Damon Runyon identifies today’s most brilliant early career scientists and funds their innovative cancer research.
- Today’s Promising Areas of Cancer Research
- What is Cancer?
- A Broken Pipeline?
A Generation of Science at Risk
- ARISE Report
Early Career Scientists and High-Risk, High Reward Research - American Academy of Arts and Sciences
- Why We’re Losing the War on Cancer (And How To Win It)
Clifton Leaf - Fortune Magazine
January 18, 2010 > Expanded umbilical-cord blood used to successfully treat leukemia
Colleen Delaney, MD (Damon Runyon-Novartis Clinical Investigator ‘07-‘10) of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, reported the first successful use of umbilical-cord blood transplants in a Phase I clinical trial to treat patients with acute leukemia. This is a significant breakthrough because unlike bone marrow transplants, umbilical-cord blood transplants do not require a perfect match to the patient. However, cord blood contains a low number of stem cells, making the time to engraftment lengthy and leaving the transplant recipient susceptible to potentially fatal infections. In this study, the researchers expanded the cord blood stem cell population prior to transplantation by activating a signaling pathway called Notch. These expanded cells were then infused into patients resulting in successful rapid engraftment. Seven of the ten patients treated are still alive with no evidence of disease. The findings were published in the journal Nature Medicine.