Newswise — Eva Hernando, PhD of the Department of Pathology at the NYU School of Medicine and her team have received a $50,000 year long grant from the Liddy Shriver Sarcoma Initiative and the Leiomyosarcoma Direct Research Foundation. The project is titled, "MicroRNA Deregulation in Mesenchymal Transformation and Sarcoma-genesis." The specific sarcoma under investigation is leiomyosarcoma. "This project represents to our knowledge the first attempt to classify sarcomas based on their microRNA expression, and to explore the contribution of these small RNAs to sarcoma-genesis. We hope our research will lead to a better understanding of the pathogenesis of leiomyosarcoma and will unravel new potential targets for future therapeutic intervention," commented Dr. Hernando, Assistant Professor of Pathology. The enormous clinical relevance of microRNAs was acknowledged by the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine awarded to Fire and Melow, the two scientists who first discovered a new mechanism of genetic regulation mediated by these small RNAs. Sarcoma is a cancer of the connective tissues, including nerves, muscles, joints, bones, and blood vessels. It is a rare and dangerous cancer in adults, accounting for only 1% of all adult cancers, however it accounts for 20% of all childhood cancers. The word sarcoma is derived from the Greek "sarc" (fleshy) and "oma" (tumor). Sarcomas come in two types, soft tissue and bone/cartilage. Leiomyosarcomas account for about 7% of all soft tissue tumors. The word Leiomyosarcoma literally means smooth muscle fleshy tumor.
Bruce and Beverly Shriver, who lost their daughter Liddy to Ewing's sarcoma said, "We are delighted to be co-funding this grant with the Leiomyosarcoma Direct Research Foundation. We think that such collaborative efforts are very important as they offer small sarcoma advocacy groups like ours the opportunity to fund larger projects together than we could fund separately."
Suzanne Kurtz, a leiomyosarcoma patient herself, and her husband Ed were motivated to form the Leiomyosarcoma Direct Research Foundation in order to advocate for and fund more research on this rare disease. Suzanne says, with great passion, "We want to help keep many leiomyosarcoma patients alive until a cure is found!" The Shrivers added, "Dr. Hernando and her team are challenging conventional wisdom about how sarcomas originate. Their approach might result in a blueprint for similar studies in other types of sarcomas and thus benefit many other patients."
RSS