Recent Advances at Penn in ovarian cancer biology and pathogenesis
A recent example of the efforts relate to the discovery by Dr. Coukos that vascular leukocytes, a population of blood cells with endothelial immunophenotype, play an important role in tumor vasculature in ovarian cancer and other tumors. Since the results published, additional papers have validated this concept. This discovery offers novel opportunities for biomarker discovery and development of cancer therapeutic strategies.
Further evidence is provided by the discovery from the Coukos lab of the molecular profile of tumor vascular cells in ovarian cancer. This discovery generates unique opportunities for the development of serum biomarkers, molecular imaging and targeted therapy in solid tumors.
Lin Zhang, MD’s and Dr. Coukos’s labs discovered that miRNA genes, a novel class of genes discovered recently, are amplified or deleted in ovarian cancer and other solid tumors. This discovery offers a novel explanation of gene changes in ovarian cancer and provides novel opportunities for the discovery of biomarkers and the development of cancer therapeutics.
Penn investigators are currently developing new platinum-derived drugs for use as chemotherapy and are studying the issue of chemotherapy resistance in ovarian cancer. Finally, Penn investigators are uneveiling the molecular make-up of ovarian cancers to identify genes that determine tumor behavior, response to treatment and clinical outcome.
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