Author Interviews, Cancer Research, Nutrition / 30.04.2021
Amino Acid’s Role in Cancer Control Investigated
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Sa Kan Yoo MD PhD
Division of Developmental Biology and Regenerative Medicine
Kobe University, Kobe, Japan
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Cancer is often considered as a disease of “overgrowth”. But, many known “cancer genes” in fact induce cell death rather than cell growth. Because of this phenomenon, it requires involvement of many genes, not a single “cancer gene”, for cells to become cancer. Although this protective phenomenon that cancer genes induce cell death has been known, its exact mechanism has remained unclear. We tackled this problem using the fruit fly, found its mechanism and discovered a way to manipulate it by dietary nutrition.
The first step that you should take to finding inner peace is to practice yoga and meditation regularly. Yoga and meditation can give you the chance to slow down and reflect, as well as to clear your mind of the worries and negative thoughts that are concerning you. Not only this, but deep breathing is also an important aspect of both yoga and meditation as this can help you to ground yourself and to reconnect with the world around you.
Nadia Koyratty[/caption]
Nadia Koyratty PhD student
Department of Epidemiology and Environmental Health
University at Buffalo
State University of New York
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: The literature suggests that sugars contribute to the incidence of breast cancer, but few exists on the prognosis after a breast cancer diagnosis.
MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings?
Response: Compared to breast cancer patients who never or rarely drank non-diet soda, those who reported drinking non-diet soda five times or more per week had a 62% higher likelihood of dying from any causes, and were 85% more likely to die from breast cancer specifically.
Dr. Willette[/caption]
Auriel Willette, PhD
Assistant Professor
Food Science and Human Nutrition
Iowa State University
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: To date, pharmacology therapies done to slow down or halt Alzheimer's disease have been inconclusive. Lifestyle interventions like changes in diet and activity are also mixed but do show some promise. Dietary clinical trials or self-reported diet have tended to focus on groups of foods such as the Mediterranean or MIND diet. To build from this excellent work, we were curious if we could pinpoint specific foods that were correlated with changes in fluid intelligence over time. Fluid intelligence represents our ability to creatively use existing knowledge, working memory, and other components of "thinking flexibly."
Further, we tested if these patterns of association differed based on genetic risk. In this case, genetic risk was defined as having a family history of Alzheimer's disease or having 1-2 "bad" copies of the Apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene, which is the strongest genetic risk factor for Alzheimer's disease.
Dr. Bragg[/caption]
Marie Bragg, PhD
Assistant Professor, Department of Population Health on Health Choice
NYU College of Global Public Health
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: We know from previous research that children who see food advertisements eat significantly more calories than children who see non-food advertisements. Those studies led the World Health Organization and National Academy of Medicine to issue reports declaring that exposure to food advertising is a major driver of childhood obesity.
What we don’t know is how frequently unhealthy food and beverage brands are appearing in YouTube videos posted by Kid Influencers. Kid influences are children whose parents film videos of the child playing with toys, unwrapping presents, eating food, or engaging in other family-friendly activities. The parents then post the videos to YouTube for other children and parents to view for entertainment. 
Dr. Brantley[/caption]
Erin Brantley, PhD, MPH
Senior Research Associate
Department of Health Policy and Management
Milken Institute School of Public Health
Preferred pronouns: she/her/hers
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: We looked at what happened when work requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Participation, or SNAP, were turned on in many places after the Great Recession.
We found large drops in participation in SNAP benefits due to work requirements, and that black recipients were more likely to lose benefits than white recipients. We think this is driven by the fact that black workers face higher unemployment rates than white workers, and work requirement policies do not take this into account.
We also found that some people who report having disabilities lost benefits, even though the intent of work requirements is that they apply to people without disabilities. 
Leighton Ku, PhD, MPH
Professor, Dept. of Health Policy and Management
Director, Center for Health Policy Research
Milken Institute School of Public Health
George Washington University
Washington, DC 20052
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: In this study, we examined how requirements that low-income adults work in order to keep their food assistance benefits (SNAP, formerly called food stamps) affects the number of people receiving benefits. Briefly, we found, based on analyses of data from 2,410 counties from 2013 to 2017, that soon after work requirements are introduced, more than a third of affected participants lose their food assistance. This meant that about 600,000 poor adults lost food assistance very quickly.
This is important for two reasons:
(1) Work requirements create greater hardship, including food insecurity and increased risk of health problems, when poor people lose their nutrition benefits.
(2) The Trump Administration is trying to broaden this policy, expanding it further in SNAP, but also applying work requirements to Medicaid (for health insurance) and public housing benefits. This is a massive effort at social experimentation that will cause tremendous harm.
And the sad part is that we already know, from other research, that these work requirement programs do not actually help people get jobs, keep them or to become more self-sufficient. This is because the work requirements do not address the real needs of low-income unemployed people, to learn how to get better job skills or to have supports, such as child care, transportation or health insurance, that let them keep working.
