Thursday, April 16, 2015

New possibility for improved treatment of Melanoma


Recent research performed at Aarhus University suggests that the presence of a protein, Megalin,  in a Malignant Melanoma indicates that cancer cells are aggressive. Malignant Melanoma is the most dangerous form of skin cancer in the United States. While it is not the most common form of skin cancers, it causes the most deaths. The protein, Megalin, helps and allows the cancer cells to divide and survive.

It was determined that Megalin is always detectable in malignant melanomas and is rarely found in the benign counterparts. The discovery of this protein allows for the possibility of identifying aggressive melanomas at an earlier stage that is currently possible.

I found this article very interesting because if not caught early, Melanoma spreads to other parts of the body, becoming hard to treat and is often fatal. If researchers and oncologists can use this information about Megalin to comprise a new approach for detecting malignant melanomas, it could be a new breakthrough in skin cancer, hopefully saving thousands of lives in the future by detecting the cancer earlier.

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2 comments:

  1. This is definitely important research because skin cancer can often be hard to detect until it is too late. By detecting the malignant melanomas sooner it may even allow for treatments to become shorter, easier and safer.

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  2. Skin cancer is certainly on the rise. On average having 5 or more sunburns doubles your risk of melanoma. Many times skin cancer goes undetected and I feel that this new detection will be extremely beneficial. Especially for the development of skin cancer prevention and UV protection.

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