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It also has no patent, meaning it could be manufactured for a fraction of the cost of newly developed drugs.

Evangelos Michelakis of the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada, and his colleagues tested DCA on human cells cultured outside the body and found that it killed lung, breast and brain cancer cells, but not healthy cells. Tumours in rats deliberately infected with human cancer also shrank drastically when they were fed DCA-laced water for several weeks.

DCA attacks a unique feature of cancer cells: the fact that they make their energy throughout the main body of the cell, rather than in distinct organelles called mitochondria. This process, called glycolysis, is inefficient and uses up vast amounts of sugar.

Until now it had been assumed that cancer cells used glycolysis because their mitochondria were irreparably damaged. However, Michelakis’s experiments prove this is not the case, because DCA reawakened the mitochondria in cancer cells. The cells then withered and died (Cancer Cell, DOI: 10.1016/j.ccr.2006.10.020).

Michelakis suggests that the switch to glycolysis as an energy source occurs when cells in the middle of an abnormal but benign lump don’t get enough oxygen for their mitochondria to work properly. In order to survive, they switch off their mitochondria and start producing energy through glycolysis.

Crucially, though, mitochondria do another job in cells: they activate apoptosis, the process by which abnormal cells self-destruct. When cells switch mitochondria off, they become “immortal”, outliving other cells in the tumour and so becoming dominant. Once reawakened by DCA, mitochondria reactivate apoptosis and order the abnormal cells to die.

“The results are intriguing because they point to a critical role that mitochondria play:

they impart a unique trait to cancer cells that can be exploited for cancer therapy,” says Dario Altieri, director of the University of Massachusetts Cancer Center in Worcester.

Manassas, VA. The following is a statement by Richard A. Viguerie, Chairman of GrassrootsFreedom.com, regarding legislation currently being considered by Congress to regulate grassroots communications:

“In what sounds like a comedy sketch from Jon Stewart’s Daily Show, but isn’t, the U. S. Senate would impose criminal penalties, even jail time, on grassroots causes and citizens who criticize Congress.

“Section 220 of S. 1, the lobbying reform bill currently before the Senate, would require grassroots causes, even bloggers, who communicate to 500 or more members of the public on policy matters, to register and report quarterly to Congress the same as the big K Street lobbyists. Section 220 would amend existing lobbying reporting law by creating the most expansive intrusion on First Amendment rights ever. For the first time in history, critics of Congress will need to register and report with Congress itself.

“On January 9, the Senate passed Amendment 7 to S. 1, to create criminal penalties, including up to one year in jail, if someone ‘knowingly and willingly fails to file or report.’

“That amendment was introduced by Senator David Vitter (R-LA). Senator Vitter, however, is now a co-sponsor of Amendment 20 by Senator Robert Bennett (R-UT) to remove Section 220 from the bill. Unless Amendment 20 succeeds, the Senate will have criminalized the exercise of First Amendment rights. We’d be living under totalitarianism, not democracy.

“I started GrassrootsFreedom.com to fight efforts to silence the grassroots. The website provides updates in the legislation and has a petition to sign opposing Section 220.

“Thousands of nonprofit leaders, bloggers, and other citizens have hammered the Senate with calls in opposition to Section 220, which seeks to silence the grassroots. The criminal provisions will scare citizens into silence.

“The legislation regulates small, legitimate nonprofits, bloggers, and individuals, but creates loopholes for corporations, unions, and large membership organizations that would be able to spend literally hundreds of millions of dollars, yet not report.

These estimates probably would have turned out to be too optimistic even if the war had gone well. Throughout history, people have typically underestimated the cost of war, as William Nordhaus, a Yale economist, has pointed out.

The aircraft was brought down when it was trying to cross the borders “during the last few days,” Seyed Nezam Mola Hoveizeh, a member of the parliament, was quoted by the local Fars News Agency as saying.

The lawmaker gave no exact date of the shooting-down or any other details about the incident, but he said that “the United States sent such spy drones to the region every now and then.”

The announcement came amid reports that the United States is increasingly flexing its muscles to counter Iran’s growing regional assertiveness and put more pressure on Tehran over its controversial nuclear programs.

Updated Tue. Jan. 16 2007 11:39 PM ET

CTV.ca News Staff

A small, non-toxic molecule may soon be available as an inexpensive treatment for many forms of cancer, including lung, breast and brain tumours, say University of Alberta researchers.

But there’s a catch: the drug isn’t patented, and pharmaceutical companies may not be interested in funding further research if the treatment won’t make them a profit.

In findings that “astounded” the researchers, the molecule known as DCA was shown to shrink lung, breast and brain tumours in both animal and human tissue experiments.

“You typically get this eureka type of feeling. It’s the most exciting thing a scientist can get,” Dr. Evangelos Michelakis, a professor at the University of Alberta department of medicine and a key study author, told CTV News.

The study was published Tuesday in the journal Cancer Cell.

The molecule appears to repair the damage that cancer cells cause to mitochondria, the units that convert food into energy.

“Cancer cells actively suppress their mitochondria, which alters their metabolism, and this appears to offer cancer cells a significant advantage in growth compared to normal cells, as well as protection from many standard chemotherapies,” Michelakis said in a written statement.

As mitochondria regulate cell death, cancer cells can resist being killed off.

For years, DCA — or dichloroacetate — has been used to treat children with inborn errors of metabolism due to mitochondrial diseases.

Until recently, researchers believed damage to mitochondria in cancer cells was permanent.

But Michelakis questioned this theory and began testing DCA, which activates a critical enzyme, as a way to “revive” cancer-affected mitochondria.

He says one of the most exciting things about this compound is that it might be able to treat many different forms of cancer because they all suppress mitochondrial function.

Therefore, DCA can primarily affect the cancer cells without affecting the normal ones.

Researchers also say DCA may prove to be effective because it is a small compound, thus easily absorbed in the body.

After oral intake, it can reach areas in the body that other drugs cannot, making it possible to treat cancer of the brain, for example.

In addition, because DCA has been used in both healthy people and ailing patients with mitochondrial diseases, researchers know it is a relatively non-toxic molecule that can be immediately tested in patients with cancer.

But because it’s not patented or owned by any drug firm, it would be an inexpensive drug to administer. And researchers may have a difficult time finding money for further research.

Dr. Dario Altieri, of the University of Massachusetts, said the drug is exactly what doctors need because it could limit side-effects for patients. But there are “market considerations” that drug companies would have to take into account.

Michelakis remains hopeful he will be able to secure funding for further research.

AZ sent $20 and wrote: “Cryptogon is one of three sites I visit near daily. I and my wife, like you and yours are struggling on our own plot of land here in Canada, we’re heating entirely with woodstoves and I’ll be building my own wind turbine in the summer, not to mention preparing the biodynamic garden. Anyways, here’s a small token for your work. Cheers, AZ”

AH sent $25.

JG sent $10.

Ktulu sent $20 and wrote: “Hello from France. Keep up the good work.”

MW sent $20.

To the dismay of the nation’s governors, the White House now will be empowered to go over a governor’s head and call up National Guard troops to aid a state in time of natural disasters or other public emergencies. Up to now, governors were the sole commanders in chief of citizen soldiers in local Guard units during emergencies within the state.

A conflict over who should control Guard units arose in the days after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. President Bush sought to federalize control of Guardsmen in Louisiana in the chaos after the hurricane, but Gov. Kathleen Blanco (D) refused to relinquish command.

Even though we had a sunny day yesterday, there were places in the yard where the ice didn’t even melt. The yard still looks like blue tarp city – why bother taking them down when there’s another night of cold temperatures.

Given that these new USAs are being plopped into offices currently investigating Republicans and other administration officials and others into states with 2008 presidential candidates, there’s certainly ample opportunity for mischief.