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Volume 11 Issue 5, May 2011

From The Editors

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Research Highlight

  • Reducing the number of macrophages in primary breast cancers in mice increases sensitivity to paclitaxel through a mechanism involving CD8+ T cells, and patients with breast cancer who have a higher ratio of CD68 (a macrophage marker) mRNA levels to CD8mRNA levels have a reduced rate of pathological complete response.

    • Nicola McCarthy
    Research Highlight
  • Sequencing of multiple myeloma genomes leads to the identification of novel mutations and potential new therapeutic targets.

    • Mhairi Skinner
    Research Highlight
  • Michael Wigler and colleagues sequence single nuclei from two advanced breast carcinomas and a matched metastasis to investigate tumour evolution.

    • Gemma K. Alderton
    Research Highlight
  • Three papers show that oncogenic RAS induces autophagy.

    • Nicola McCarthy
    Research Highlight
  • This paper shows that activation of the JNK pathway mediates engulfment of premalignant cells by surrounding normal cells in cell competition.

    • Sophie Atkinson
    Research Highlight
  • Inhibition of Myc activity in tumour cells induces the collapse of the tumour microenvironment.

    • Nicola McCarthy
    Research Highlight
  • A new study suggests that activation of SRC may underlie multiple mechanisms of resistance to the targeted breast cancer therapy, trastuzumab.

    • Darren J. Burgess
    Research Highlight
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Progress

  • Desmosomes are adhesion complexes that are related to adherens junctions, and recent studies using mouse genetic approaches have uncovered a role for desmosomes in tumour suppression.

    • Rachel L. Dusek
    • Laura D. Attardi
    Progress
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Review Article

  • Otto Warburg has contributed important data and hypotheses to the fields of cancer research and metabolism, but what did he actually find and what conclusions did he draw? This Review looks at the life and research of Otto Warburg and places his work in the context of our current understanding of metabolism and hypoxia in cancer.

    • Willem H. Koppenol
    • Patricia L. Bounds
    • Chi V. Dang
    Review Article
  • The Notch family of receptors activate a complex web of cancer-relevant signalling pathways, and activating mutations inNOTCH1are common drivers of T cell acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (T-ALL). Despite this oncogenic role of NOTCH1 in T-ALL, mutations in Notch genes are rare in solid cancers. This Review discusses the growing evidence that deregulation of Notch signalling can indeed have a major role in the development of various solid tumours, and the oncogenic versus tumour suppressive roles of Notch signalling are highly context dependent.

    • Prathibha Ranganathan
    • Kelly L. Weaver
    • Anthony J. Capobianco
    Review Article
  • The incidence of metastasis to the brain is apparently rising in cancer patients and threatens to limit the gains that have been made by new systemic treatments. As discussed in this Review, translational research that aims to improve the outcome for patients with brain metastases needs to be multi-disciplinary, marrying advanced chemistry, blood–brain barrier pharmacokinetics, neurocognitive testing and radiation biology with metastasis biology.

    • Patricia S. Steeg
    • Kevin A. Camphausen
    • Quentin R. Smith
    Review Article
  • The calpains are a conserved family of cysteine proteinases that catalyse the controlled proteolysis of many specific substrates that are involved in proliferation, apoptosis and migration. Calpain expression is altered during tumorigenesis and can influence the response to cancer therapies, indicating a need for new calpain inhibitors.

    • Sarah J. Storr
    • Neil O. Carragher
    • Stewart G. Martin
    Review Article
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Perspectives

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Correspondence

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