Since the Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation began awarding research grants in 1997, several grant recipients have achieved great progress toward their research goals in searching for new treatments for cancers affecting women.

• Emory University researcher Dipali Sharma, Ph.D., assistant professor of medicine and 2007 recipient of a grant from the Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation, is investigating the role leptin plays in the formation and growth of breast cancer. While researchers have long known that the hormone leptin plays a role in obesity, it has recently been discovered that leptin also plays a role in the development of cancer.

Leptin affects cancers such as those of the colon and endothelial tissue, but it plays a significant role in the development of breast cancer because breast tissue is comprised mostly of fat. The grant from MKACF will help Dr. Sharma further study the link between leptin and breast cancer, and continue the quest to find new treatments for this disease.

• The Foundation’s support of research of cancers affecting women has led to a groundbreaking discovery in the research of cancers affecting men. In 2002, Dr. Arul M. Chinnaiyan, co-founder of Compendia Bioscience in Ann Arbor, Mich., received a grant from the Foundation to help fund a revolutionary database designed to study the development of breast cancer. Dr. Chinnaiyan’s database has now been used to generate a landmark discovery of a strong indicator of prostate cancer. Experts in the bioscience industry are excited about Dr. Chinnaiyan’s discovery and believe the database can be instrumental in future discoveries.

• The Jan. 15, 2007, issue of Cancer Research reported that a study funded by the Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation, the National Cancer Institute and the U.S. Department of Defense Breast Cancer Research Program has produced a cancer research breakthrough. Led by Dr. James DiRenzo, a 2005 grant recipient, researchers linked nestin, a structural protein, to a form of breast cancer, identifying a new biomarker that could lead to earlier detection and better treatment. Researchers from Dartmouth Medical School found that nestin could represent a selective biological marker for basal epithelial breast tumors, a highly aggressive cancer. A marker like this could enable clinicians to monitor patients and detect cancer before it reoccurs. Currently, there isn’t a direct way to determine if a breast cancer is a basal epithelial tumor. This new discovery may help formulate diagnostic tools for this particular cancer. Another important step is to find an efficient way of detecting nestin in a clinical screening setting.

• In April 2007, Dr. Leif W. Ellisen, a 2004 grant recipient, along with institute researchers at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Cancer Center announced that they have identified a subgroup of hard-to-treat breast cancers that may be sensitive to the drug cisplatin, rarely used in the treatment of breast tumors. They also have discovered the molecular basis of this sensitivity, which may help identify patients most likely to benefit from cisplatin treatment. The findings will be tested in a clinical trial anticipated to begin at the MGH Gillette Center for Breast Cancer and collaborating institutions later this spring. This study was supported in part by grants from the Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation.

• In May 2005, Sudhansu K. Dey, Ph.D., a 2004 MKACF cancer grant recipient from Vanderbilt University Medical Center, released a report that stated blocking the COX-1 enzyme — not COX-2 — may lead to prevention and possible treatment of the most common and fatal form of ovarian cancer.

The finding was based on a study showing COX-1 inhibition slowed the growth of surface layer tissue ovarian tumors in a mouse model of the disease. Researchers concluded that these results established a need for additional studies and trials that target COX-1 for the prevention and treatment of cancer.

Dey is director of the Reproductive and Development Biology Division in the Vanderbilt Department of Pediatrics. He says further studies should be conducted to determine whether aspirin and other non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs can block both COX enzymes and improve treatment of epithelial ovarian cancer.

• In 2005, a Duke University Medical Center research team led by Victoria L. Seewaldt, M.D., a 2004 MKACF cancer grant recipient, identified an alteration or defect in the breast cells of women at high risk for developing breast cancer. The alteration indicates that damage has occurred and that breast cancer may be imminent for half of these women.

The defect identified is the "silencing" of a gene called RARbeta2. This gene regulates how breast cells utilize vitamin A to keep themselves growing and dividing normally. In damaged or cancerous breast cells, the gene is often silenced. Testing is currently available through research studies at Duke and the University of Kansas. The team is also testing various preventive agents, such as flaxseed oil and fish oil, to see if they eradicate damaged breast cells.

• In May 2001, Dr. Michael Steller, a 1998 MKACF grant recipient at Brown University, received FDA approval to conduct a third human trial for his innovative cervical cancer vaccine. In progress for eight years, Dr. Steller’s vaccine attacks the human papillomavirus, which is often found in cervical cancer tumors. The vaccine is given to women already infected with the virus or who have developed cervical cancer, and the results have been very encouraging. One patient who participated in the first study has been disease-free for more than three years, and a patient from the second study is showing remarkable stability in her progress.

• For years, Dr. Kambiz Dowlatshahi, a 1997 grant recipient from Rush University, has conducted an ongoing study to prove that small, nonpalpable breast cancers detected by mammography can be treated successfully with laser energy instead of by invasive breast surgery. The grant money from the Foundation allowed Dr. Dowlatshahi to move forward to the human trial stage with the procedure. According to a work-in-progress report in a recent issue of ARCH SURG magazine, Dr. Dowlatshahi’s procedure was tested on 36 breast cancer patients who experienced no side effects, minimal discomfort and were able to walk away from the procedure with nothing more than a spot bandage.

• Dr. Doris Benbrook, a 1998 grant recipient, and her team from the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center in Oklahoma City, developed a three-dimensional model of ovarian tumors. The model allows tumors removed from patients to grow so drugs may be tested on them. The research findings provided strong enough preliminary results — inhibiting tumor growth and reversing cancer statistics — that Dr. Benbrook has applied to the National Institutes for Health for a large-scale investigation into the use of these substances as anti-cancer agents.

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