Cyclooxygenase-2 blockade can improve efficacy of VEGF-targeting drugs.

Anti-angiogenic therapies were approved for different cancers. However, significant primary and secondary resistance hampers efficacy in several tumor types including breast cancer. Thus, we need to develop clinically applicable strategies to enhance efficacy of anti-angiogenic drugs.

Axl, a prognostic and therapeutic target in acute myeloid leukemia mediates paracrine crosstalk of leukemia cells with bone marrow stroma.

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) represents a clonal disease of hematopoietic progenitors characterized by acquired heterogenous genetic changes that alter normal mechanisms of proliferation, self-renewal, and differentiation.(1) Although 40% to 45% of patients younger than 65 years of age can be cured with current therapies, only 10% of older patients reach long-term survival.(1) Because only very few novel AML drugs were approved in the past 2 decades, there is an urgent need to identify novel targets and therapeutic strategies to treat underserved AML patients.