EurekAlert! Cancer Research - News Releases

News Releases

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 22-Jun-2026 04:16 ET (22-Jun-2026 08:16 GMT/UTC)

Elinzanetant reduces severity and frequency of hot flushes and night sweats, regardless of type of hormone treatment breast cancer patients receive

European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer
Reports and Proceedings

Results from the OASIS 4 clinical trial last year showed that a new drug, elinzanetant, relieved hot flushes and night sweats that can occur because of the menopause or because of hormone treatment for breast cancer. Now, a new analysis of data from the trial, presented at the 15^th European Breast Cancer Conference (EBCC15) in Barcelona, shows that it also gives sustained relief regardless of the type of hormone treatment cancer patients receive.

Funder: Bayer AG
Meeting: 15th European Breast Cancer Conference

Radiotherapy rather than surgery may help reduce risk of lymphoedema in patients with breast cancer: results from pilot study

European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer
Reports and Proceedings

Patients with breast cancer may be able to avoid lymphoedema, which can occur after surgery to remove lymph nodes in the armpit (the axilla), by having radiotherapy instead. New findings, presented at the 15^th European Breast Cancer Conference (EBCC15) in Barcelona suggest that axillary radiotherapy may be as effective at killing any remaining cancer cells, while being less likely to trigger lymphoedema – an often painful swelling of the arm and armpit.

Funder: Gynecology Department of Bellvitge University Hospital, Donation from the breast cancer patient advocacy association DACMA, based in Sant Joan d’Espi
Meeting: 15th European Breast Cancer Conference

Using new anti-obesity drugs in prevention of obesity-related cancers – global panel of experts suggest 10-year trial with 5,000 participants with cancer pre-cursor condition to establish efficacy

European Association for the Study of Obesity
Reports and Proceedings

In new research to be presented at this year’s European Congress on Obesity (ECO2026) in Istanbul, Turkey (12-15 May), a global panel of 21 obesity and cancer experts suggest that to test the potential efficacy of the new generation of obesity drugs such as semaglutide and tirzepatide in preventing obesity-related cancer (ORC), a trial of the drugs for some 5,000 participants at high risk of cancer due to their having a cancer pre-cursor condition will provide the required answers.

Meeting: European Congress on Obesity 2026 (ECO2026)

Breast cancer hijacks the lung repair system to fuel tumor growth, study finds

University of Colorado Anschutz
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Researchers at the University of Colorado Anschutz found that breast cancer cells that spread to the lungs can activate the lung’s natural healing process in a way that helps tumors grow. In laboratory pre-clinical models, the FDA approved drug Roflumilast slowed lung tumor growth by disrupting this process.

Journal: Cancer Research Communications

Landmark Alliance ATOMIC Trial establishes new standard of care for patients with stage III dMMR colon cancer

Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A new study from researchers at the Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology (Alliance) shows that patients with stage III colon cancer with deficient deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) mismatch repair (dMMR) had significantly better outcomes when the immunotherapy drug atezolizumab (Tecentriq^®) was added to standard chemotherapy after surgery. The phase III Alliance ATOMIC A021502 trial, sponsored by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and conducted in partnership with Genentech, a member of the Roche Group, and the German group Arbeitsgemeinschaft Internistische Onkologie (AIO), found that this approach lowered the risk of the cancer returning or causing death by 50%, with 86.3% of patients remaining disease-free at three years compared with 76.2% receiving chemotherapy alone. The findings, now published in The New England Journal of Medicine, provide strong evidence that adding immunotherapy to chemotherapy can improve clinical outcome for this group of patients and establishes a new therapeutic standard for this biologically distinct subset of colon cancer.

Journal: New England Journal of Medicine
Funder: Genentech

Hormone patches effective for locally advanced prostate cancer

University College London
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Hormone patches are as good at controlling locally advanced prostate cancer as the injections typically used to deliver hormone therapy, according to the results of a large clinical trial led by UCL (University College London) researchers.

Journal: New England Journal of Medicine
Funder: Cancer Research UK, UCL, Medical Research Council, MRC Clinical Trials Unit at UCL

Scientists call out health-harming corporations driving rise in chronic disease

University of Sydney
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Chronic diseases including cancer, diabetes, neurocognitive disorders and infertility are rising globally, with health-harming products such as fossil fuels, tobacco, ultra‑processed foods, toxic chemicals, plastics and alcohol being major contributors, say the authors of a new paper published in New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). The authors include proposed solutions, including policy safeguards and a stronger research focus on the risks to health connected with corporate activity.

Journal: New England Journal of Medicine

Surgical management and reconstruction strategies highlighted for head and neck basal cell carcinoma

Impact Journals LLC
Peer-Reviewed Publication

BUFFALO, NY — March 26, 2026 — A new research perspective was published in Volume 13 of Oncoscienceon March 11, 2026, titled “Basal cell carcinoma of the head and neck: Surgical management and postoperative strategies – A researcher’s perspective.”

Journal: Oncoscience

Ependymoma fusion protein locks cells in developmental limbo

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
Peer-Reviewed Publication

St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine scientists show how ZFTA-RELA fusions hijack developmental programs to drive a type of pediatric brain cancer.

Journal: Nature

Microtubules discovered to play an active role in correctly distributing chromosomes during cell division

Rockefeller University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

During cell division, chromosomes must attach correctly to microtubules to ensure they are evenly distributed to daughter cells. The enzyme Aurora B kinase maintains this balance by breaking faulty attachments while stabilizing correct ones. Researchers found that microtubules actively guide the enzyme Aurora B by reshaping the proteins that bind to them. The results redefine microtubules as active regulators of cell signaling, helping cells detect faulty chromosome attachments and prevent abnormalities in the number of chromosomes, a hallmark of cancer.

Journal: Science Advances