Cell Wars: The Cancer-Killers of the Immune System - Hardcover

Goldberg, Marshall

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0374120102 ISBN 13: 9780374120108

Publisher: Hill and Wang, 1988

Synopsis

Charts the discovery of cancer-fighting monoclonal antibodies--the breakthrough technology enabling physicians to selectively destroy cancer cells--and explains how they are likely to affect cancer therapy in the future

About this title

From Publishers Weekly

The 1984 discovery by a Nobel Prize-winning cancer research team of Philadelphia's Wistar Institute of monoclonal antibodies permits identification of all parts of a cell too tiny to be seen even by an electron microscope. Goldberg, chief of endocrinology of Flint, Mich.'s Hurley Medical Center and also a novelist ( Nerve , etc.) here provides helpful background on the nature of the immune system and that of cancer-cell formation, along with a review of recent research and modes of treatment. The use of monoclonal antibodies as a diagnostic tool is invaluable and, in the case of cancer, helps to identify malignant cells. In addition, experimental cancer therapy by these antibodies used singly or in combination with other agents, is being conducted in several medical centers in an effort to reinforce the immune systems of patient volunteers, one of whose treatment of a pancreatic cancer employing Wistar Institute techniques the author recounts in moving detail. Although the patient did not survive, Goldberg stresses the scientific contribution and human benefits derived from the experiment.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Describing the case of a patient with pancreatic cancer, medical professor Goldberg explains the development of monoclonal antibody therapy and its application to several forms of cancer. His story concerns the Wistar Institute of Philadelphia, whose scientists developed this new therapy; Goldberg worked closely with them in its trial stages. His description of the institute and its scientists provides insight into their lives and ways of working, in a somewhat similar manner to Natalie Angier's Natural Obsessions ( LJ 8/88), and her description of Weinberg's laboratory at the Whitehead Institute of MIT. Clarity of explanation and an easy narrative style make this a good book for those interested in immunological cancer therapy. Eleanor Maass, Maass Assocs., Mew Milford, Pa.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Hill and Wang
• Publication date: 1988
• ISBN 10: 0374120102
• ISBN 13: 9780374120108
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 224