Cancer Drug Found; Scientist Annoyed 349
sporkme writes "A scientist was frustrated when the compound she was working with (called PPAR-gamma) destroyed her sample of cancer cells. Further research revealed that the substance was surprisingly well suited as a cancer treatment. Lab test results on mice resulted in the destruction of colon tumors without making the mice sick." Quoting: "'I made a calculation error and used a lot more than I should have. And my cells died,' Schaefer said. A colleague overheard her complaining. 'The co-author on my paper said, "Did I hear you say you killed some cancer?" I said "Oh," and took a closer look.' ... [They found that the compound killed] 'pretty much every epithelial tumor cell lines we have seen.'" Update: 02/15 17:27 GMT by KD : As reader CorporalKlinger pointed out, PPAR-gamma is a cellular receptor, not a compound; and this news is not particularly new.
Tag Article Thusly: (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Tag Article Thusly: (Score:5, Insightful)
The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not "Eureka!" but "That's funny ..."
It applies quite well here.
Re:Tag Article Thusly: (Score:4, Informative)
The headline is accurate, too (Score:5, Insightful)
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Or possibly less toxic or more effective. The argument is not that they have to keep working -- they should do that anyway -- but rather that unused patents should be revoked.
Re:The headline is accurate, too (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, that's right - all cancer researchers are only out for a quick buck and fuck every possible cure that gets in their way.
Yeah, cancer researchers are holding back the true cures until we pay them enough.
Yeah, cancer research laboratories don't employ people suffering from cancer themselves. It's only the lay public that suffer from cancer, not scientists and stuff.
You fucking retard.
He gets his cynicism from the world around us (Score:3)
Yeah, cancer researchers will do anything they can to get a drug to the people who need it. They usually give it away at cost to save peoples lives right?
Yeah, cancer researchers only employ people who have a vested
Moo (Score:3, Informative)
Um, no. The "Scientist Annoyed" came first. Indeed, had she not been annoyed she it may not have been brought to her attention that she suceeded.
A scientist was frustrated
And stop saying scientist. She is a researcher. The articles calls her a researcher. I'll bet she will even call herself a researcher. And, she is relevant because she was researching.
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Re:Moo (Score:5, Informative)
I am not, however, a researcher specializing in one aspect of scientific inquiry.
It's becoming an important distinction these days because so many "scientists" who are no better qualified than I am, are none-the-less using their status as "scientist" to question the results put out by scientists with in-depth knowledge backed by significant practical experience in the study of their specialty (e.g. a researcher).
Scientist Vs Researcher (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyway, why will changing the name stop ill-qualified challenges? One researcher in one branch of science could still challenge another researcher in another branch.
Re:Scientist Vs Researcher (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Scientist Vs Researcher (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Moo (Score:5, Informative)
research director
scientist
research assistant/researcher
The research director can approve projects for research.
The scientist can propose projects for research - also supervise the project
The research assistant/research carries out the work required to complete the project
Re:Moo (Score:4, Insightful)
Debate and flame.
Re:Moo (Score:5, Informative)
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Yes, and that research was relevant because it was part of science... [Origin [reference.com]: 1300-50; ME
By the way, I'm a scientist too. I use the scientific method, and my "faith" (if you can call it that, and I think you can) is in science. But wait, I am employed as a Graphic Artist! Holy shit, I guess you can't call me a scientist ei
Getting hungry, Jimmy? (Score:5, Funny)
Troy: Nooooo, just ignorant. You see, your crazy friend never heard of "The Scientific Method." Just ask this scientician.
Scientician: Uhhhh...
Troy: He'll tell you that anyone who makes observations, creates theories based on them, tests the predicitons of those theories, and modifies the theories based on the tests is a scientist. Don't kid yourself, Jimmy. If that scientician ever got the chance, he'd study you and everyone you care about.
Re:Getting hungry, Jimmy? (Score:5, Funny)
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pwned.
Sucker.
spun(1352) owns teh intarwebs for 5 minutes.
Re:Moo (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Moo (Score:4, Interesting)
"Research scientist" is probably a better term for the woman in TFA; "scientist" alone is so vague as to be almost unusable. It's just 'someone doing science,' and could be pretty much anyone from a grad student to a Nobel laureate; it doesn't say anything about what type or kind of science they're engaged in, or what their goals are.
Re:Moo (Score:5, Funny)
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I am claiming that there are too many doctors that are too focused on their specialty that they ignore anything else.
I walked into a big city doctor's office with multiple fractures in my hand. After the doctor has multiple x-rays taken, reviewed by him, and several others, he proclaims that I have a bad sprain.
I then go to another doctor (small town, generalist family doctor), he takes one x-ray, with my hand
Homeresque (Score:5, Funny)
Now that is a true nerd (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Now that is a true nerd (Score:5, Informative)
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YES! Finally the answer to my prayers!
It just also happens to kill the host if you take it intravenously.
Shit! I need to read faster! Call 911 for me...
You have to wonder (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:You have to wonder (Score:5, Informative)
Re:You have to wonder (Score:5, Interesting)
It's fairly far along in clinical trials and seems very promising, making it the first recognized effective pharmaceutical aphrodisiac.
Re:You have to wonder (Score:5, Funny)
It's a cruel joke when you look like an overgrown carrot and have a raging boner.
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Not sure how to feel (Score:3)
Seriously, is ALL pharmaceutical research on tanning, boners, and other non-life threatening shit? How about we tackle the stuff the KILLS PEOPLE first, huh? (Nah, there's too much money in the other stuff...)
Truly, a sad statement on affairs, if I've ever see
Re:Not sure how to feel (Score:4, Insightful)
(But even if you're going to the beach, there's a benefit and prevented skin damage by taking this first, other than your boner showing through your swim trunks).
So, it's not quite so silly, eh?
Re:You have to wonder (Score:5, Funny)
Yes. (Score:2)
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Alexander Fleming said it best (Score:5, Funny)
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A science teacher once told me (Score:5, Insightful)
So are a fair percentage of "last words".... (Score:5, Funny)
It's from Asimov, I believe. (Score:5, Informative)
Very True. Discovery of Teflon is another example. (Score:5, Interesting)
Source: http://users.wfu.edu/starbt5/Serendipity%20Projec
Re:Very True. Discovery of Teflon is another examp (Score:3, Informative)
F4C2 is horribly toxic. They had a big tank of this compressed gas and had set up the wall of glassware (with great care) for some experiment. They hooked it up, opened the valve, and nothing came out. (Yet the weight, as above, indicated that the tank WAS still full.)
The concern was that the valve was clogged, and that the tank still contained the poisonous gas under high pressure. So any attempt to open
Typical science (Score:3, Insightful)
And how many problems could have been solved by now, if instead of someone saying "Hey, this isn't doing what I wanted it to do!" instead they said "Wow, not doing what I wanted it to do, but this effect is pretty darn useful too!"
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Re:Typical science (Score:4, Funny)
So what you are saying is that if life hands you a lemon, use napalm?
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Dangit, I spilled the sticky useless-tree-goo on the stove...
Wait a minute, this new stuff is interesting...
Don't Be Daft (Score:5, Informative)
Oh please. You make it sound like the researcher was walking down the street one day with a dish of cancer and somebody bumped into her with the right chemicals. Like it was the scientific equivalent of "You got chocolate in my peanut butter!"
The decades of previous work, including her education and work experience, worked steadily towards her being a cancer researcher who was following a logical chain that brought cancer cells and compound together for the discovery. If any of it was blind luck it was perhaps a tiny little sliver at the end. Really not even that was luck. After all, even though the results were unexpected, clearly she was on the track to something. No luck required.
I think it's insulting to her dismiss the roles that logic and deductive reasoning played in arranging these circumstances.
Alright - I Concede I Didn't RTFA Well Enough (Score:3, Informative)
Regardless, I maintain it was much less luck than determined methodology that brought this forward. A fortunate event happened at the tip of decades of buildup.
She was lucky (Score:3, Interesting)
blind luck plus ability to recognize. (Score:3, Interesting)
The decades of previous work, including her education and work experience, worked steadily towards her being a cancer researcher who was following a logical chain that brought cancer cells and compound together fo
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I disagree; "research for the sake of research" (aka pure research) is overrated as a source of progress. Look at all the Eureka stories we've been discussing, from TFA to the older ones -- most of them are cases of applied research leading to new uses, via error or serendipity. Even Archimedes (the original Eureka moment) was trying to detect fra [wikipedia.org]
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Amazingly not a dupe. (Score:4, Insightful)
"Oh, you wanted to *cure cancer*!" (Score:5, Funny)
Terrible article, facts wrong (Score:2, Insightful)
"She was testing a compound called a PPAR-gamma modulator. It would never normally have been thought of as a cancer drug, or in fact a drug of any kind."
PPARg modulators are huge drugs, some of the most highly perscribed therapeutics for type II diabetes.
"Most of the drugs like Taxol affect the ability of tubulin to forms into microtubules. This doesn't do that -- it causes the tubulin itself to disappear. We
Re:Terrible article, facts wrong (Score:5, Informative)
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This is cool and all, and very interesting, but I've seen a lot of cool and interesting stuff that works great in mice that's fallen flat in human testing. Maybe this will be the one that finally does it.
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Hey hey calm down (Score:2)
Re:Terrible article, facts wrong (Score:5, Informative)
"PPAR Y inhibitors reduce tubulin protein levels by a PPAR, PPAR and proteasome-independent mechanism, resulting in cell cycle arrest, apoptosis and reduced metastasis of colorectal carcinoma cells"
Male severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) mice, 6 weeks of age, were maintained in a specific pathogen-free environment. Experiments were performed according to the guidelines of Yokohama City University. At day 0, 2 106 HT-29 cells were injected into the spleen. After inoculation, the mice were randomized into 2 treatment groups (each with n = 6) and 1 control group (n = 6). Starting at day 1 and daily thereafter, T0070907 (1 or 5 mg/kg/day) or control (1% DMSO vehicle) was administered orally. These concentrations were chosen based on initial pilot experiments to detect morbidity based on T0070907 alone. At 1 or 5 mg/kg/day, no increased morbidity (based on grooming, activity and food intake) was noted in mice with or without injected tumor cells. Four weeks later, the number and size of metastatic lesions in the liver were determined. Tumor volume was calculated as previously described.
PPAR-Gamma is a cellular receptor, not a compound (Score:5, Informative)
Source:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=
Notice how it says "implicated in cancer"? That information has been there for quite some time. Time for people to stop posting this antiquated junk as "new news."
Re:PPAR-Gamma is a cellular receptor, not a compou (Score:2)
Re:PPAR-Gamma is a cellular receptor, not a compou (Score:5, Insightful)
So you're saying I shouldn't find out about things on Slashdot because I could just look in one of a billion scientific journals? Oddly enough, I think most Slashdot readers aren't hardcore scientists and don't spend their time reading scientific journals (seeing as WE CAN'T without paying subscriptions). So if we don't read it here, where SHOULD we read about it? I haven't seen this in the mainstream news.
Quit being an elitist asshole.
From TFA (Score:4, Interesting)
FTW. I found a cure for cancer, sorry patented. And for AIDS too, sorry patented. I found a cure for all sickness and death, sorry patented.
Further investigation (Score:3, Funny)
The focus is to narrow! (Score:3, Interesting)
This is where a good project manager should step in. "You do realize you've been painting the same tiny bit of trim for the past three hours, right?"
Forest before the trees (Score:2)
Relevance in vivo to be determined (Score:2)
Seems like every week we get one of these "cure for cancer" stories. It's great that the research is ongoing, but the breathless headlines are premature.
Where is the kaboom? (Score:2)
Shouldn't someone be shouting holyfsck and doing back flips up and down the halls of the AMA?
Maybe we're just shell shocked, or quietly waiting for the sticker shock?
stuff is patented: Sorry, can't cure cancer today! (Score:3, Insightful)
Another plus for having a "Great" patent system.
You have cancer? Go to China or India.
After a few years of people doing this,
China and India will be as rich as the USA was 5 years ago.
(Today, the USA is actually poorer!)
Re:stuff is patented: Sorry, can't cure cancer tod (Score:3, Insightful)
Amen! By the same token, I think that if you're an individual valuable to business or scientific progress living in the US, and you don't like to see what the US is doing with its power, you have a responsibility to either enter politics, or leave the country.
Otherwise you're just lending your power to the country wit
watch the Sankyo stock go balistic (Score:2)
We need a new meme (Score:5, Interesting)
Every other compound you can order from Aldrich will kill cancer cells in vitro. So will a ball peen hammer. Drano, playground sand, double-acting baking powder. Pledge will kill them and leave a lemony-fresh scent.
When this compound gets to stage III clinical trials and does not leave a trail of bodies and does show some efficacy, then you can post the story.
Until then, Netcraft confirms it. These cancer cells are dying.
In the Soviet Union, cancer cells kill new drugs.
etc
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Furthermore, most cancers in mice can be cured with the biochemical equivalent of a dirty look.
Humans are exceptionally long-lived for mammals. The average mammal lives about a billion of its own heartbeats. Humans live two billion. this massively delayed senescence is due in part to effective tumour-supressor genes. From an ev
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Way to go, captain obvious!
Read it. Why don't you read a thousand or so J Med Chem articles and browse PubMed for a decade or so and get back to me. Then you might know that a mouse is a Petri dish with whiskers. Killing cancer ce
Funding cut (Score:4, Funny)
hee, hee, don't wash up. (Score:2)
this probably means the coffee cups in cubicles will be allowed to grow another couple inches of fur, but to the delight of kid hackers everywhere... don't wash up.
Patents (Score:3, Insightful)
So is the public at large now generally accepting the beliefs that not only are biological compounds [wikipedia.org] patentable, but that slightly changing them results in something sufficiently different to also be patentable?
I had a similar problem. (Score:4, Funny)
Nice! (Score:2)
So even with rocket science (Score:2)
forget all the calculations and fancy formulas, most breakthroughs are still done by "mistake"
Just Like Penicillin (Score:4, Informative)
It seems that the "error" part of the scientific method's "trial and error" process is even more important than the planned "trial" part.
Maybe we should have more scientific research conducted like jazz, which is sometimes described as "gracefully exploiting errors".
Mouse Cancer (Score:5, Funny)
Why don't they use some of this money to find cures for human diseases or world hunger, or something?
Re:Mouse Cancer (Score:5, Informative)
For example, many animal trials (mice in particular) didn't show cigarette smoke to be nearly as much of a cancer risk as it is for humans. This research data was in turn used by Big Tobacco in their defense back when they were still trying to pretend that smoking isn't so bad.
Similarly, penicillin's release to the market was delayed because it had a tendency to kill lab animals.
Re:I found a cancer drug, darn it (Score:5, Informative)
Re:I found a cancer drug, darn it (Score:5, Funny)
That would be fantastic! It would prove that mutually exclusive wishes can be programmed in. "I want it red" followed by "I don't like red" followed by "I wanted it red", followed by "I told you not red".
Now if a program could code that, I would pay top dollar for it. Seriously.
Patents (Score:3, Insightful)
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A Bahamian mouse claims that Hugh Hefner is the father of its baby after a "meeting" at a Playboy photoshoot. The mouse is dying of cancer, and wants Hugh to pay for treatment with the PPAR thingy? Can I get that job at the Inquirer now?