iCureASPS is looking for active people from the ASPS community to help maintaining viable collaborations with scientists who perform research on ASPS in medical centers. If you wish to be part of an active search for Alveolar Soft Part Sarcoma Cure search please contact us.

Such a new collaboration was recently established with Dr. Dina Lev at the Department of Cancer Biology at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston Texas. The contact person from iCureASPS for this collaboration is Dr. Nancy Landfish who serves as iCureASPS Medical Affairs Director.

Recently, a member in the iCureASPS community has donated the first 5,000 dollars to support Dr. Dina Lev’s research who recently published a scientific paper: “Angiogenesis-promoting gene patterns in Alveolar Soft Part Sarcoma”. Dr. Dina Lev conducts research on the highly vascular (angiogenic) nature of ASPS because she believes that this is an important factor driving ASPS metastasis. Her laboratory evaluates gene expression of ASPS frozen samples to identify candidate genes possibly contributing to ASPS angiogenesis. Next she would like to study the importance of these genes and gene products in ASPS metastasis and their possible regulation by the ASPL-TFE3 fusion gene. Lev’s studies may potentially result in better understanding of ASPS progression, and would lead to identification of targets for the development of novel therapeutics.

The specific aims of Dr. Dina Lev are:

1) to create an annotated paraffin and frozen tissue bank for ASPS.

2) to collaborate with other scientists with an interest in ASPS research, with the aim of expanding the available bioresources.

3) to study the expression and function of potential angiogenic factors in ASPS.

4) to investigate the effect of the ASPL-TFE3 fusion gene on the expression of the studied angiogenic factors.

If you are interested to support this research of Dr. Lev, please write to Dr. Nancy Landfish at: Nancy.Landfish@HCAhealthcare.com

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Yosef Landesman, Ph.D.
President & Cancer Research Director
Cure Alveolar Soft Part Sarcoma International (iCureASPS)
e-mail: landesmany@yahoo.com