Featured series 
Tag: Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
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Health
End-of-life conversations associated with lower medical expenses
Few physicians are eager to discuss end-of-life care with their patients. Yet such conversations may result in better quality of life for patients and could lower national health care expenditures for cancer care alone by tens of millions of dollars each year, according to a study led by Harvard researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. As…
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Health
Banking of umbilical cord blood has little physician support
A survey of physicians has found broad support for the position that parents should not bank their newborns’ umbilical cord blood in a private blood bank unless another member of the family is at risk for a blood disease that will require a stem cell transplant. The results of the survey are reported by Harvard…
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Health
Scientists identify antibodies effective against bird, seasonal flu viruses
Researchers at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Burnham Institute for Medical Research, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have reported the identification of human monoclonal antibodies (mAb) that neutralize an unprecedented range of influenza A viruses, including the avian influenza A (H5N1) virus, previous pandemic influenza viruses, and some seasonal influenza viruses. These…
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Health
Doctors override most electronic medication safety alerts
Computer-based systems that allow clinicians to prescribe drugs electronically are designed to automatically warn of potential medication errors, but a new study reveals clinicians often override the alerts and rely instead on their own judgment. The study, led by investigators at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), suggests that most clinicians…
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Science & Tech
Implants mimic infection to rally immune system against tumors
Harvard bioengineers have shown that small plastic disks impregnated with tumor-specific antigens and implanted under the skin can reprogram the mammalian immune system to attack tumors. The research — which rid 90 percent of mice of an aggressive form of melanoma that would usually kill the rodents within 25 days — represents the most effective…
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Health
Hormone therapy for prostate cancer does not appear to increase cardiac deaths
Treating prostate cancer patients with drugs that block hormonal activity does not appear to increase the risk of death from cardiovascular disease, according to a study led by Harvard Medical School researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital. While a 2006 report from members of the same study team found that treatment with gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) agonists…
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Health
Scientists unlock secret of death protein’s activation
Harvard Medical School researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have identified a previously undetected trigger point on a naturally occurring “death protein” that helps the body get rid of unwanted or diseased cells. They say it may be possible to exploit the newly found trigger as a target for designer drugs that would treat cancer by…
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Health
NIH names Harvard Pioneers, Innovators
Harvard faculty members comprise almost 20 percent of the 47 scientists nationally whose promising and innovative work was today recognized with the announcement of two grant programs through the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The grants, expected to total $138 million over five years for all recipients, recognize established researchers through the Pioneer Award and…
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Campus & Community
HMS to host quantitative genomics conference, more
The second annual Conference in Quantitative Genomics will be held Sept. 23-25 at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). Hosted by the Program in Quantitative Genomics at the School, “Emerging Quantitative Issues in Parallel Sequencing” is supported with a grant from the National Cancer Institute and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.
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Health
GlaxoSmithKline and Harvard Stem Cell Institute announce major collaboration agreement
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and the Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) today announced that they have entered into a five-year, $25 million-plus collaborative agreement to build a unique alliance in stem cell science to hasten the development of treatments and cures for a range of diseases. GSK’s investment, one of the largest by a pharmaceutical company in…
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Health
Researchers identify promising cancer drug target in prostate tumors
Scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute report they have blocked the development of prostate tumors in cancer-prone mice by knocking out a molecular unit they describe as a “powerhouse” that drives runaway cell growth. In a letter appearing in an advanced online publication by the journal Nature, the researchers said the growth-stimulating molecule called p110beta —…
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Health
Research in brief
BLACKS, HISPANICS LESS LIKELY TO GET FOLLOW-UP RADIATION THERAPY, BLACKS MORE LIKELY TO CHOOSE AGGRESSIVE CARE AT END OF LIFE
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Health
NIH awards Harvard Medical School $117.5 million, five-year grant for patient-centered research
The National Institutes of Health today announced that Harvard Medical School (HMS) will receive $117.5 million over the next five years for the establishment of a Clinical and Translational Science Center (CTSC) that will transform patient-oriented, laboratory-to-bedside research at HMS and its affiliated hospitals. Harvard University, HMS, and a number of the affiliated hospitals are…
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Health
First targeted therapy for melanoma brings hope
In a demonstration that even some of the most hard-to-treat tumors may one day succumb to therapies aimed at molecular “weak points,” researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute report the first instance in which metastatic melanoma has been driven into remission by a targeted therapy.
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Health
Research in brief
GROWING U.S. DISPARITIES IN HEALTH NOT INEVITABLE NEW WAY TO GROW BLOOD VESSELS
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Health
Grapefruit compound may help combat hepatitis C infection
A compound that naturally occurs in grapefruit and other citrus fruits may be able to block the secretion of hepatitis C virus (HCV) from infected cells, a process required to maintain chronic infection. A team of researchers from the Massachusetts General Hospital Center for Engineering in Medicine (MGH-CEM) report that HCV is bound to very…
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Science & Tech
Scientists may have identified new target for HIV vaccine
By coaxing the HIV-1 protein to reveal a hidden portion of its protein coat, scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School have provided a newly detailed picture of how protective, or so-called broadly neutralizing, antibodies block HIV-1 infection. In a study in the January issue of Immunity, the investigators report that the discovery…
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Health
Gene variation may elevate risk of liver tumor in patients with cirrhosis
A genetic variation appears to significantly increase the risk that individuals with cirrhosis of the liver will develop hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), a liver tumor that is the third leading cause of cancer death. Researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Cancer Center and colleagues in France describe in the January 2 edition of the Journal of…
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Health
Harvard researchers achieve stem cell milestone
Harvard Stem Cell Institute researchers have successfully turned back the clock on human skin cells, causing them to revert to an embryonic stem cell-like state from which they can become any cell in the body. The work, published online Sunday (Dec. 23) by the journal Nature, is an independent report similar to the stem cell…
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Health
Study paints genetic portrait of lung cancer
An international team of scientists today announced the results of a systematic effort to map the genetic changes underlying lung cancer, the world’s leading cause of cancer deaths. Appearing in the November 4 advance online issue of the journal Nature, the research provides a comprehensive view of the abnormal genetic landscape in lung cancer cells,…
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Health
Flier hails new, cooperative era in Harvard science
Harvard Medical School Dean Jeffrey Flier Friday evening issued a call for new approaches to advance the fight against disease, embracing cross-institutional collaborations at Harvard as a way to bring new thinking to old problems. Flier, the keynote speaker at the Fourth Annual Tony and Shelly Malkin Stem Cell Symposium at the Harvard Club of…
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Health
Diabetes drug dramatically boosts power of platinum chemotherapy
A widely used diabetes drug dramatically boosted the potency of platinum-based cancer drugs when administered together to a variety of cancer cell lines and to mice with tumors, report scientists from Harvard-affiliated Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
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Campus & Community
More blacks ‘misperceive’ weight problem
Overweight black Americans are two to three times more likely than heavy white Americans to say they are of average weight – even after being diagnosed as overweight or obese by their doctors, according to a new study led by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute researchers. Weight misperception was most common among black men and women, and…
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Health
Scientists identify switch for brain’s natural anti-oxidant defense
Scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute report they have found how the brain turns on a system designed to protect its nerve cells from toxic “free radicals,” a waste product of cell metabolism that has been implicated in some degenerative brain diseases, heart attacks, strokes, cancer, and aging. Potentially, the researchers say, it may be possible…
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Campus & Community
Genetic ‘road map’ leads to discoveries
A research team led by scientists at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard announced Sept. 28 the development of a new kind of genetic “road map” that can connect human diseases with potential drugs to treat them, as well as predict how new drugs work in human cells. Called the “connectivity map,” the new…
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Health
New myeloma drug proves more potent, less toxic than thalidomide
A designer drug significantly less toxic than thalidomide has shown impressive activity in prolonging survival of patients with advanced multiple myeloma, report researchers from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. A multicenter Phase II study of lenalidomide, an altered version of thalidomide, found a response rate of 25 percent among patients with myeloma that had recurred despite multiple…
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Health
New insight into skin-tanning process suggests novel way of preventing skin cancer
Findings from a study led by researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Children’s Hospital Boston have rewritten science’s understanding of the process of skin tanning – an insight that has enabled them to develop a promising way of protecting fair- skinned people from skin cancer caused by exposure to sunlight. The study, published in the…
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Campus & Community
Study: Hope alive for AIDS vaccine
Researchers from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School (HMS) have prompted human immune cells to attack HIV protein fragments, showing that the long-sought vaccine to protect against AIDS is still a possibility. Researchers using advanced data-analysis programs identified five protein fragments from HIV – the virus that causes AIDS – that promote a…
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Health
Study offers new hope for preventive vaccine for AIDS
New research by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists suggests that it may one day be possible to immunize healthy individuals against HIV-1, the virus that causes AIDS. In a study published in the online journal Medical Immunology, investigators led by Dana-Farber’s Pedro Reche, Ph.D., and Derin Keskin, Ph.D., upend the long-held view that human immune system…
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Health
Advances in chemotherapy improve outcomes in select breast cancers
Recent advances in chemotherapy have significantly reduced the risk of disease recurrence and death in breast cancer patients whose tumors are not hormone sensitive, according to a study by researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and 10 other institutions. The findings were reported in the April 12, 2006 issue of the Journal of the American Medical…