�Scientific American magazine focussed on 2 University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers in a news story on experimental next-generation anticancer therapies.
David T. Curiel, M.D., Ph.D., is a UAB professor of medicine and director of the human gene therapy division, and Ronald Alvarez, M.D., is a UAB professor of medicine and director of the gynecological oncology division.
Both doctors are featured in a Scientific American special cancer edition, and both served as co-authors on the story "Tumor-busting viruses." The editors chose Curiel and Alvarez because of their research into a field called viral factor therapy, or virotherapy.
Virotherapy involves an observational technique to target viruses to cancer cells spell leaving goodish cells untouched. The viruses are genetically engineered to kill tumor cells in different shipway. One way is by adopting the viruses' natural ability to invade and reproduce as a way to pitch target genes that make tumor cells more susceptible to existing chemotherapies.
Curiel and Alvarez have been testing this concept with a virus combine called adenovirus in women with repeated ovarian or other gynaecological cancers. The clinical trial is still in the early stages, yet the compound has shown antitumour effects that appear safe to most patients, Curiel said.
"We image a substantial role for viruses - that is, therapeutic viruses - in 21st-century medicament," Curiel and Alvarez wrote in wrote in the story.
First proposed in the 1940s, virotherapy now relies heavily on adenoviruses, a cause of the usual cold that has been studied and altered extensively for medical research. Adenoviruses have the ability to shuttle targeted segments of DNA into a neoplasm cell and make biochemical changes that minimize equipment casualty to levelheaded cells.
Source: Troy Goodman
University of Alabama at Birmingham
More info
Saturday 30 August 2008
Wednesday 20 August 2008
MC pals' flows are Kosha
People unfamiliar with present-day hip-hop power be surprised that tonight�s Roxy star is a 32-year-old Jewish rapper from Long Island named Aesop Rock.
They�ll be even more than surprised by Rock�s opening acts: Iranian-American MC Yak Ballz (natural Yashar Zadeh) and his Israeli-American cohort, Rami Even-Esh, better known as Kosha Dillz.
By choosing Ballz and Dillz, Rock isn�t qualification a �We Are the World� statement. He�s load-bearing veterans of the new alternative-rap prospect he helped establish a decade ago.
�I recorded my first individual, �Flossin�,� when I was 16,� said Ballz, 26, by phone from New Jersey. �I grew up in Queens around a draw of MCs, so I was genuinely in the mix even before I got my own opportunities. Fortunately, I finally got my chance to flex.�
Dillz and Ballz knew each other ahead they got into hip-hop. They secondhand to toy together growing up. Though he was mostly brocaded in Queens, Ballz as well spent time at his father�s house in Edison, N.J., where Dillz lived around the corner.
�Yak was the MC in the neighborhood,� Dillz aforesaid from Brooklyn. �Then I started rapping on the weekends when we would get together, whether it was just hanging out in the back of someone�s whip or wherever.�
Following Ballz�s lead, Dillz started entering the Braggin� Rights MC battles at the legendary Nuyorican Poets Cafe in Manhattan. Ballz became the youngest rapper to reach the finals, and it was there that both aspiring MCs met producers including Mondee, wHO helped develop their careers.
�One time when I was 17 I went to see Yak at Braggin� Rights and there was extra blank space, so I just got up on stage,� Dillz aforementioned. �I had something scripted already. Even back then we were battling with conscious lyrics, not talking about how fat the other person�s mother was.�
Despite their shared history and tours, Ballz and Dillz have followed contrasting creative paths. While Dillz�s rhymes push into religious and geo-political realms, Ballz keeps his music largely secular and abstract.
�I never genuinely incorporated my ethnicity into my music,� Ballz said. �It only came out that I was Persian afterward in my career. Most people thought that I was just a edward D. White kid from Queens. Actually, from what I read, some people even persuasion that I was a black kid.�
Dillz reports graver misunderstandings concerning his Jewish background. Judaism, he says, often is misrepresented in the knock scene. With his new CD - a pas de deux project with freestyle guru C-Rayz Walztitled �Freestyle vs. Written� - he hopes to teach the pat community that hip-hop transcends racial andreligious boundaries.
�On my last hitch this fellow in Georgia told me that he thought all Jews hate black citizenry,� Dillz said. �That was laughable, especially since I was on circuit with (Wu-Tang affiliate) Killah Priest, and that I have an album advent out with C-Rayz Walz.�
Aesop Rock, with Kosha Dillz and Yak Ballz, at the Roxy, tonight. Tickets: $20; 617-931-2000.
More info
Sunday 10 August 2008
Cara Therapeutics Announces Successful Completion Of Phase I Clinical Trial Of Novel Analgesic, CR845
�Cara Therapeutics, Inc.
announced completion of a Phase I clinical trial for its second-generation,
peripherally playing kappa opioid agonist, CR845, under development for the
treatment of acute and chronic annoyance. The drug candidate was safe and
well-tolerated after intravenous infusion, and resulted in plasm levels of
CR845 expected to be associated with clinical anodyne activity. In
addition, CR845 infusion triggered a quantitative endocrine biomarker of
peripheral kappa opioid receptor activation at the lowest dose tested.
The Phase Ia single-center clinical trial evaluated the safety,
tolerability, pharmacokinetic profile, and pharmacological activity of
CR845 in a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled, unmarried escalating
intravenous dose study in 54 healthy male person and distaff volunteers. CR845 was
shown to be safe at all doses investigated, with no reports of serious side
personal effects or contrary central uneasy system natural process. Linear,
dose-proportional increases in systemic exposure to CR845 were ascertained.
Low doses of CR845 resulted in plasma levels at or above the plasma levels
of do drugs expected to be associated with clinical analgesic efficaciousness.
The Company plans to advance its intravenous conceptualization of CR845 into
Phase II trials later in 2008. Based on the demonstrated safety,
tolerability, and bioactivity of this conceptualization in Phase I, Cara will
continue to develop its unwritten formulation of CR845 for advancement into
Phase I.
About CR845
CR845 was designed to be highly selective for the peripheral kappa
opioid receptor, with a prolonged length of action relative to Cara's
first base generation of peripheral kappa opioids. Animal studies argue that
CR845 is effective in reducing pain of inflammatory, neuropathic and
nonrational origin. The analgesic and anti-inflammatory personal effects of CR845
lasted for up to 18 hours after a single venus's curse. CR845 was active after
intravenous, hypodermic, or oral administration. Preclinical studies likewise
indicate that CR845 possesses anti-itch properties. Unlike currently
marketed opioids, CR845 did not inhibit intestinal transit (ileus), vitiate
breathing, or elicit signs of addiction in animal models. CR845 and related
compounds ar covered by a late issued U.S. patent.
About Cara Therapeutics
Cara Therapeutics is a in private held biotech company focused on
development novel, superscript therapeutics to treat bother and firing
associated with diverse medical conditions. Cara's current pipeline
includes near-term clinical dose candidates within multiple classes of
peripherally-acting analgesics. Cara also plans to modernize entirely novel
classes of analgesics that emerge from its proprietary GPCR DimerScreen(TM)
technology.
Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements in this press release are forward-looking statements
that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Such forward-looking
statements include statements relating to the remedial applications of
CR845 and about Cara's strategy, technologies, pre-clinical and clinical
programs, and ability to identify and develop drugs, as well as other
statements that ar not historical facts. Actual events or results may
differ materially from Cara's expectations. Factors that could cause actual
results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements include,
merely are non limited to, the timing, success and cost of Cara's research and
clinical studies and Cara's ability to hold additional financing. These
forward-looking statements represent Cara's sound judgment as of the day of the month of this
release. Cara disclaims any intent or obligation to update these
forward-looking statements.
Cara Therapeutics, Inc.
http://www.caratherapeutics.com
More info
announced completion of a Phase I clinical trial for its second-generation,
peripherally playing kappa opioid agonist, CR845, under development for the
treatment of acute and chronic annoyance. The drug candidate was safe and
well-tolerated after intravenous infusion, and resulted in plasm levels of
CR845 expected to be associated with clinical anodyne activity. In
addition, CR845 infusion triggered a quantitative endocrine biomarker of
peripheral kappa opioid receptor activation at the lowest dose tested.
The Phase Ia single-center clinical trial evaluated the safety,
tolerability, pharmacokinetic profile, and pharmacological activity of
CR845 in a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled, unmarried escalating
intravenous dose study in 54 healthy male person and distaff volunteers. CR845 was
shown to be safe at all doses investigated, with no reports of serious side
personal effects or contrary central uneasy system natural process. Linear,
dose-proportional increases in systemic exposure to CR845 were ascertained.
Low doses of CR845 resulted in plasma levels at or above the plasma levels
of do drugs expected to be associated with clinical analgesic efficaciousness.
The Company plans to advance its intravenous conceptualization of CR845 into
Phase II trials later in 2008. Based on the demonstrated safety,
tolerability, and bioactivity of this conceptualization in Phase I, Cara will
continue to develop its unwritten formulation of CR845 for advancement into
Phase I.
About CR845
CR845 was designed to be highly selective for the peripheral kappa
opioid receptor, with a prolonged length of action relative to Cara's
first base generation of peripheral kappa opioids. Animal studies argue that
CR845 is effective in reducing pain of inflammatory, neuropathic and
nonrational origin. The analgesic and anti-inflammatory personal effects of CR845
lasted for up to 18 hours after a single venus's curse. CR845 was active after
intravenous, hypodermic, or oral administration. Preclinical studies likewise
indicate that CR845 possesses anti-itch properties. Unlike currently
marketed opioids, CR845 did not inhibit intestinal transit (ileus), vitiate
breathing, or elicit signs of addiction in animal models. CR845 and related
compounds ar covered by a late issued U.S. patent.
About Cara Therapeutics
Cara Therapeutics is a in private held biotech company focused on
development novel, superscript therapeutics to treat bother and firing
associated with diverse medical conditions. Cara's current pipeline
includes near-term clinical dose candidates within multiple classes of
peripherally-acting analgesics. Cara also plans to modernize entirely novel
classes of analgesics that emerge from its proprietary GPCR DimerScreen(TM)
technology.
Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements in this press release are forward-looking statements
that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Such forward-looking
statements include statements relating to the remedial applications of
CR845 and about Cara's strategy, technologies, pre-clinical and clinical
programs, and ability to identify and develop drugs, as well as other
statements that ar not historical facts. Actual events or results may
differ materially from Cara's expectations. Factors that could cause actual
results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements include,
merely are non limited to, the timing, success and cost of Cara's research and
clinical studies and Cara's ability to hold additional financing. These
forward-looking statements represent Cara's sound judgment as of the day of the month of this
release. Cara disclaims any intent or obligation to update these
forward-looking statements.
Cara Therapeutics, Inc.
http://www.caratherapeutics.com
More info
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