolic demands of tissues and tumors, and is thought to play an essential role in progression of solid tumors, including lung cancer (1). It is observed in early stages of lung carcinogenesis, such as ...

In recent years, the observation that many endogenous angiogenesis inhibitors are fragments of larger molecules has driven significant research efforts to understand the mechanisms by which these cryptic angiogenesis inhibitors are liberated. Our interest in this area stemmed ...

Lung cancer is the most common cause of cancer-related death in the western world. Of patients with lung cancer, in the region of 90% are either current or ex-cigarette smokers. Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) accounts for approx 80% of these cases. Despite improvements in the diagnostic evaluat ...

The importance of matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) in the growth and spread of solid tumors has been known for over a decade (1,2). However, the molecular mechanisms that regulate their expression and the elucidation of their role in angiogenesis are subjects of extensive, ongoing investi ...

Tumor angiogenesis enables a pre-existing tumor to grow and metastasize. The term angiogenesis designates development of new blood vessels from preexisting vasculature. Goldman (1), in 1907, was the fi rst to describe the formation of new blood vessels, i.e., angiogenesis, around tumors. G ...