News: Momentum

The television ad opens on a city skyline at sunrise, with people looking up curiously at the buildings. “It’s not every day something this big comes along,” says the narrator, as words appear projected on the side of a building. “A chance to live longer,” the words spell out in big, bright capital letters. The […]

Imagine trying to navigate an unfamiliar Medical Center with appointments sprinkled across numerous buildings, often on different days of the week. Now add a cancer diagnosis, and the emotions that come with that, and traversing unfamiliar surroundings becomes infinitely more difficult. Your life has just been turned upside down and there’s much to do. There […]

A biochemist pointed to a structure of a protein, one suspected of a link to pancreatic cancer, caught in the act of DNA replication. The molecular images produced at the Vanderbilt Mass Spectrometry Research Center allow scientists to see proteins at precise moments and in complex associations with each other. Some of those proteins have never […]

In January 2011, Harriet Wilson of Hartsville, Tennessee, began to experience pain in her left side, under her rib cage. Her primary care physician ran some tests, ruling out heart problems and shingles. However, blood work revealed something ominous: elevated liver enzymes. A CT scan helped diagnose the source of her pain: two advanced pancreatic […]

T cells. Killer T cells. They’re on the prowl inside you right now, these “hit men” of the immune system. Their surfaces are armed with receptors that have the dossiers of their “marks”—virus-infected cells, cancer cells or other damaged cells. When they recognize a target, they have the power to kill. But they aren’t always effective. “It’s […]

Ten-to-one. Cell for cell, they’ve got us outnumbered. And as a group, they have 100 times more genes than we do. Fortunately, these microbes that share our corporeal space are usually on our side. Known collectively as the microbiome, the microbial species that flourish along our mucosal surfaces—the linings of our intestines, mouth and nose, […]

Melanoma, the most lethal form of skin cancer, spreads aggressively and is often resistant to therapy. Melanoma tumor formation is driven in part by nuclear factor-kappa B (NF-kappaB)-mediated gene transcription, and loss of NF-kappaB activity can block melanoma tumor formation. However, NF-kappaB also plays a crucial role in immune cells. In an October online edition […]

It’s been two years since Joan Meredith’s stem cell transplant for acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Although she is now “100 percent donor” and her new immune system appears to be functioning well, she remains vigilant against the health complications related to her transplant – like infections, for example. “I hated wearing the mask because I […]

Barbara Forbes, MSN, keeps a big jar of tar on her desk. The dark, goopy mess is a visual representation of the amount of tar that a smoker will ingest by smoking one pack of cigarettes per day for a year. Forbes is the director of the Smoking Cessation Institute at the Vanderbilt Dayani Center […]

Kort Nygard opted to wait until his prostate cancer needed treatment. Then he decided to have open surgery. Jim Davidson chose radiation therapy, the external beam type. Sam Dick selected robotic surgery. Three different patients with prostate cancer, three different treatment choices. The decision that faces a man diagnosed with localized prostate cancer is daunting. […]