Irene Joliot-Curie, Frederic Joliot-Curie

Irene Joliot-Curie is the daughter of Marie Curie, a double Nobel Prize-winner. In 1925, Irene Curie became Doctor of Science.In 1926, Irene married her colleague Frederic Joliot, an assistant at the Radium Institute. With him, she continued experiments with various chemical elements. In some of these experiments, Irene and Frederic performed bombardment of boron, and aluminium with alpha particles, thereby producing new chemical elements. These new elements were radioactive: aluminum became radioactive phosphorus, while boron became a radioactive isotope of nitrogen. Within a short time, Joliot-Curie created many new radioactive elements. In 1935, Irene and Frederic Joliot-Curie were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for their artificial creation of new radioactive elements Working with uranium in the late 1930s, Irene Joliot-Curie made several important discoveries and came close to the discovery of uranium decay, when bombarded with neutrons.Jean Frederic Joliot was born in Paris, in the family of a prosperous merchant Henri Joliot and Emilia (Roederer) Joliot, who came from a wealthy Protestant family from Alsace.Frederic obtained his Doctor of Science degree in 1930 for a thesis on the electrochemistry of radioactive polonium. Having received the Nobel Prize in 1935 together with his wife, 35-year-old Frederick still remains the youngest Nobel Laureate in Chemistry.The discoveries and achievements of the Joliot-Curie family laid the foundation for further research in nuclear physics, chemistry, and nuclear medicine. Without their discoveries, it is impossible to imagine modern science and everyday life.

Combined chemotherapy and EUS-guided intra-tumoral 32-P implantation for locally advanced pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma: a pilot study

Aim: This study evaluated clinical outcomes of combined chemotherapy and Endoscopic Ultrasound (EUS) guided intra-tumoral radioactive phosphorus-32 (32P OncoSil) implantation in locally advanced pancreatic adenocarcinoma (LAPC). Methods: Consecutive patients with a new histological diagnosis of LAPC were recruited over 20 months. Baseline CT and 18FDG PET-CT were performed and repeated after 12 weeks to assess response to treatment. Following 2 cycles of conventional chemotherapy, patients underwent EUS-guided 32P OncoSil implantation followed by a further six cycles of chemotherapy. Results: Twelve patients with LAPC (8M:4F; median age 69 years, IQR 61.5-73.3) completed the treatment. Technical success was 100% and no procedural complications were reported. At 12 weeks, there was a median reduction of 8.2cm3 (95% CI 4.95-10.85; p=0.003) in tumour volume, with minimal or no 18FDG uptake in 9 (75%) patients. Tumour downstaging was achieved in 6 (50%) patients, leading to successful resection in 5 (42%) patients, of which 4 patients (80%) had clear (R0) resection margins. Conclusions: EUS guided 32P OncoSil implantation is feasible and well tolerated and was associated with a 42% rate of surgical resection in our cohort. However, further evaluation in a larger randomized multicenter trial is warranted. (32P funded by OncoSil Medical Ltd, equipment and staff funded by the Royal Adelaide Hospital, ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT03003078).

Wanna Get Away? Maintenance Treatments and Chemotherapy Holidays in Gynecologic Cancers

Epithelial ovarian cancer has a very high rate of relapse after primary therapy; historically approximately 70% of patients with a complete clinical response to surgery and adjuvant chemotherapy will relapse and die of the disease. Although this number has slowly improved, cure rates remain less than 50%. As such, maintenance therapy with the aim of preventing or delaying disease relapse and the goal of improving overall survival has been the subject of intense study. Numerous earlier studies with agents ranging from radioactive phosphorus to extended frontline therapy or to monthly taxol administration demonstrated encouraging improvements in progression-free survival (PFS) only to find, disappointingly, no benefit in overall survival. In addition, the PFS advantage of maintenance therapy was associated with disconcerting side effects such that maintenance therapy was not adapted as standard of care. Studies with bevacizumab and PARP inhibitors have demonstrated a PFS advantage with a manageable side-effect profile. However, an overall survival advantage remains unclear, and the use of these approaches thus remains controversial. Furthermore, in recurrent disease, the length of chemotherapy and benefits of extended chemotherapy is unclear. Thus, additional trials assessing maintenance strategies in ovarian and other gynecologic malignancies are needed.

Efficacy of phosphorus-32 brachytherapy without external-beam radiation for long-term tumor control in patients with craniopharyngioma

OBJECT Radioactive phosphorus-32 (P32) has been used as brachytherapy for craniopharyngiomas with the hope of providing local control of enlarging tumor cysts. Brachytherapy has commonly been used as an adjunct to the standard treatment of surgery and external-beam radiation (EBR). Historically, multimodal treatment, including EBR, has shown tumor control rates as high as 70% at 10 years after treatment. However, EBR is associated with significant long-term risks, including visual deficits, endocrine dysfunction, and cognitive decline. Theoretically, brachytherapy may provide focused local radiation that controls or shrinks a symptomatic cyst without exposing the patient to the risks of EBR. For this study, the authors reviewed their experiences with craniopharyngioma patients treated with P32 brachytherapy as the primary treatment without EBR. The authors reviewed these patients' records to evaluate whether this strategy effectively controls tumor growth, thus avoiding the need for further surgery or EBR. METHODS The authors performed a retrospective review of pediatric patients treated for craniopharyngioma between 1997 and 2004. This was the time period during which the authors' institution had a relatively high use of P32 for treatment of cystic craniopharyngioma. All patients who had surgery and injection of P32 without EBR were identified. The patient records were analyzed for complications, cyst control, need for further surgery, and need for future EBR. RESULTS Thirty-eight patients were treated for craniopharyngioma during the study period. Nine patients (23.7%) were identified who had surgery (resection or biopsy) with P32 brachytherapy but without initial EBR. These 9 patients represented the study group. For 1 patient (11.1%), there was a complication with the brachytherapy procedure. Five patients (55.5%) required subsequent surgery. Seven patients (77.7%) required subsequent EBR for tumor growth. The mean time between the injection of P32 and subsequent treatment was 1.67 ± 1.50 years (mean ± SD). CONCLUSIONS In this small but focused population, P32 treatment provided limited local control for cyst growth. Brachytherapy alone did not reliably avert the need for subsequent surgery or EBR.

Exchange of Radioactive Phosphorus 32P between the Components of an Artificial Plant Community

In artificial plant communities (wooden cases with soil) the following plants were grown together for one year: case No. 1: <i>Betula verrucosa</i> Ehrh. (2 specimens) and <i>Carex pilosa</i> Scop.; sases No. 2 and 3: <i>Alnus incana</i> (L.) Mnch., <i>Fraxinus excelsior</i> L., <i>Podus avium</i> Mili., <i>Aegopodiurti podagraria</i> L., <i>Eupatorium cannabinum</i> L. and others. Into the stalks or stems of one to three plants of every case ³²P was introduced. After 3 months all the plants in every case contained radiactive phosphorus. There were great differences in ³²P concentration (up to ten-fold) between plants grown in the same case. The concentration of ³²P in plants into which it had not been introduced was of the range of 0.1%.