A collection of recently published news items.

  • Thanks to a fundraising frenzy, the Oregon Health and Science University's Knight Cancer Institute will receive $1 billion for cancer research. In 2013, Phil Knight, the CEO and cofounder of Nike, pledged to give $500 million to the center on the condition that it raise $500 million more within 2 years.

  • After being canceled last year due to design flaws and trouble recruiting participants, the NIH National Children's Study (NCS) may be resurrected, although in a different form. Appropriations committees in both the U.S. House and Senate approved spending bills for the 2016 fiscal year that include $165 million to form the National Children's Study Alternative.

  • Proton Partners International Limited began work to build the United Kingdom's first proton beam cancer treatment center, which will be located in Newport. The company plans to build two other centers in the UK—one in Northumberland and the other in London.

  • The American Society of Human Genetics issued a position statement saying that genetic testing should be limited to a single-gene analysis or targeted gene panels in children and adolescents (Am J Hum Genet 2015;97:6–21). It also says that testing for adult-onset conditions should be avoided unless a childhood treatment exists, and that secondary findings should be disclosed only when there is “clear clinical utility.”

  • The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled that Sandoz must wait 6 months to market Zarxio, its version of the biologic drug Neupogen (filgrastim; Amgen), following FDA approval. That means that an injunction imposed on the marketing of Zarxio will remain in effect until September 2.

  • The European Commission approved the PD-1 inhibitor pembrolizumab (Keytruda; Merck) for patients with advanced melanoma. It also approved the PD-1 inhibitor nivolumab (Opdivo; Bristol-Myers Squibb) for patients with locally advanced or metastatic squamous non–small cell lung cancer who have already received chemotherapy.

For more news on cancer research, visit Cancer Discovery online at http://CDnews.aacrjournals.org.

©2015 American Association for Cancer Research.
2015