About Us
Founded in 1944, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science develops philanthropic support for the Weizmann Institute in Israel, and advances its mission of science for the future of humanity.
Jul 29, 2010... In the future, the practice and precision of medicine may be very different from what they are today. Prof. Uri Alon of the Department of Molecular Cell Biology at the Weizmann Institute of Science foresees a future in which medicine is predictive, personalized, accurate, and rational. In fact, he has already begun to set the groundwork for this transformation by identifying common recurring patterns in the way proteins interact, and developing a novel method for essentially spying on living cells as they undergo chemotherapy.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/feature-stories/seeing-cancer-saving-lives/
Mar 17, 2016...
About one in eight women in the U.S. will develop invasive breast cancer during her lifetime, according to the American Cancer Society. Fortunately, it is no longer the probable death sentence it once was, in large part because today’s well-designed screening tests help doctors find breast tumors at an earlier stage, thus increasing the chances for successful treatment.
“If you detect breast cancer very early, you make it a disease that is in more cases curable. And that’s really our aim,” says Prof. Hadassa Degani of the Weizmann Institute of Science’s Department of Biological Regulation. For more than 20 years, she has been developing less-invasive cancer diagnosis techniques that utilize existing magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanners.
Sep 10, 2009... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—September 10, 2009—Why are some pediatric cancers able to spontaneously regress? Prof. Michael Fainzilber and his team in the Weizmann Institute’s Biological Chemistry Department seem to have unexpectedly found part of the answer. Further research toward a better understanding of the mechanism of action might hopefully lead, in the future, to the development of drugs that will be able to induce regression of certain tumors.
Jul 25, 2018... The effects of p53 in cancer-associated fibroblasts on cancer cell migration: Cancer cells (magenta) migrate in the direction of cancer-associated fibroblasts (yellow) that express a non-mutated p53 gene (left); this migration slows down (center) when the p53 in the fibroblasts is silenced; when substances released by the cancer-associated fibroblasts are added to the laboratory dish, the migration is restored (right)
Sep 07, 2016... Prostate and Ovarian Cancer: What Weizmann is Doing
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/news-releases/science-tips-august-2007/
Aug 28, 2007...
A Computer Simulation Shows How Evolution May Have Speeded Up
Is heading straight for a goal the quickest way there? If the name of the game is evolution, suggests new research at the Weizmann Institute of Science, the pace might speed up if the goals themselves change continuously.
Nadav Kashtan, Elad Noor, and Prof. Uri Alon of the Institute’s Molecular Cell Biology and Physics of Complex Systems Departments create computer simulations that mimic natural evolution, allowing them to investigate processes that, in nature, take place over millions of years. In these simulations, a population of digital genomes evolves over time towards a given goal: to maximize fitness under certain conditions. Like living organisms, genomes that are better adapted to their environment may survive to the next generation or reproduce more prolifically. But such computer simulations, though sophisticated, don’t yet have all the answers. Achieving even simple goals may take thousands of generations, raising the question of whether the three-or-so billion years since life first appeared on the planet is long enough to evolve the diversity and complexity that exist today.
Dec 04, 2018...
Early diagnosis of acute myelocytic leukemia (AML) paves the way for treatment. Image Credit: National Cancer Institute
A study of more than half a million blood samples has allowed scientists to pinpoint the risk factors for a rare type of leukemia, enabling them to predict if someone will develop the disease eight years before symptoms appear and opening the door to preventative treatments.
Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a rare cancer usually detected at an advanced stage. ‘It usually comes out of the blue,’ said Dr Liran Shlush of the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. ‘Most patients survive just a few weeks or months after diagnosis.’
Aug 26, 2007...
The work of Israeli cancer researchers is enhanced by the efforts of the ICRF.
A team of researchers from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, led by ICRF-supported scientist Professor Yosef Yarden, has identified a specific protein that enables breast cancer cells to metastasize and spread to other organs.
The team hopes that the discovery will facilitate the development of drugs that block or inhibit the production of this protein to prevent metastasis in breast and other cancers. Metastasis, when cancer cells break away from the original tumor and spread via the blood stream to other organs, is the leading cause of cancer death.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/feature-stories/to-die-for-the-cause/
Sep 21, 2009... Programmed cell suicide is particularly important in the ovaries, where thousands of cells in the follicle should die each month, releasing just one mature egg. Failure of these cells to die on schedule causes problems ranging from infertility to cysts or ovarian cancer. Prof. Abraham Amsterdam of the Department of Molecular Cell Biology studies the role of cell suicide in both normal and cancerous ovarian cells. He has developed a method to keep granulosa cells, which make up the bulk of the ovarian follicle, alive and multiplying in the test tube, where they can be studied efficiently.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/news-releases/tumors-might-grow-faster-at-night/
Oct 06, 2014... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—October 6, 2014—They emerge at night, while we sleep unaware, growing and spreading out as quickly as they can. And they are deadly. In a surprise finding that was recently published in Nature Communications, Weizmann Institute of Science researchers showed that nighttime is the right time for cancer to grow and spread in the body. Their findings suggest that administering certain treatments in time with the body’s day-night cycle could boost their efficiency.
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