Airc ineffective antibiotics, tumors frighten young 
The Cancer is a disease that is still very scared young people. But beyond the terror the boys also have many interesting, want to understand how it forms, how we get sick, and how to defeat. And how you can join the battle. These are the main questions that students in high schools and technical institutes in Milan has turned to experts in the day for cancer research organized by AIRC in Milan, at the IFOM-IEO Campus.
Questions that came from young people not yet eighteen, but already had the depth and maturity of adults, someone asked the causes of the disease, its inheritance, how do you heal. Someone else wanted to deepen the work of the investigator, how they propose ideas for the tests and how to obtain funding. Others, finally, maybe they were already screened in a future scientist asked the experts if some ideas have already been proven, if a certain route of care had already been attempted.
So afraid of cancer but also a great desire to understand and one day to see them defeated. Many have asked "how many people are actually cured of a tumor," and if the healing can really say definitively. "Absolutely - said Marco Foiani, IFOM researcher - and one of the goals today is chronic disease. For example, in diabetes before they died, but now you control the disease with insulin. This is achieved with the tumor, but the long-term goal is certainly defeat the disease altogether. "
Some students asked if there is a link between psyche and cancer ("difficult to say, they say the experts), one in particular has proposed, instead of killing cancer cells, to try to make them return to normal. And in fact is what has been done in the past with a certain type of leukemia, said a scientist, although today the most promising approach is to target the whole environment that is around the tumor, to cut 'food and kill him. Some guy, finally, perhaps imagining a day of work in science, asks whether Italians are really the brains on the run, and how do you get them back in Italy. "With the excellence of our schools - said Tiziana Bonaldi secure the European Institute of Oncology, she returned to Italy after several experiences abroad -. And making Italy a place where both Italians abroad that foreigners want to come and do research. We have to learn to bet on youth - he concluded - because it's a bet that many times then pay.
The war on cancer is a real game of chess with each move by cancer researchers responded with a new strategy to 'escape attention; and that scientists react with a counter-move faster and faster. Today checkmate cancer seems a little 'closer: the winning move would be to affect the environment in which the tumor develops, taking away everything that used to survive. And to carry out research in this field is Paolo Ghia, San Raffaele University in Milan: his is one of five projects funded by the Italian Association for Cancer Research (AIRC), with the funds of 5 per mille . "The idea of \u200b\u200bhitting the micro-environment - said the expert - was created for cancers of the blood, but now is the new frontier for all types of cancers, including solid ones. It seemed an idea of \u200b\u200bthe niche, but now it no longer is. "
Some treatments, such as those that block the blood vessels that nourish the tumor, affecting only one aspect of the disease, the approach of the micro-environment, however, is more cooperative: they bring into the field several weapons, and once you hit the tumor from all sides. "Our goal - continued Ghia - is to try to clarify the components that help the tumor grow and then stop them. This, unfortunately, just because even a single tumor cell, hidden and protected from its environment, because the disease returns "
A researcher is very similar to an artist, despite the platitudes they want science and art as two separate worlds. He said the oncologist Umberto Veronesi during one of the meetings between researchers and the public organized by AIRC during the day for cancer research, which was held in Rome at the headquarters of the museum Maxx. "Science and art have much in common - the doctor said - in both camps are imagination and creativity. In addition, many arts, like music, are actually based on mathematics and geometry. "
In all the meetings this year, cancer experts are guided by an artist, and in the case of Rome this was the master Michelangelo Pistoletto, who was also convinced of the possible coexistence of both worlds: "Art from the person may arrive at the company - said Pistoletto - and I am convinced that it is time to do as in the Renaissance, when art and science have come together to heal the ills of society. " The meeting was attended by approximately 150 high school students, special care during the intervention of Manuel Pellegrini, a young researcher at the University of Rome Tor Vergata just returned from the USA who has tried to portray the beauty of his work and sacrifices, " In Italy there are difficulties at several levels - he said - especially because the funding is not sufficient and there are no jobs for young researchers who have a life that ensures the progress of projects. However it is worth engaging, especially to give hope to patients and their families. "
"tanning centers are veritable factories of cancer." It is convinced Professor Pier Luigi Lollini, who introduced the debate organized by AIRC in Bologna for the day to cancer research. Lollini insisted on prevention, "which would allow, and this is the goal of eliminating 50% of the tumors," pointing out that among the factors are in fact carcinogenic ultraviolet rays. These, as well as from the sun, are irradiated by its own lamps for tanning. Responsible for one third of cancers, said Lollini, however, is the smoke. "In Italy there were 80 000 deaths this year from causes related to it, half of them from cancer." To In comparison, adding the deaths' accidental, homicide, suicide or an accident, you get to about 30 000 deaths, said the professor at the University of Bologna. Smaller, however, the pollution factor, responsible for only 1% of the diseases.
"It is true that living in cities increases the risk," the professor. Alcohol causes cancer and 4%, 3% obesity, low physical activity levels of 2%. The new frontiers of research, in particular to two projects carried out by the association with the funds of five per thousand, was devoted to the discussion. "The first news - explained Professor Stefano Pileri, he University of Bologna - Is the development of new targeted therapies. Ie move from rigid protocols, applied to all patients, to study more and more personalized care. "
Source: The messaggero.it
