cancer

A team led by the Spanish National Cancer Research Centre (CNIO) has shown in mice that a high-fat diet increases metastasis in triple-negative breast cancer, which has the worst prognosis. In addition, it has identified several of the mechanisms that would explain this, such as the activation of platelets and coagulation, which would help the tumour hide from the body's defences and prepare the so-called ‘pre-metastatic niche’. According to the researchers, who published the results in Nature Communications, ‘this mechanism could be extrapolated to other tumour types and other organs’. The results suggest that ‘dietary intervention, together with the control of platelet activity, may increase the efficiency of certain anti-tumour treatments’.

In women, high consumption of sugary drinks is associated with an increased risk of oral cavity cancer, according to a study published in JAMA Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery. Among research participants who consumed one or more sugary drinks per day, the rate of these cancers was 5 cases per 100,000 people, compared to 2 cases per 100,000 among those who drank less than one per month. The analysis is based on data from more than 162,000 nurses followed for 30 years in the United States. According to the authors, further studies with larger samples, including men, are needed to validate these results.

Extrachromosomal DNA circles are structures that appear floating in the nucleus of cells in some tumours and are associated with a poor prognosis. Now, an international team has studied the mechanism by which they could contribute to the aggressiveness of pancreatic cancer. The circles may contain an oncogene called Myc that promotes growth. Furthermore, their quantity increases or decreases to adapt to the environment. Although they were only observed in 15% of the cases studied, the discovery could open up new possibilities for treatment, according to the authors. The results are published in the journal Nature.

An international team has found that aspirin is capable of reducing the appearance of metastasis in mice, by enabling the activation of T lymphocytes capable of recognising tumour cells. The research showed that several different mouse cancer models — including breast cancer, colon cancer and melanoma — treated with aspirin showed a lower rate of metastasis in other organs, such as the lungs and liver, compared to untreated mice. According to the authors, who publish the results in the journal Nature, ‘the finding paves the way for the use of more effective anti-metastatic immunotherapies’.

Peto´s paradox is the lack of observed relationship between the size of an animal and the prevalence of cancer, despite the fact that the greater number of cells and divisions as they get larger should increase the likelihood of cancer. A new study disproves this paradox by finding that, at least in terrestrial vertebrates, larger species do develop more cases of cancer. In quite a few of them, however, the increase is less than would be expected, suggesting that they have evolved anticancer mechanisms that remain worth studying. The results are published in the journal PNAS.  

An international team has analysed data on the incidence and mortality of breast cancer in 185 countries. In 2022, 2.3 million new cases and 670,000 deaths were recorded and, with this trend, it is predicted that by 2050 these figures will increase by 38% and 68% respectively, particularly affecting low-income countries. Although the mortality rate fell in 30 of the 46 countries studied over the last ten years, only seven of them met the WHO targets of reducing it by at least 2.5% each year. The results are published in the journal Nature Medicine.

A team of US researchers has followed some patients treated with CAR-T therapies in a small clinical trial conducted between 2004 and 2009 to treat children with neuroblastoma, a nerve cell tumor that can have a poor prognosis. At least one of them, a woman who was treated with CAR-T as a child, remains in remission 18 years later, the longest duration of such therapy described to date. The results are published in the journal Nature Medicine. 

A paper published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine has analyzed new cases of lung cancer worldwide during the year 2022. While the incidence in women continues to approach that of men, the decrease in tobacco consumption in many countries causes the proportion of cases in non-smokers to increase. This increase is associated with air pollution, especially in countries such as China. 

World Cancer Day is celebrated on 4 February. Behind the cases of this disease there are people who, although they have overcome it, bear the burden of the diagnosis years after the end of their treatment. Survivors demand the right to be forgotten so as not to suffer financial, employment and social discrimination.

Osteosarcoma is a rare bone tumor that, when it appears, usually affects children and young adults. Due to its complexity, hardly any advances in its treatment have been made in the last 40 years. A team of researchers with Spanish participation has now described the mechanism that would explain its aggressiveness in approximately half of the cases. In addition, they propose a marker that could be used to predict prognosis. The results are published in the journal Cell.