Here at OncoBites, a team of cancer professionals and advocates has gathered to share cutting-edge research with a non-specialist audience. We understand that jargon and isolated professional communities have made science feel inaccessible to most people, even people considering the field. In addition, paywalls on articles can make trying to investigate topics alone a challenge.... Continue Reading →
Reverse Vaccinology for Cancer-Causing Viruses
Reading time: 7 minutes Felicites Rapon Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is the causative agent of hepatitis C, an infectious disease of the liver causing inflammation and necrosis. HCV infection can be either acute (which can be cleared without any medicines) or chronic. The latter can be due to environmental factors such as alcohol usage but... Continue Reading →
Cancer Neuroscience: A New Field
Reading time: 6 minutes Ana Isabel Castillo Orozco "Cancer Neuroscience": This is the name given to a novel and exciting field that aims to study the complex interactions between the nervous system and cancer development. In recent years, increasing evidence has come to light that neuronal activity is crucial in regulating cancer initiation and progression.... Continue Reading →
Transmissible Tumors in Tasmanian Devils
Reading time: 3 minutes Hannah Young Cancer is generally thought to be a disease that develops from one cell that eventually divides and becomes a tumor within an individual; how this cell becomes cancerous differs depending on the initiating event. While some cancers are initiated through a series of mutations in tumor suppressors or oncogenes,... Continue Reading →
What’s the Link Between Ultra-Processed Foods and Colon Cancer?
Reading time: 4 minutes Deanna MacNeil Colorectal cancer is the third most common malignancy in the US, and the second leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide. Though the incidence in the US is declining rapidly overall, the increased incidence of early-onset colorectal cancers is a concerning trend. Although the reasons for this increase remain unknown,... Continue Reading →
The Cancer Genome Atlas: What If We Knew of All the Mutations That Cause Cancer?
Reading time: 4 minutes Sneha Das We are our genomes! Our genome is the DNA comprising roughly 3 billion genetic letters, called bases, that appear in a specific order to make us humans. The DNA encodes messages to make proteins and other biomolecules that work in concert to perform important bodily functions. But sometimes this... Continue Reading →
Bacterial Fortification for Cancer Therapeutics
Reading time: 3 minutes Bhavuk Garg Cancer treatment options have undergone multiple strategic shifts over the course of the last century starting with resection and moving to chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and chemical inhibitors. Major challenges faced by many therapeutics are adverse toxic reactions inflicted on the patients and the development of therapeutic resistance due to high... Continue Reading →
Why do we need mice models in the study of cancer?
Namrata Nilavar Reading time: 5 minutes During the COVID-19 pandemic, many researchers have ‘simulated’ the progression of the pandemic, which often involves researchers using a computer program that allows them to understand how the pandemic might pan out. These programs can help us predict ‘real-world’ scenarios. Similarly, we can simulate or imitate the progression of... Continue Reading →
A Dash of Turmeric: The Secret Ingredient for Cancer Treatment?
Reading time: 4 minutes Melanie Padalino “Do you have any spices?” my friend Elizabeth asked while cooking an omelet in my kitchen. “Yep, there should be a whole bunch in the cabinet” I replied. Without hesitation, she went straight for the little glass jar of ground turmeric, an ancient spice known for its bright orange... Continue Reading →
Cancer Cells Can Exploit Koala-like Grips to Metastasize
Reading time: 5 minutes Emily Chan During a holiday weekend, I had the chance to see one of the most beloved animals at my local zoo: the koala. Contrary to their adorable exterior, koalas boast strong arms and legs that hook around tree branches, allowing them to scale large eucalyptus trees. Recently, researchers at Institut... Continue Reading →
Exercise and Antitumor Immunity in Pancreatic Cancer
Reading time: 3 minutes Aishat Motolani We live in an era of catchy headlines. I gasp every time I read a health headline on mainstream news networks. Some thumbnails read thus, “red wine could increase your lifespan,” or “naps are linked to X type of disease.” Naps? I often remark in confusion. I love taking... Continue Reading →
Peering Into the Future: Where Contact Lenses May Detect Cancer
Reading time: 7 minutes Michael Marand In short-distance track competitions, the winner of a race is largely determined by how well the runners take off from the starting blocks. With the athletes only narrowly separated by their top speeds, the initial difficulty of shifting from an immobile crouch to rapid acceleration is an art that... Continue Reading →
A Standing Ovation! Results From DESTINY-Breast04 trial in Breast Cancer
Reading time: 5 minutes Patty Spears The applause was thunderous and traveled like a wave across the large auditorium at the end of a 2022 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting Plenary Session talk. It did not stop. The audience stood and kept applauding and reveling in the positive results of a clinical... Continue Reading →
One size Does Not Fit All in Cancer Treatment: The Role of Precision Medicine
Reading time: 4 minutes Ifeoluwa Oyelade Imagine a scenario where an individual is diagnosed with a type of cancer, and physicians only need to prescribe a treatment that is specific and optimized to that individual and the type of cancer, with little or no undesirable side effects. That is the goal of precision medicine in... Continue Reading →
Mass Spectrometry Advances in Oncology
Reading time: 5 minutes Susan Egbert As technology has been advancing exponentially over the years, more efficient diagnostic tools have been developed for cancer detection. Recent studies1,2,3 have shown the need for this advancement, as current diagnostic tools are still not adequate enough to detect cancer. One of the new tools that have been advancing,... Continue Reading →
Membrane Tension: A Costume That Turns Cells Into Metastatic Monsters
Reading time: 5 minutes Emily Chan With Halloween soon approaching, children and adults everywhere are preparing to disguise themselves in costumes to transform into someone or something else. Unlike the disguises we wear once a year, cells can make continuous strides to transform into malignant cells that metastasize to other areas of the body. Cancer... Continue Reading →
How Cancer Research Influenced the World’s Fastest Vaccine
Reading time: 4 minutes Jacqueline Mann In December 2020, less than a year after the COVID-19 pandemic was declared, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted emergency use authorization for the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines to prevent COVID-19. These vaccines work differently from traditional immunizations: they contain a specific sequence of messenger RNA (mRNA) that... Continue Reading →
Old weapon for a new battle: Repurposing existing market drugs for cancer treatment
Reading time: 5 minutes “It cannot get any better with our three-in-one device…buy one get one free today,” sings my radio as I commute to the lab daily. I nod in agreement to such commercials because I love to do more with less. Currently, many products are often rebranded as multi-purposed because products and services... Continue Reading →
Cellular transit system fabricates secondary nesting spot for cancer
Reading time: 4 minutes Hema Saranya Ilamathi Cancer can develop at any time and in any part of the human body once the conditions are favorable for their growth. They continue to multiply by utilizing nutrients available in their habitat. These cancerous cells form a mass called primary tumors. However, once their resources become limited,... Continue Reading →
Location, Location, Location: Cell Position is Important for Melanoma Development
Reading time: 4 minutes Vicky Tan Cancer severity and therapy responses can be influenced by both the cell of origin and its location. Melanoma is a skin cancer that arises from pigment-producing cells, called melanocytes. Melanoma is predicted to become the third most commonly diagnosed cancer in Australia, while in the US, 100,000 new cases... Continue Reading →
Somatic Mutation Across Mammals
Reading time: 3 minutes Hannah Young Somatic mutations are changes in DNA that occur as cells in our body divide. They are distinct from germline mutations, which occur in germ cells (e.g. eggs and sperm) and are passed down from parent to child. Both somatic and germline mutations contribute to cancer and aging. While we’ve... Continue Reading →
Targeting Transcription Factors in Cancers
Reading time: 4 minutes Bhavuk Garg Cancers are characterized by uncontrolled growth and failure of differentiation, whereby cells lose their physiological characteristics and acquire malignant phenotypes, also known as neoplastic properties. Examining the distinct properties of cancer cells and their underlying mechanisms are active areas of investigation. Broadly, these properties are summarized as hallmarks of... Continue Reading →
The Role of the Human Gut Microbiome in Pancreatic Cancer
Reading time: 5 minutes Aishat Motolani The incidence of pancreatic cancer is almost commensurate with its media mentions. As a fan of the wizarding world of the Harry Potter series and the quiz game show Jeopardy, the demise of Professor Snape and Alek Trebek came as a shock. "Neither a magic wand nor an encyclopedia... Continue Reading →
Sex Differences in Cancer Therapy Safety
Reading time: 5 minutes Deanna MacNeil One goal in cancer therapy is to strike a balance between treatment efficacy and toxicity. While treatments such as surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation are meant to kill cancer cells, healthy tissues can be adversely affected in the process. Common side effects of systemic cancer treatment occur because treatments work... Continue Reading →
Cancer’s Jumping Gene Problem
Reading time: 3 minutes Gabby Budziszewski Proteins, the molecular machines that perform functions within our cells to keep us alive, are all encoded in DNA, but only 1-2% of our three billion base pairs of DNA encode proteins. For many years, the other 98-99% of DNA was referred to as “junk” DNA. However, we now... Continue Reading →
AI and Oncology: An Unexpected but Useful Pairing
Reading time: 4 minutes Susan Egbert Did you know that researchers are trying to integrate artificial intelligence (AI) with cancer treatments? There are plenty of studies in oncology available that range from diagnostic to treatment that are peer-reviewed (experts looking at the articles before publishing). This is useful for AI as the more data that... Continue Reading →
Tumor Microenvironment: A Determinant of Dormancy and Metastatic Growth
Reading time: 3 minutes Ifeoluwa Oyelade One of the most impactful breakthroughs in cancer research would be to completely eradicate all cancer cells in the body upon treatment, thereby preventing possible cases of cancer relapse. However, the ability of tumor cells to move out of their primary sites to reside in different organs in the... Continue Reading →
These Living Magnets Break Down Cancer’s Defenses
Reading time: 5 minutes Michael Marand From a young age, we are taught to protect ourselves from germs. From scrubbing our teeth to washing our hands, the hygienic routines we learned as kids help us steer clear of harmful single-celled organisms. And for good reason – research suggests bacterial infection is a significant risk factor... Continue Reading →
Breast Milk May Give a Glimpse into Breast Cancer
Reading time: 4 minutes Jessica Desamero Breastfeeding is essential for a baby’s first few months and can even reduce a mother’s risk of breast cancer. The exact cause is unclear, but it could be due to the associated hormonal changes that delay the mother’s menstrual cycles. This delay reduces the mother’s lifetime exposure to menstrual... Continue Reading →
“Un-stemming” Cancer Stem Cells – A Novel Approach to Treat Cancer
Reading time: 5 minutes Mahrukh Fatima Did you know that some animals, like salamanders and axolotls, can regenerate their limbs? They have this spectacular ability due to a small and rare subset of primitive cells called stem cells. These cells have the ability to differentiate into many different types of specialized cells from brain cells... Continue Reading →
Immune Agonist Antibodies: Promising Immunotherapy Targets on the Horizon
Reading time: 4 minutes Kate Secombe You may have read previously on OncoBites about immunotherapies, and the great promise they hold in treating a wide range of cancers. Commonly used immunotherapies include checkpoint inhibitors such as PD-1 or CTLA-4 inhibitors. Here I will be looking at an emerging subset of immunotherapies known as immune agonist... Continue Reading →
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