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Albert Einstein College of Medicine Researchers Present at AACR Annual Meeting Symposia

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Newswise March 26, 2014 (BRONX, NY) From uncovering the role nerve cells play in metastasis to identifying new cancer-causing genes, researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University made notable advances in the understanding and potential treatment of cancer during the past year.

Several Einstein faculty members and students will present their recent research at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting, taking place in San Diego April 5-9, 2014. Among the presentations are those during major and mini symposia:

Gene Regulation and Transcription Factors Ujunwa Cynthia Okoye-Okafor, M.D./Ph.D. student Ms. Okoye-Okafor, who will be receiving the AACRs 2014 AACR Minority Scholar in Cancer Research Award during the Annual Meeting, will present Characterization of novel protein-coding gene named TIHL (Translocated in Hodgkins Lymphoma). Ms. Okoye-Okafor discovered this gene as a student in the lab of Ulrich Steidl, M.D., Ph.D., who focuses on transcriptional and epigenetic regulation of hematopoiesis and leukemia. Dr. Steidl is associate professor of cell biology and of medicine at Einstein and associate chair, translational research in oncology at Montefiore Medical Center, the University Hospital for Einstein. Monday, April 7, 3:00-5:00 pm (3:20-3:35 pm), Room 33, San Diego Convention Center

Neural Regulation of Prostate Cancer Paul Frenette, M.D. Dr. Frenette will present at the major symposium titled Complexity in the Tumor Microenvironment. He will discuss his research, including his recent Science paper that showed nerves play a key role in triggering prostate cancer and influencing its spread. Dr. Frenette is chair and director of Einsteins Ruth L. and David S. Gottesman Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine. Tuesday, April 8, 10:30 am-12:30 pm, Ballroom 20D, San Diego Convention Center

EGFR Family, P13K, AKT and NF-kB Signaling Antonio Di Cristofano, Ph.D. Dr. Di Cristofano will chair and present during the minisymposium. The central focus of his laboratory is the identification and characterization of the specific biological processes and signaling pathways that are controlled by the PI3K/PTEN/AKT cascade. His research is centered on tumors originating in the thyroid gland and he was recently honored by the American Thyroid Association for his work. Dr. Di Cristofano is professor of developmental & molecular biology at Einstein. Tuesday, April 8, 3:00-5:00 pm, Room 6CF, San Diego Convention Center

Epigenetics 4 Orsolya Giricz, Ph.D. Dr. Giricz will be presenting Integrated epigenomic profiling reveals widespread demethylation in melanoma and reveals CSF-1 receptor as an aberrant regulator of malignant growth and invasion. She received an AACR Millennium Scholar in Training Award for this work. Dr. Giricz is an associate in the medicine department at Einstein and works in the lab of Amit Verma, M.B.B.S., whose research focuses on epigenomic profiling of tumors. Dr. Verma is associate professor of medicine and of developmental & molecular biology at Einstein and director of hematologic malignancies at Montefiore Einstein Center for Cancer Care, Tuesday, April 8, 3:00-5:00 pm (3:35-3:50 pm), Room 6A, San Diego Convention Center

In addition to the symposium presentations, faculty members will lead two methods workshops and present 19 posters on a variety of topics, including imaging tumor cells, evaluating cancer subtypes in epidemiological studies, and identifying potential biomarkers and drug targets for breast, colon, thyroid, head and neck, and lung cancers.

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Albert Einstein College of Medicine Researchers Present at AACR Annual Meeting Symposia

Wikipedia founder calls alt-medicine practitioners lunatic charlatans

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A diagram about Emotional Freedom Techniques that is hosted on Wikipedia.

Several months ago, the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology (ACEP), an alternative medicine non-profit, began a petition on Change.org asking Wikipedia to create and enforce new policies that allow for true scientific discourse about holistic approaches to healing. The petition reached 7,000 signatures in mid-January and then largely stalled. But this weekend, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales responded to the request, saying that no amount of signatures would get him on board with ACEP's request.

In its petition, ACEP wrote to Wikipedia, people who are interested in the benefits of Energy Medicine, Energy Psychology, and specific approaches such as the Emotional Freedom Techniques, Thought Field Therapy, and the Tapas Acupressure Technique, turn to your pages, trust what they read, and do not pursue getting help from these approaches which research has, in fact, proven to be of great benefit to many.

These pages are controlled by a few self-appointed 'skeptics' who serve as de facto censors for Wikipedia, the petition continued. They clothe their objections in the language of the narrowest possible understanding of science in order to inhibit open discussion of innovation in health care. As of this writing, another 800 people have signed the petition in support of a revision of Wikipedia's policies.

Wales, however, responded on Change.org with a short note:

No, you have to be kidding me. Every single person who signed this petition needs to go back to check their premises and think harder about what it means to be honest, factual, truthful.

Wikipedia's policies around this kind of thing are exactly spot-on and correct. If you can get your work published in respectable scientific journalsthat is to say, if you can produce evidence through replicable scientific experiments, then Wikipedia will cover it appropriately.

What we won't do is pretend that the work of lunatic charlatans is the equivalent of "true scientific discourse." It isn't.

Wikipedia's guidelines for the inclusion of information are outlined at length on its project pages, but the ACEP did not identify a specific rule it wanted added or excised in its grievances. (The ACEP has not yet responded to Ars' request for comment. This article will be updated if we hear back.)

One rule that may have irked alternative medicine proponents might be that Wikipedia tries to avoid being the host of original perspectives. As the site states on oneproject page, Wikipedia does not publish original thought: all material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source.

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Wikipedia founder calls alt-medicine practitioners lunatic charlatans

Operation Medicine Drop nets more than 70 pounds of pills

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Published: Tuesday, March 25, 2014 at 6:10 p.m. Last Modified: Tuesday, March 25, 2014 at 6:10 p.m.

Operation Medicine Drop in Polk County bagged a total of 56,926 pills and removed more than 4,500 doses of controlled substances from the community on Saturday.

The Polk County Sheriffs Office, which held the event in conjunction with Tryon Police Department, Tryon Fire Department and the Saluda Police Department, called the collection very successful in a news release Tuesday.

Residents responded in positive stride to get prescription drugs that were no longer of value to the prescribed off the streets. By taking part in these take back events, it aids in the prevention of keeping them from being abused or distributed illegally on our streets, the Sheriffs Office said in the release.

Citizens deposited unused medications at the Sheriffs Office, Saluda Police Department, Sunny View Fire Department, Tryon Estates and Tryon Fire Department during the collection Saturday.

Officers collected a total of 56,926 pills that weighed more than 70 pounds. According to the release, 4,536 of the dosage units were controlled substances.

Prescription drug abuse is one of the most abused forms of drug use that plagues North Carolina, according to the release.

The national Operation Medicine Drop campaign gives residents an opportunity to rid their homes of these drugs which are so commonly sought after during other criminal activities such as breaking and entering, according to the Sheriffs Office.

Operation Medicine Drop partners with Safe Kids North Carolina, the Drug Enforcement Administration, North Carolina State Bureau of Investigations, and local law enforcement to collect and safely destroy these drugs during this campaign. Once the dosages are collected, the State Bureau of Investigation gathers them from across the state, where they are later transported by the North Carolina Highway Patrol to a state-approved incinerator.

Operation Medicine Drop events typically take place statewide in the spring and fall.

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Operation Medicine Drop nets more than 70 pounds of pills

Penn Medicine Researcher Receives Grant to Study the Roots of Speech Perception

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Newswise PHILADELPHIA -- Maria Neimark Geffen, PhD, assistant professor of Otorhinolaryngology: Head and Neck Surgery in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania has received a $750,000 grant over a three-year period from the Human Frontier Science Program to fund research into the developmental mechanisms in the human brain that are responsible for speech and communication. Dr. Geffen will head the cross-interdisciplinary, cross-continental team of investigators, which also includes Dr. Judit Gervain at the Laboratoire de la Perception, CNRS in Paris.

Speech is one of the most important functions that our brains perform every day. While we now understand that infants start understanding some features of speech in utero, how the brain develops to understand the full richness of speech remains a mystery, said Dr. Geffen. The goal of our project is to combine state-of-the-art computational and brain imaging techniques to trace how the brain develops to be able to process speech.

Recent results suggest that the category speech itself might need to be revised to include other biological communicative sounds, as young infants process primate vocalizations in a similar fashion as speech. The team will use new brain imaging techniques to measure the activity in the infant brain, through different points of development. Combining a collaborative expertise in developmental cognitive neuropsychology and computational and systems neuroscience, the research team will identify what classes of sounds are special for the human auditory system, which brain regions and mechnanisms process these sounds in the infant brain, and how this processing changes with developments.

Our project seeks to explore the developmental mechanisms of specialization of the human brain for speech and communication, she says.

Dr. Geffens research proposal Development of brain mechanisms underlying speech preference in infants: Is speech special? was one of only 10 of young investigator projects selected worldwide for funding by the International Human Frontier Science Program Organization (HFSPO). HFSPO works to promote intercontinental collaboration and training in cutting-edge, interdisciplinary research focused on the life sciences.

For more information, please see the HFSPO award announcement.

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Penn Medicine is one of the world's leading academic medical centers, dedicated to the related missions of medical education, biomedical research, and excellence in patient care. Penn Medicine consists of the Raymond and Ruth Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania (founded in 1765 as the nation's first medical school) and the University of Pennsylvania Health System, which together form a $4.3 billion enterprise.

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Penn Medicine Researcher Receives Grant to Study the Roots of Speech Perception

Medicine Hat police chief mourns death of businessman linked to police shooting victim

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Chester Hunchak went the extra mile for the people who were important to him, including the local chief of police.

When I became the chief, he brought me a letter congratulating me, Medicine Hat Police Chief Andy McGrogan said.

McGrogan was a constable working the streets when he first met Hunchak, and was among many remembering the popular businessman since his death last week.

Hunchak, who operated a second-hand vehicle dealership in Medicine Hat, went missing Friday after accompanying a prospective customer on a test drive.

His body was discovered on a rural property where a deadly police shooting took place Saturday afternoon.

Police shot and killed an armed man, believed to be connected to Hunchaks death, as he ignored their orders and drove toward them near Range Road 60, just outside Medicine Hat city limits.

Earlier, Hunchaks black Cadillac Escalade had been traced to the property.

According to the Alberta Serious Incident Response Team, which investigates police-involved incidents involving injury or death, an armed man came out of the home and pointed a firearm at an officer, who retreated to his vehicle.

The RCMP, which has jurisdiction over the area outside Medicine Hat city limits, was notified and officers from both police departments surrounded the house.

RCMP and Medicine Hat officers determined the armed man was a danger to police based on telephone conversations they had with him.

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Medicine Hat police chief mourns death of businessman linked to police shooting victim

Research Opportunities at the Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University – Video

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Research Opportunities at the Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University
Dr. Stephen Wikel at Quinnipiac University #39;s Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine shares opportunities that students have for research and scholarship.

By: QuinnipiacUniversity

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Research Opportunities at the Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University - Video


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