University of Illinois Cancer Center members are the senior and first authors of a new study on a discovery that may help cancer survivors regain their muscle strength, which could contribute to better outcomes for these patients.
Published in Nature Cancer, the study from University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) researchers reports that a dysfunction in muscle blood vessels could be to blame for the weak muscles and weight loss that most cancer patients experience.
The paper’s senior author is Jalees Rehman, MD, co-leader of the Cancer Center’s Translational Oncology Research Program and the Benjamin J. Goldberg Professor and Head of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at UIC. The paper’s first author is Cancer Center member Young-Mee Kim, PhD, Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics.
The paper, “Skeletal Muscle Endothelial Dysfunction Through the Activin A–PGC1α Axis Drives Progression of Cancer Cachexia,” includes other Cancer Center and UIC authors. The Cancer Center is part of UI Health, UIC’s academic health enterprise.
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