Detection of fos, jun and ras in newly-diagnosed childhood acute lymphoblastic-leukemia by immunocytochemistry and PCR

Network insights on oxaliplatin anti-cancer mechanisms

Oxaliplatin has been a crucial component of combination therapies since admission into the clinic causing modest gains in survival across multiple malignancies. However, oxaliplatin functions in a non-targeted manner, posing a difficulty in ascertaining precise efficacy mechanisms. While previously thought to only affect DNA repair mechanisms, Platinum-protein adducts (Pt-Protein) far outnumber Pt-DNA adducts leaving a big part of oxaliplatin function unknown. Through preliminary network modeling of high throughput data, this article critically reviews the efficacy of oxaliplatin as well as proposes a better model for enhanced efficacy based on a network approach. In our study, not only oxaliplatin’s function in interrupting DNA-replication was confirmed, but also its role in initiating or intensifying tumorigenesis pathways was uncovered. From our data we present a novel picture of competing signaling networks that collectively provide a plausible explanation of chemotherapeutic resistance, cancer stem cell survival, as well as invasiveness and metastases. Here we highlight oxaliplatin signaling networks, their significance and the clinical implications of these interactions that verifies the importance of network modeling in rational drug design.

Expression of metallothionein in initial and relapsed childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia

In a retrospective study we analyzed the expression of metallothionein (MT) in initial acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) of 92 children and in relapsed ALL of 27 children using immunohistochemistry. MT expression was detectable in 33% of the patients with initial ALL and in 33% of the patients with relapsed ALL. No differences were seen concerning the intensity and the proportion of positively stained cells between initial and relapsed patients. The expression of MT was independent of clinical prognostic factors such as age, sex, immunological subtype, and initial blast cell count. Patients with initial ALL and MT expression tended to have a lower probability of disease-free survival compared with the MT-negative group. The relapsed patients with MT expression showed also a trend toward a shorter survival in comparison to the MT-negative group. However, the differences were not statistically significant. Thus, the results show that MT expression is not an important prognostic factor in the clinical drug resistance of childhood All.