Leukemia News and Research

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Leukemia (Leukaemia) is a cancer of the blood cells. It is the most common type of blood cancer and affects 10 times as many adults as children. Most people diagnosed with leukemia are over 50 years old. No one knows why some people develop leukemia and others do not. However, scientists have identified some risk factors for the disease. Most people who have known risk factors do not get leukemia, while many who do get the disease have none of these risk factors. During the early stages of leukemia, there may be no symptoms. Many of the symptoms of leukemia don't become apparent until a large number of normal blood cells are crowded out by leukemia cells.

Caregivers’ coping strategies affect their level of distress and quality of life

November is Caregiver Awareness Month, and timely findings from a study published in Blood Advances suggest that, among caregivers of patients undergoing a stem cell transplant, how someone approaches coping can influence their levels of anxiety, depression, and poor quality of life (QOL) they experience.

20 Nov 2022

Whole-genome sequencing reveals five new subgroups of chronic lymphocytic leukemia

A collaborative study led by the University of Oxford as part of the UK's 100,000 Genomes Project, published in Nature Genetics today, has defined five new subgroups of the most common type of blood cancer, chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and associated these with clinical outcomes.

16 Nov 2022

Research findings could bolster the effectiveness of immune-checkpoint therapy

Immune checkpoint inhibitors such as Keytruda and Opdivo work by unleashing the immune system's T cells to attack tumor cells.

16 Nov 2022

Study finds no differences in CAR T-cell therapy outcomes among pediatric ALL patients across different socioeconomic levels

Social determinants of health affect the outcomes of many illnesses, and pediatric cancer is no exception. In fact, children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) living in poverty are significantly more likely to relapse and die from their disease than those from wealthier backgrounds.

11 Nov 2022

Nanotechnology platform can make solid tumor cells more receptive to immunotherapy

A team of researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center has developed a nanotechnology platform that can change the way the immune system sees solid tumor cells, making them more receptive to immunotherapy.

10 Nov 2022

Enzyme that drives growth of medulloblastoma may hold the key to future treatment

An enzyme that drives the growth of an often-lethal childhood brain cancer may hold the key to a future treatment, says a McMaster University-led study.

10 Nov 2022

Hospital giant HCA fends off accusations of questionable inpatient admissions

Jennifer Smithfield felt weak and still had trouble breathing in February after nearly two weeks with covid-19. It was a Sunday, and her doctor's office was closed. So her primary care physician suggested going to an emergency room to be safe.

4 Nov 2022

Targeted therapy for children with high-risk Hodgkin lymphoma reduces relapse rates, trial shows

A targeted therapy for children with high-risk Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) was shown to significantly reduce relapse rates when tested in a large multicenter clinical trial conducted by the Children's Oncology Group (COG) and led by pediatric oncologists at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center, Children's Healthcare of Atlanta and Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University. By combining the targeted antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) brentuximab vedotin (BV) with the standard chemotherapy regimen, children were 10% less likely to relapse.

2 Nov 2022

Molecular drug transporters could improve treatment of cancers and other diseases

A team of Canadian researchers from Université de Montréal has designed and validated a new class of drug transporters made of DNA that are 20,000 times smaller than a human hair and that could improve how cancers and other diseases are treated.

2 Nov 2022

New review elucidates current treatment approaches for myelodysplastic syndromes

Physician scientists at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine have published a review in the Journal of the American Medical Association that clarifies current treatment approaches for myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), which are rare and often deadly bone marrow cancers.

1 Nov 2022

Researchers use CRISPR-edited T cells to treat seriously ill children with resistant leukaemia

Researchers at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children (GOSH) and UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health (UCL GOS ICH) have used CRISPR/Cas9 technology to engineer donor T cells to try to treat seriously ill children with resistant leukaemia, who had otherwise exhausted all available therapies.

27 Oct 2022

25 years on, varicella vaccination reports impressive success in the USA

New research suggests that 25 years on, varicella vaccination continues to report impressive success in the USA.

26 Oct 2022

Researchers set sights on a new therapeutic target for aggressive breast cancer

Researchers at VCU Massey Cancer Center have set their sights on a new therapeutic target for an aggressive form of breast cancer with limited treatment options.

25 Oct 2022

Researchers streamline way to manufacture CAR T-cells in just 24 hours

Researchers at University Hospitals (UH) Seidman Cancer Center and a biotech start-up company have developed a streamlined way to manufacture CAR T-cells for immunotherapy treatment in just 24 hours – an improvement over the team's previous benchmark of eight days and commercial suppliers that typically take three weeks.

25 Oct 2022

MTCH2 acts as a doorway for proteins into the mitochondrial membrane, study reveals

Mitochondria - the organelles responsible for energy production in human cells - were once free-living organisms that found their way into early eukaryotic cells over a billion years ago.

20 Oct 2022

Bioinformatics analysis of monkeypox virus-host cell interactions

A recent study posted to the bioRxiv* preprint server reported the interaction between monkeypox and human cells. Molecular sequences were screened to identify differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and their associated signal pathway, expression regulation, and metabolic pathways.

18 Oct 2022

Changes in the skin microbiome may contribute to development of GVHD after stem cell transplant

Organ damage occurs in up to 70 percent of patients in the first few months following stem cell transplant. The precise reasons for this potentially life-threatening reaction have long been the subject of scientific research.

13 Oct 2022

Novel peanut-specific human IgE monoclonal antibodies may uncover new therapeutic targets for peanut allergy

A recent Frontiers in Immunology journal study by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Vanderbilt University researchers has created an in vitro system to determine potential therapeutics targeting sensitized effector cells based on human, allergen-specific, Immunoglobulin E (IgE) monoclonal antibodies (mAbs).

2 Oct 2022

Pluripotent bat stem cells as a model to study novel viruses

Researchers generate induced pluripotent stem cells from bats using to establish bats as a novel in vivo model study species.

29 Sep 2022

Researchers discover how cancer cells can turn off the immune system to help tumors grow

When cancer arises in the body, it starts with tumor cells that rapidly grow and divide and eventually spread.