Science and Medicine News

Carcinoma Gene Found   Researchers from Stanford and the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) have found a gene that, when defective, causes the most common form of human cancer - a skin cancer called basal cell carcinoma. This type of cancer usually affects pale-skinned people of Northern European ancestry and strikes during middle age or later. But unlike many other cancers, these tumors do not spread throughout the body. The finding provides a promising new direction for researchers pursuing treatments, said Ronald Johnson, a postdoctoral fellow in developmental biology at Stanford.

Cancer researchers.

Clinicians currently treat basal cell carcinomas with surgery or radiation. Using the new information, scientists may be able to develop drugs that could be applied directly to the skin for treatment, said Dr. Ervin Epstein Jr., a UCSF professor of dermatology. The team’s finding was published in the June 14 issue of Science.

Eco-Friendly Chips   It takes roughly 10 gallons of water to make a single computer chip. That may not sound like much, but multiply it by the millions of chips made each year, and the result is a large and growing demand for water. Chip making also requires large amounts of energy and many toxic

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