Healthcare industry

Metastatic breast cancer cells abuse macrophages, a type of immune cell, to promote the settlement of cancer metastases in the lungs. The reprogrammed macrophages stimulate blood vessel cells to secrete a cocktail of metastasis-promoting proteins that are part of the so-called metastatic niche.

A research team around Dr. Andreas Weltin, Dr. Jochen Kieninger and Johannes Dornhof from the Department of Microsystems Engineering (IMTEK) at the University of Freiburg has developed a system that, among other things, makes it possible to study the development of tumour cells outside the human body in a three-dimensional environment.

As cancer progresses, the tumor cells continually change, ultimately resulting in a tumor consisting of a large number of different cell clones with different characteristics. This is referred to as "tumor heterogeneity". In many cases, the cancer cells become resistant to the treatments available.

Scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum, DKFZ) have developed antibodies that have two antigen-binding sites and can couple cancer cells with effector cells of the immune system. In laboratory tests, these bridging antibodies, together with an enhancer antibody, were able to specifically mobilize the body's own immune defenses and destroy breast cancer cells.

Women have an increased risk of breast cancer if they have a family history of this disease. However, the risk may also be higher if first-degree family members have another type of cancer, according to a study by a team of scientists and physicians from the National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT) Heidelberg, the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and Heidelberg University Hospital (UKHD), as well as international colleagues.

AI-based evaluation of medical imaging data usually requires a specially developed algorithm for each task. Scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) have now presented a new method for configuring self-learning algorithms for a large number of different imaging datasets – without the need for specialist knowledge or very significant computing power.

Translational oncology - 26/05/2020

Translation: driver of cancer medicine

The fight against cancer is a pressing issue. Although technological advances in the treatment, prevention and early detection of cancer have improved over the past few decades, the number of people affected is increasing. Cancer medicine now wants to counteract this by joining forces with other players involved in the field.

Article - 11/06/2019

New pathogens in beef and cow's milk contributing to the risk of cancer

A team of researchers led by Nobel laureate Prof. Dr. med. Dr. h.c. mult. Harald zur Hausen has discovered a new type of infectious agent in dairy and meat products produced from European cattle that increases the risk for colon and breast cancer. These so-called Bovine Meat and Milk Factors (BMMFs) are small DNA molecules that are similar in sequence to both bacterial plasmids and certain viruses.

New edition - 24/05/2019

Tumour metastasis

Cancer is usually not curable when metastases have formed in the body. Metastases are often resistant to drugs that have successfully eliminated the primary tumour. The basic features of the complex process of metastasis are now known, but many details still remain elusive. Intensive research activities are focusing on new therapeutic concepts aimed at developing effective anti-metastatic therapies.

Article - 16/04/2019

Tumour monitoring using liquid biopsy

Liquid biopsy, the analysis of cancer biomarkers and circulating tumour cells in body fluids such as blood, is revolutionising the diagnosis and monitoring of cancer. It has also been possible to expand circulating tumour cells from the blood under laboratory conditions. It is expected that in the future, liquid biopsy will be able to precisely characterise tumour cells at every stage of a cancer.

Article - 22/03/2019

Personalised therapies for treating metastasing breast cancer

Breast cancer is characterised by broad genetic diversity. Successful treatment is made even more difficult by the fact that, in advanced breast cancer, the properties of metastases often differ significantly from the primary tumour. The Heidelberg CATCH study is now collecting genetic profiles from patients' metastasis tissue samples, which can be used to tailor therapy to individual requirements.

Press release - 10/12/2018

High distinction for stem cell researcher Andreas Trumpp

This year's State Research Prize of Baden-Württemberg awarded for outstanding achievements in applied research goes to Andreas Trumpp from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and the Heidelberg Institute for Stem Cell Technology and Experimental Medicine (HI-STEM). Theresia Bauer, State Minister of Science, Research and the Arts, presented the award, which carries a monetary prize of €100.000, at a festive ceremony on December 10, 2018.

Article - 18/01/2018

Medications that target metastasing tumours

Tumour metastases are often resistant to the drug that is used to eliminate the primary tumour. Genome-wide analyses of mutation patterns in the primary tumour and its metastases provide information on the aggressiveness of cancer and may help to find the best available means of further treatment. This has been demonstrated by scientists from Heidelberg in a clinical trial on the molecular evolution of renal cancer.

Article - 11/12/2017

KDM4 – an efficient target for the therapy of triple-negative breast cancer

While breast cancer survival has clearly improved in recent years, women with triple-negative breast cancer have benefitted very little from progress in cancer medicine. Targeted therapies aimed at inhibiting epigenetic regulators might offer a potential new option for the treatment of breast cancer. Prof. Dr. Roland Schüle and Dr. Jochen Maurer have discovered an epigenetic enzyme called KDM4 and come up with a new cell model that significantly…

Article - 22/02/2017

MammaScreen – blood test for early detection of breast cancer

The MammaScreen team from the University of Heidelberg Women’s Hospital has developed a blood test for diagnosing breast cancer. This new test can detect breast cancer at a very early stage. It works on women of all ages with tumours of any type and size.

Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen – 14 December 2016: amcure, a biopharmaceutical company developing first-in-class cancer therapeutics, today announced the closing of a Series B financing round amounting to a total of EUR 6 million.

Article - 13/12/2016

Smart sensor technology from Ulm can do more than just breath analysis

Detecting disease-specific molecules in human breath is technically feasible, but time-consuming and rather costly. "µbreath" could soon change this. The breath gas analysis device has all the necessary requirements for commercial success in the healthcare sector: it is compact, accurate, highly sensitive and fast. The chemist who developed µbreath, Prof. Boris Mizaikoff from Ulm University, and his partners are hoping to start…

Article - 05/09/2016

Apogenix: immuno-oncological protein drugs for the treatment of malignant diseases

Apogenix AG, a biopharmaceutical company from Heidelberg that specialises in immuno-oncology, develops protein drugs that target central signalling pathways involved in regulating the growth, migration and apoptosis of malfunctioning cells and thus offer novel treatment options for cancer and other malignant diseases.

Article - 28/09/2015

Breast cancer: a few millilitres of urine to diagnose the disease early

It would be phenomenal news if it turned out that breast cancer could be detected by way of urine samples. Treating physicians would be able to use conspicuous test results to begin further examinations as quickly as possible along with therapy if necessary. Prof. Dr. Elmar Stickeler and his team from the Freiburg University Medical Centre have developed a method that identifies the composition of microRNAs in urine. They were able to predict…

Article - 26/05/2015

Does too much beef and cow’s milk cause cancer?

The large number of breast and colon cancer cases might be due to viruses that are taken up with beef and dairy products. This is the provocative thesis of Nobel Laureate Harald zur Hausen who previously linked HPV with cervical cancer. In addition to epidemiological evidence, zur Hausen and his team have also provided experimental evidence to substantiate his thesis.

Article - 25/08/2014

Frederik Wenz - radiologist sets milestone with new surgical technique for the treatment of bone metastases

Can painful bone metastases be treated in a targeted and quick way? Can metastases that are potentially present in the liver and kidneys be adequately treated at the same time as bone metastases? These are the questions that Professor Dr. med. Frederik Wenz from the University Medical Center Mannheim asked himself before going on to develop an innovative surgical technique. After a long development period, this technique is now recognized as an…

Article - 31/03/2014

TherapySelect – Identifying Susceptibility to Cancer Therapy

TherapySelect Dr. Frank Kischkel is an innovative biotechnology company based in Heidelberg, Germany, with a special focus on the development, validation and application of diagnostic tests for cancer patients. The company’s proprietary CTR-Test® uses patients’ cancer cells to determine the tumor’s susceptibility to treatment with cytostatic drugs. This knowledge helps identify ineffective drugs prior to treatment as well as reduce adverse drug…

Article - 04/07/2013

Experimental evidence of stem cells for metastasis

For the first time, scientists from Heidelberg have characterised cancer cells that initiate metastasis in the blood of breast cancer patients using an in-vivo xenograft mouse model. These cells have the properties of cancer stem cells and are characterised by three surface molecules that can be used as biomarkers for disease progression.

Article - 21/05/2013

Green gold: bioactive plant foods

Nowadays everything must be good for something must have a direct noticeable or tangible effect. The ever topical issue of nutrition is no exception. All this makes functional food a promising and inexhaustible market. Teams of scientists around the world are focussing on how unhealthy food can be made healthy. Bioactive plant foods are expected to close a gap that should not have existed in the first place.

Article - 25/03/2013

Epigenetics for personalised cancer care for women

Every year in the EU, 45,300 women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer and 330,000 with breast cancer. Ovarian cancer has a mortality rate of around 64% and breast cancer around 27%*. The EU-funded research project EpiFemCare aims at improving cancer detection and subsequent patient care. The research project aims to develop blood tests based on epigenetic DNA modifications, i.e. the methylation of the base cytosine, for the identification of…