The cornerstone of conventional treatments of malignant gliomas in adults has been surgical debulking, radiation therapy and chemotherapy. Almost always a combination of these treatments is used. With these conventional treatments the outcome, as measured by survival and quality of life, has remained universally dismal. Novel treatments, which are at different stages of laboratory and clinical ...

The human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) and glioma symposium was convened on April 17, 2011 in Washington, DC, and was attended by oncologists and virologists involved in studying the relationship between HCMV and gliomas. The purpose of the meeting was to reach a consensus on the role of HCMV in the pathology of gliomas and to clarify directions for future research. First, the group summarized data t...

BACKGROUND Patients with malignant gliomas do not respond to any current therapy. Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) controls several oncogenic processes, being frequently up-regulated in gliomas due to overexpression, gene amplification and gene mutation. EGFR inhibitors are being tried in gliomas, yet the molecular determinants of therapeutic response are unclear. MATERIALS AND METHODS...

We characterized γ-cystathionase, rhodanese and 3-mercaptopyruvate sulfurtransferase activities in various regions of human brain (the cortex, thalamus, hypothalamus, hippocampus, cerebellum and subcortical nuclei) and human gliomas with II to IV grade of malignancy (according to the WHO classification). The human brain regions, as compared to human liver, showed low γ-cystathionase activity. T...

Ubiquitin-conjugating enzyme E2C (UBE2C) is a key regulator of cell cycle progression and is involved in the tumorigenesis of a variety of cancers. Previous studies have demonstrated that UBE2C is an important factor in the malignant progression of astrocytic tumors. However, the association between UBE2C expression and clinical prognosis of glioma patients has not been defined. In the present ...

Despite continuing debates around cytoreductive surgery in malignant gliomas, there is broad consensus that increased extent of tumor reduction improves overall survival. However, maximization of the extent of tumor resection is hampered by difficulty in intraoperative discrimination between normal and pathological tissue. In this context, two established methods for tumor visualization, fluore...

Accepted, February 12, 2003. MALIGNANT GLIOMAS ARE among the most challenging of all cancers to treat successfully, being characterized not only by aggressive proliferation and expansion but also by inexorable tumor invasion into distant brain tissue. Although considerable progress has been made in the treatment of these tumors with combinations of surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy, these...

Metabolic aberrations in the form of altered flux through key metabolic pathways are the major hallmarks of several life-threatening malignancies including malignant gliomas. These adaptations play an important role in the enhancement of the survival and proliferation of gliomas at the expense of the surrounding normal/healthy tissues. Recent studies in the field of neurooncology have directly ...

Malignant gliomas are highly lethal neoplasms that cannot be cured with currently available therapies. Temozolomide (TMZ) is a recently introduced alkylating agent that has yielded significant benefits and become a key agent in the treatment of high-grade gliomas. However, its survival benefit remains unsatisfactory. Understanding the molecular basis of TMZ sensitivity/resistance is necessary f...

INTRODUCTION High grade gliomas are the most common primary malignant brain tumours. Treatment with chemoradiation and adjuvant chemotherapy with Temozolomide may prolong survival but some patients develop complications during or soon after therapy due to radiation necrosis, oedema or tumour progression. PATIENTS We report the use of Bevacizumab in four patients with newly diagnosed high grad...