Gut Microbes May Help in Cancer Treatment

By Ramadhani Chambuso

Since the gut is the largest immunological organ in the body, research has found that certain anticancer drugs work better with prior or concomitant modulation of specific gut microbiome to optimize maximum therapeutic outcome in the treatment of skin and lung cancer in mice. However, this strong interrelationship between the immune system and the host gut microbiota which can determine responses to cancer therapies has not yet been demonstrated in humans, although efforts are made to have ethical clearance to conduct further clinical trials.

Source links: Vétizou et al. (2015) and  Reardon (2017)

Special forum: Biostatistics support in the Faculty of Health Sciences

Join the Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics for a panel discussion on the need and future of biostatistics support in the Faculty of Health Sciences. Submissions are welcome – please email: maia.lesosky@uct.ac.za.

All are welcome to the seminar.

Where: Seminar Room 2, Falmouth Building, Entrance 5, School of Public Health and Family Medicine, Health Sciences Campus, UCT.

When: 12:30-13:30, Wednesday, August 23, 2017.

AORTIC Cancer Network Directory (ACND) 2nd Edition

At AORTIC, we are currently developing the second edition of our Cancer Network Directory, which aims to map out the resources that are available in Africa in order to help understand the cancer landscape in Africa and promote collaboration in cancer work.

If you would like to be included in this directory, please provide us with your contact information by filling out the information card below.

We would also appreciate it if you could either forward along this information card or give us the contact information for anyone else who would benefit from being listed.

Thank you for your cooperation!

Information to be completed:

Information Card

It may be of interest to you that AORTIC is hosting its biannual conference this November in Kigali, Rwanda 7-10 November 2017.

The conference will be a great opportunity for multidisciplinary specialists from the global cancer community to present their research, learn about relevant case studies, gain practical skills through workshops, broaden their network connections, and much more.

If you are interested in attending, please check out our website for more information: www.aorticconference.org.

Postgraduate Cancer Research Initiative (CRI) Opens Door to New Postgraduates!

On behalf of Prof. Jennifer Moodley, we would like to extend a cheerful welcome to the new members who have joined the Postgraduate Cancer Research Initiative (CRI). As you are aware, this group was founded in 2015 as “Cancer PhD Mentorship Group” and was only for PhD students. This year, after much discussion, we extended the invitation and membership to MSc students doing cancer-related projects; hence, the name “Postgraduate Cancer Research Initiative”. Therefore, we are delighted to have all the new postgraduate members from different divisions and departments join our group.

Our main goal is to offer mentorship to postgraduate students, identifying and assisting them in their areas of need in academics and research. It also provides students with the opportunity to share exciting ideas in cancer research. This is not limited to policy implementation, translational research, and any opportunities in the discipline.

Thanks to all the old and new members who made a huge effort to participate in our first two meetings (7^th and 27^th July 2017 chaired by Prof. Jennifer Moodley and Dr. Ramadhani Chambuso, respectively). To those that were unable to attend, it is our pleasure to welcome you!

Photographs courtesy of Fleury A. N. Biteghe and Harris Onywera.