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Prostate cancer develops from cells inside the prostate gland, a gland near the neck of the urinary bladder that produces part of the fluid of semen. About 180,000 new cases occur in the United States per year making prostate cancer the second most common cause of cancer death among men. Common treatments include surgery and radiation therapy. For men with metastatic prostate cancer, doctors prescribe a androgen-deprivation therapy which involves reducing levels of testosterone. Nearly 100% of men whose prostate cancers are still localized at the time of diagnosis will survive at least 5 years. The 5-year relative survival rate for men whose prostate cancer has already spread to distant parts of the body decreases significantly to 33%.
Glioblastoma multiforme is a cancer of the glial cells, which are the "support" cells of the brain. Glial cells provide nutritional, metabolic, and mechanical support to brain tissue. There are approximately 25,000 – 30,000 cases per annum of malignant brain tumors in North America and Europe. Glioblastoma is the most aggressive of glial cancers and the most difficult to treat: the efficacy of surgery and radiation treatment are limited. The probability of recidivism after a conventional treatment is very high. The life expectancy even after a treatment about only a few months. Liver metastases are secondary liver tumors caused by cancerous cells from a different origin based in the liver, e.g. metastasis from colorectal cancer. About 15 percent of patients have liver metastases when they are first diagnosed with colorectal cancer, and 50 to 75 percent of patients with advanced disease go on to develop liver metastases. Colorectal cancer is thereby the main reason for liver metastases. For patients who develop metastatic liver disease the most common treatment is chemotherapy and surgical removal of the tumor. Such treatment does not always promise a cure, so the goal is often to produce a remission while maintaining the best possible quality of life. The natural history of liver metastases suggests that patients with untreated hepatic metastases from colorectal cancer have an extremely poor life expectancy of perhaps only 6 to 18 months. Genital warts are benign tumors caused by HPV strains that disfigure the genital region and can be painful. It is one of the fastest growing sexually transmitted disease worldwide. The market revenues of genital warts treatments is growing by 7 percent annually. 14 million people in North America and Europe suffer from the disease, of which only about 3 million are currently seeking treatment. 10% to 20% of sexually active Americans are thought to be infected with HPV, resulting in 750,000 new cases of genital warts each year in that country. Existing treatments include laser vaporization, freezing or repeated applications of cytotoxic substances. The major problems are the high recurrence rate (in 20-60% of patients) the side effects (local reactions such as itching or pain) and the duration of treatment. Actinic keratoses are hornification disorders caused by excessive exposure of the skin to the sun, which may develop into malignant spinocellular carcinoma. Scientific research indicates that infection with certain human papilloma viruses (HPV) may also be involved in the onset and development of skin tumors such as actinic keratosis. Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) is a chronic systemic disease of the connective tissue that affects more than 1 % of the world population. RA mainly affects the joints and leads to deformities as well as to limited movement. Women are 3 times more likely to be affected by RA than men. The disease can appear at any age, though mainly between the ages of 30 and 50. The symptoms of arthritis may vary: mainly swelling, pain, limited movement and not uncommonly, stiffness. Triple-Receptor-Negative Breast Cancer Breast cancer still is a major public health problem worldwide. It is estimated that in the U. S. approximately 213,000 new cases of invasive breast cancer will be diagnosed in 2006 and 41,000 women are expected to die from this disease. Breast cancer will account for about 31% of new cancer cases among women in the U. S. in 2006 making it the by far the most frequent neoplasm in women. Figures are similar in Europe and other developed countries. Breast cancer tumors that do not display neither estrogene/gestagene receptors nor HER-2 on the cell surface are termed "triple-receptor-negative" (= TRNBC). This subtype represents about 15 - 20 % of all breast cancer cases. Patients with "triple-receptor-negative" breast cancer have a paucity of treatment options. They are no candidates for current anti-hormonal or anti-HER-2 therapeutic strategies. Instead the only remaining therapeutic option is chemotherapy. Again, even in this respect the choice of cytostatic agents is limited. Pancreatic carcinoma: With approximately 32.000 new cases annually in the US and a similar number of deaths, pancreatic carcinoma ranks fourth among the tumor related causes of death. Only 5 to 25 % of patients are operable at the time of diagnosis. Due to the extremely aggressive course of the disease and the dissatisfying therapeutic options, the average survival is as low as six months. One year survival is approximately 19 % and five year survival drops to 4 %. Pancreatic carcinoma is one of the most aggressive forms of cancer and an enormous challenge in Oncology. Therefore, the need for new therapeutic options is very high. |