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Biotech / Medical : Ligand (LGND) Breakout! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Henry Niman who wrote (20145)	5/6/1998 10:32:00 PM
From: Scott H. Davis	Read Replies (5) \| Respond to of 32384

To All: I have a friend with a re-occurance of melanoma and need your help. Several years ago she had a small mole diagnosed and removed (stage I). At the time she was told there was only a 10% chance of re-occurance. Unfortunately, she just had a fairly good tumor removed, along with lymph. Biopsy revealed it had metastized (sp?) but there is no evidence of it spreading elsewhere at this point. So I guess that makes her phase II/III. Drs estimate an 80-90% chance of re-occurance, and want her to go on a 1 year course of Alpha Interferon. There are no other known tumors, and the recent tumor was completely operable (upper thigh) So my question is, do any of you know of any promissing therapies, including meds in phase II or III that would be effective and tollerable for maintenance or long term therapy? Possibly in combinational therapy. VICL has two meds with Melanoma indications and I love the idea of turning the immune system loose on the cancer, but both of those are for injection into tumors as far as I can read, and thus would not work well in a post-op application. The LGND lasar therapy is also a actions against existing tumors. Any info on potential meds, adjunct therapy (nutritional, immune system boosts, etc.) would be most gratefully appreciated. I know a lot of the contributors and lurkers on this thread have a good background in this area, and are probably diversified into other biotechs as well, and/or are researching others. If you currently lurk but are not SI members, please e-mail me at sdavis@midwest.net (Southern Illinois) Prayers for her would also be sincerely appreciated. Profound thanks in advance for any help. Scott

To: Henry Niman who wrote (20145)	5/7/1998 4:47:00 AM
From: Steve Tauscher	Respond to of 32384

Henry and thread, some leptin related news... LONDON, May 6 (Reuters) - Danish scientists said on Wednesday that a protein in the brain of fat rats that regulates appetite could be a key element in controlling obesity in humans. Peter Kristensen, a pharmacologist with Danish bio-tech group Novo Nordisk, said a brain protein called CART cocaine-and amphetamine-regulated transcript) produces a full feeling in rats and probably works the same way in humans. ''CART is a protein which is made in the brain and is involved in satiety. It's a protein that mediates fullness,'' Kristensen said in a telephone interview. Scientists already know that the hormone leptin, which is produced by fat cells and found in abundance in obese people and mice, regulates food intake and body weight but they were not sure how. Kristensen and his colleagues have shown that CART acts with leptin inside the brain to suppress appetite to produce a full feeling. Another brain compound called neuropeptide Y (NPY) has the opposite effect. It works with leptin to increase feeding in animals. So far Kristensen has only tested the theory on rats but he said he was confident that CART would have a similar function in humans. ''These are very basic mechanisms. It's the same protein in humans. By creating a drug that works like CART you could make a pill that would make you feel less hungry. It's certainly a step in terms of identifying and treating obesity,'' he added. In his study of obese rats, reported in the scientific journal Nature, Kristensen found that all the rodents had very low levels of CART. When he injected antibodies against CART in normal mice it increased and prolonged their feeding. He found that any disruption of either leptin levels or the leptin receptor led to decreased amounts of CART, and a reverse relationship existed for NPY. ''NPY and CART may thus be two of the factors that balance the effects of leptin on feeding through the hypothalamus (area of the brain),'' Kristensen said. ''We propose that leptin-mediated suppression of food intake is controlled by a balanced reduction and induction of NPY and CART, respectively.'' Kristensen and his team are now trying to isolate other targets in the brain that are influenced by CART with the intention of developing new therapies for obesity. Regards, Steve