EHE News
How one donor fuels potential cure for cancer wasting
As holder of the Carol S. Kennedy Professorship in Human Nutrition, Martha Belury (right) attracts high-quality students such as Michelle Asp (left), who is studying for her PhD and served as co-author of the cancer-wasting study. Here, Asp discusses dosage levels with Belury as she prepares rosiglitazone in the Campbell Hall cell culture laboratory.
Carol S. Kennedy believed in the ability of human nutrition researchers to unlock cures to some of humankind's most distressing diseases. He designated a gift in his will to create an endowed professorship in the Department of Human Nutrition.
Since the establishment of the professorship in 1978, Kennedy's gift has paid off, most recently in the remarkable new discovery by Professor Martha Belury, who holds the Carol S. Kennedy Professorship in Human Nutrition. Belury's research found that a diabetes drug shows promise in stopping the devastating weight loss and muscle wasting, known as cachexia, that accompany some cancers.
Belury discovered that before cachexia begins in mice with colon cancer, they develop insulin resistance, the hallmark of type 2 diabetes. Giving the mice rosiglitazone, a diabetes drug that promotes insulin sensitivity, slowed the progression of cachexia.
Although further study is needed to determine whether rosiglitazone has the potential to prevent cachexia in humans with cancer, the finding leads researchers to believe that curbing insulin resistance in cancer patients could improve their quality of life.
Read the research news story about Belury's study.
How you can help
Endowed professorships help the college respond to growing student enrollment in this time of economic recession. Carol S. Kennedy's gift allows us to support distinguished scholar Martha Belury. World-class faculty members attract high-achieving students, who apply their Ohio State learning beyond the campus gates. To discuss how to endow a professorship in the program area of your choice, contact Tracy Kirby, senior director of development, College of Education and Human Ecology, at trkirby@ehe.osu.edu or (614) 292-5538.
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