30^th Experts Meet On Cancer Therapy November 14-15, 2018 Melbourne, Australia

Jia-Yin Ma has completed master degree of Chung Yuan Christian University. She specializes in cancer psychology,and also is a clinical psychologist of Taipei city hospital in Taiwan. She has published a research in conference of Taiwan Association of Clinical Psychology. Chun-Yu Huang has completed PhD from National Chengchi University. Now she is a clinical psychologist, and a professor of Chung Yuan Christian University. Chun-Yu Huang has studied many resarch of health pcychology, especially about psychology state of cancer survivor.

This study aims to consider the adaptation process of disease within breast cancer patients and their partners, including communication pattern, the perceived quality of the relationship and quality of life. This study is a cross-sectional design, and 257 breast cancer patients and their partners are participated. As analysis methods, we applied correlation analysis, difference analysis, multiple regression analysis and dyadic data analysis through the actor-partner interdependence model (APIM). The results revealed the points as followed: 1. Not only patients but their partner perceived themselves are demand-discussion, and others are withdraw-discussion, they have worse satisfactory quality of relationship.2. By using the APIM, the consequence revealed that the cancer-related communication pattern of each person is the strongest predictor of their own quality of relationship. The communication pattern of woman breast cancer patient’s perception also plays a significant role on their male partner’s quality of relationship. 3. Quality of relationship is a mediator variable between the cancer-related communication patterns and quality of life. For patients, quality of relationship is consistent with full mediated between the cancer-related communication patterns and all domain of quality of life. In conclusion, disease does have an impact on relationship. Besides, for cancer patients and their partners, we encourage partners to accompany patients for medical treatment, be patient’s primary caregiver, and provide more assistance to patients. Clinicians should be aware of the communication between the patients and their partners in order to help them to improve their communication skills and the quality of their relationship.

Yeni Purnamasari has completed her Master Degree of Biomedical Sicience at the age of 25 from Brawijaya University and now assigned as Internship Doctor in Aisyiyah Hospital Malang in East Java, Indonesia.

Coelomic fluid of the earthworm had a lot of bioactive substances as therapeutic drug and anticancer effect that has been proven in many medical research. The benefit of coelomic fluid as anticancer effect needs further investigation. This study aimed to investigate whether the coelomic fluid of the earthworm Lumbricus rubellus as combination of 5-Fluouracil has role in decreasing focal adhesion kinase (FAK) and calcium intracellular expression (iCa2-) on colorectal cancer HT-29 cell line. HT-29 cells were cultured by adding coelomic fluid with 5-Fluouracil (5,10, and 20 g/ml) and without 5-Fluouracil (0, 20 g/ml) for 24 hours. We assessed the percentage of FAK level using flowcytometri and iCa2+ using immune-fluorescence. The result showed that after treating HT-29 cells with combination of coelomic fluid and 5-Fluouracil in different concentration, the percentage FAK level significantly decreased in dose combination (p < 0.05) and iCa2+ percentage compare each groups was significantly differences (p< 0.05). Corelation between percentage FAK and iCa2+ showed that there is a strong correlation (R = 0.77). This suggest that treating combination coelomic fluid and 5-fluouracil in HT-29 cells made the decrease in FAK percentage and also followed by iCa2+ percentage. Our finding suggested that coelomic fluid of the earthworm Lumbricus rubellus could prove useful as a combination of 5-fluouracil in colorectal cancer therapy.

Will be updated soon.

Frizzled family receptor 7 (FZD7) is one of the 10 members of Frizzled family of receptors. It interacts with Wnt ligands to activate canonical Wnt signaling, which function to turn on different downstream transcription factors essential for modulating cellular proliferation, polarity, and differentiation. Altered expression of FZD7 receptor is associated with development and progression of breast cancer. An effective targeted therapy for breast cancer through modulating ligand-receptor interaction may involve using antibodies to antagonize FZD7. ScFvs (single-chain fragment variable) have provided an alternative to full-length monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) in diagnostic and therapeutic applications. A phage antibody library of scFv was used and selection of specific scFvs were performed by 4 rounds of panning process against an immunodominant epitope of FZD7, followed by PCR and fingerprinting of the selected clones. ELISA was used to confirm the specificity of the clones. Apoptotic effects of the selected scFv on MDA-MB-231 cell line were assessed by annexin V/PI assay after 24 h and 48 h. A specific scFv with the frequency of 35% was isolated which produced positive ELISA with the corresponding epitope. After 24h treatment with the selected scFv, MDA-MB-231 cells showed 48.7% apoptotic cell death (Annexin V+/PI−). However, this amount increased to 81.6% following 48h treatment with scFv. Due to unique apoptotic properties of selected scFv including human origin, high affinity and specificity, this agent has been applied in cancer immunotherapy. The specific anti-FZD7 scFv selected in this study has the potential to be used for inhibiting Wnt signaling pathway in breast cancer cells.

Dr Farhan Mehedi has completed his MBBS from the Univeristy of Dhaka and postgraduate studies from the Univeristy of Nottingham, UK. He is currently a specialist trainee doctor at National Health Service (NHS) in United Kingdom. He has multiple publications in reputed journals. His future intertest is to be is to be involved in clinical, academic and scientific areas of oncology.

Angiogenesis is principally induced by Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor A (VEGF-A); however, the use of VEGF-A inhibitors in the treatment of oesophageal cancer (e.g. Bevacizumab) has not proven efficacious in clinical trials. It has subsequently been shown that splicing of the terminal exon of VEGF-A pre-mRNA generates two separate isoforms: pro-angiogenic VEGF165a and anti-angiogenic VEGF165b. These isoforms are balanced to regulate angiogenesis by the splicing factor SRSF1, phosphorylated by serine–arginine protein kinase 1 (SRPK1). The aim of this study was to investigate expression of VEGF-A, its isoforms, and SRPK1 in oesophageal cancer and their association with micro vessel density (MVD) and patient survival. Understanding the role of SRPK1 and VEGF-A splice isoforms in the regulation of oesophageal cancer angiogenesis may provide a new and potentially efficacious target for anti-angiogenic therapy. Methods: Tumour samples from 36 patients with oesophageal adenocarcinoma undergoing curative resection following neo-adjuvant chemotherapy were examined using immunohistochemistry for VEGF-A, VEGF165a, VEGF165b, CD31 (for MVD) and SRPK1. Digital droplet PCR was used to quantify SRPK1 levels at the gene level. Results: VEGF-A was not associated with MVD. There was a high (pro-angiogenic) VEGF165a/ VEGF165b ratio in the majority of the oesophageal cancers examined. VEGF165a expression was positively correlated with SRPK1 expression (p=0.01). There was a positive correlation between the pro-angiogenic (VEGF165a dominant) oesophageal cancers, MVD and poor overall survival; however, this did not reach statistical significance. Conclusion: The dominance of the pro-angiogenic VEGF splice isoform and the splicing factor SRPK1 show greater correlation with oesophageal cancer angiogenesis and disease survival than the general target of VEGF-A. Further investigation of the control and potential inhibition of this angiogenic pathway in oesophageal cancer is required.

Qingcai Meng is a PhD student in Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center. He is mainly committed to molecular typing and clinical transformation research of pancreatic cancer. He has published more than 5 papers in reputed journals.

Purpose: Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) remains one of the deadliest cancers worldwide, partly due to tumor chemoresistance. Numerous studies have shown that glutathione peroxidase-1 (GPx1) plays various roles in development and progression of multiple tumors. However, its role in pancreatic cancer remains unclear. In this study, we sought to elucidate the function of GPx1 in pancreatic cancer malignancy and gemcitabine (GEM) resistance. Experimental Design: PDAC tissue microarrays was used to evaluate the correlation between GPx1 expression and clinicopathological features. Cytobiology, molecular biology assays and mouse models were performed to investigate the detailed mechanisms. Finally, RNA-sequencing was performed in the scramble-shRNA and GPx1-shRNA MiaPaCa-2 cells to identify core signaling pathways. Results: The level of GPx1 expression was negatively associated with overall survival (OS) in patients with PDAC. Silencing of GPx1 resulted in an epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT) phenotype and increased chemoresistance to GEM in vitro and in vivo. Additionally, activation of Akt/GSK3β/Snail signaling was demonstrated to be involved in this process. Conclusions: Our results reveal that GPx1 could inhibit EMT and chemoresistance by regulating Akt/GSK3β/Snail axis in PDAC.

Mr. Sourav Taru Saha is a PhD. student working on Breast cancer at the University of the Witwatersrand. The research group’s main focus is the link between Cholesterol and Breast cancer. Till now, his research has shown promising results and in 2018 the concept would be tested in vivo. Based on the results, this research might lead to a novel drug in treating Breast cancer.

Cancer cells have an increased need for cholesterol, which is required for cell membrane integrity. Cholesterol accumulation has been described in various malignancies including breast cancer. Cholesterol has also been known to be the precursor of estrogen and vitamin D, both of which play a key role in the histology of breast cancer. Thus, depleting the cholesterol levels in cancer cells is a proposed innovative strategy to treat cancer. Therefore, novel cholesterol-depleting compounds are currently being investigated. KS-01 is a cyclic amylose oligomer composed of glucose units. It solubilizes the cholesterol and is proven to be toxicologically benign in humans. This led us to hypothesize that it might deplete cholesterol from cancer cells and may prove to be a clinically useful compound. Our work provides preliminary experimental evidences to support this hypothesis. We identified the potency of KS-01 in vitro against two breast cancer cell lines: MCF-7 (Estrogen positive, ER+), MDA-MB-231(Estrogen negative, ER-) and compared the results against two normal cell lines: MRC-5 (Normal Human Lung Fibroblasts) and HEK-293 (Normal human embryonic kidney cells) using cytotoxic, apoptosis and cholesterol based assays. KS-01 treatment reduced intracellular cholesterol resulting in significant breast cancer cell growth inhibition through apoptosis. The results hold true for both ER+ and ER-. These data suggest that KS-01 can prevent cholesterol accumulation in breast cancer cells and is a promising new anticancer agent.

Soo-Cheon Chae has completed his B.S. and M.S. degree from Chonbuk National University of South Korea and earned a PhD degree in molecular biology from Tohoku University of Japan in 1998. He trained as a Postdoctoral fellow at UC San Diego during 1998-2001. He is a professor of School of Medicine at Wonkwang University of the South Korea. He has published more than 90 papers in reputed journals and has been serving as an editorial board member of repute

MiRNAs are non-coding RNAs that play important roles in the pathogenesis of human diseases by regulating target gene expression in specific cells or tissues. Previously we identified colorectal cancer (CRC) associated MIR196B, which was specifically up-regulated in CRC cells and tissue. We also identified 18 putative MIR196B target genes by comparing the mRNAs down-regulated in MIR196B-overexpressed cells with MIR196B target genes predicted by public bioinformatics tools. In this study, we verified the association between MIR196B and three genes, HOXA5, HOXB6 and GLTP. HOXA5, HOXB6 and GLTP transcripts were directly down-regulated by MIR196B. The mRNA and proteins levels of HOXA5, HOXB6 and GLTP were also down-regulated in CRC cells by the up-regulated MIR196B. GLTP protein expression was decreased in CRC tissues compared to adjacent non-tumor tissues. These results suggest that HOXA5, HOXB6, and GLTP were direct target genes of MIR196B in CRC cells, and that the up-regulated MIR196B in CRC tissue regulates the expression levels of HOXA5, HOXB6, and GLTP during colorectal carcinogenesis. Our results suggest that MIR196B may have a therapeutic value in relation to various human cancers.

Joe Patrick Jamelo graduated from the University of St. Lasalle- College of Medicine. He is currently a 3rd year medical resident at Dr. Pablo O. Torre Memorial Hospital

Coronary Artery Disease After Radiation Therapy for Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in a Pregnant Patient: Radiation-associated cardiovascular diseases are increasingly recognized as adverse effects of Hodgkin’s lymphoma (HL) treatment. This case report aims to identify the risk factors for coronary artery disease (CAD) in a symptomatic pregnant patient who had mediastinal irradiation for HL. She later underwent coronary angiogram and percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). We evaluated a 26-year-old pregnant patient who had been treated for HL by radiation therapy at the age of 19. The total mediastinal dose was 51 Gray (Gy). Patient was evaluated with serial electrocardiography (ECG) monitoring and Troponin I followed by coronary angiography of the coronary arteries. Patient had CAD. Coronary angiogram showed 2-vessel CAD with significant left main coronary artery involvement, which led to PCI of ostial to proximal left main artery. We report a case of a 26-year-old pregnant patient with CAD who had history of HL treated by radiation therapy. Cardiovascular complications like CAD should be kept in mind as a possible complication after radiation therapy. Physicians must be aware of post-radiation cardiac complications, recognize at-risk patients, and screen such patients for symptoms and signs of cardiac disease.