The Department of Oral Pathology and Microbiology, Manipal College of Dental Sciences, hosted an international symposium on ‘Head and neck tumours: translation from cancer biology to cancer medicine,’ here on October 3 and 4.
A release by the Manipal University here on Monday said, H. Vinod Bhat, Vice Chancellor of Manipal University, who inaugurated the symposium, said that identification of novel biomarkers for prognostication of oral cancers should be carried out to benefit the community.
The guest of honour and resource person was Mark William Lingen, Professor, Department of Pathology, University of Chicago. He has been working on the prevention and early detection of oral cancers. He directs a dynamic research lab at the University of Chicago.
This lab has cloned NOL7, a novel gene that induces an anti-angiogenic phenotype and suppresses in vivo tumour growth by 95 per cent. NOL7 acts as a master regulator of angiogenesis. The outcome of this research is expected to provide new therapeutic avenues for targeting angiogenesis in both physiologic and pathologic conditions.
He spoke on targeting angiogenesic phenotype for the prevention of oral cancer, oral screening adjunctive tests; current realities and future opportunity and biospecimen: a critical aspect of translational research.
He emphasised that the identification of a premalignant or early cancerous lesion is the single most important clinical observation/diagnosis a dentist can provide their patients.
The other resource persons were Malathi N., Head, Department of Oral Pathology, Sri Ramachandran Dental College, Chennai, Gabriel Sunil Rodrigues, Professor, General Surgery, Kasturba Medical College, Manipal, and B.S. Satish Rao, Head, Department of Radiobiology and Toxicology, School of life Sciences, Manipal.
The symposium was attended by 250 oral pathologists, anatomists, oral surgeons and oral medicine specialists. Nearly 140 scientific papers, presented during the symposium, were released in CDs.
