Of 1,500 foods tested in a University of Oslo study, blackberries were identified as nature's top cancer fighter.

Blackberries apparently have the highest antioxidant content per serving of any food tested. And a compound found in fresh blackberries appears to stop the development of skin tumors and lung cancer cells.

Think about this:

This sweet and juicy fruit, available year-round but plentiful and perfectly potent in April and May, was promoted in a television commercial that aired during the recent Michigan-Ohio State football game.

Ohio State University is a recipient of federal grants to study the health effects of blackberries, and the student who appeared in the TV ad plugged the school's research into the cancer fighting effects of blackberries. Now that's some good press.

A study appearing in the Journal of Clinical Oncology reveals there may be something out there that can extend the lives of patients with recurrent prostate cancer.

This something is a new class of anti-cancer targeted drugs that scientists at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles say are quite promising, despite their ineffectiveness in some prostate cancer patients with no previous chemotherapy treatment.

Pertuzumab, a molecular targeted compound that has been used successfully in ovarian cancer patients, has been shown to block the human epidermal growth factor receptor family by binding to and inhibiting the function of HER2 receptors. They essentially block a key pathway that leads to cancer growth. And this blockage can possibly offer a better, longer life for recurrent prostate cancer patients whose diseases no longer respond to traditional chemotherapy.

Pertuzumab, marketed under the brand name Omnitarg by Roche and Genentech, is just one of many targeted cancer therapies that give researchers hope that cancer may one day be a lifetime disease that can be skillfully managed.

Katherine Schaefer was investigating methods for treating the inflammation seen in Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis when something terrible happened -- she noticed her carefully cultured cells were dead. And then something wonderful happened -- she realized she had stumbled upon a potential new method of attacking cancerous tumors that have become resistant to existing drugs.

Schaefer and her colleagues at the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York were testing a compound called a PPAR-gamma modulator -- a compound never considered a cancer drug, or a drug of any kind really -- when Schaefer made a calculation error and used a lot more of the compound than she should have. And her cells died.

Upon further study, Schaefer found the compound killed just about every possible epithelial tumor cell. These cells line organs such as the colon and also the skin. The compound, that works like taxane drugs but without eventual tumor resistance, also killed colon tumors in mice without making them sick.

The research team, whose findings are published in the journal International Cancer Research, plans more safety tests in mice. And eventually, if their outcomes are promising, they plan to design something they can patent as a new drug -- because they would love to see this disastrous lab experiment one day lead to treatment for cancers of the colon, esophagus, liver, and skin.

Nearly a decade ago, women in Long Island began to worry about their high rates of breast cancer. So they advocated and lobbied and pushed until a public law was passed that allowed for the creation of the Long Island Breast Cancer Project. Funded by both the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, great data has emerged from this project -- like the data linking breast cancer and household pesticides.

Although much research has linked cancer with pesticides in work and industrial settings, few studies have investigated what these chemicals can do in households -- until now, thanks to research conducted as part of The Long Island Breast Cancer Project.

Published online in the December 13 American Journal of Epidemiology, researchers found an association between lifetime residential pesticide use and breast cancer risk in a sample of 1,508 Long Island women diagnosed with breast cancer between 1996 and 1997. These women were compared to 1,556 random controls. All women were asked to self-report their pesticide exposure and to offer blood samples for the study of organochlorine compound levels -- found in lawn and garden products.

As expected, researchers found an increased breast cancer risk for women whose blood samples showed the highest levels of organochlorine compounds. They also found it hard to find women who did not use lawn and garden pesticides to some degree.

Use of household pesticides has infiltrated our society, says researcher Susan Teitelbaum, assistant professor in the department of community medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, who reports she is happy to see a movement toward use of alternative methods, like integrated pest management.

Teitelbaum has just one recommendation as result of this study. It's quite simple really -- stop using pesticides.

A study that appears in the December issue of Science reports that a chemical compound called mifepristone present in the abortion pill may prevent breast tumors from developing. The compound has been found to prevent the growth of breast tumors caused by the mutant gene responsible for breast and ovarian cancers.

Mifepristone showed to prohibit progesterone, a hormone involved with the female reproductive cycle. Women who are diagnosed with BRCA 1 mutation often have their breasts or ovaries removed to reduce the risk of developing cancer.

Eva Lee, lead author of the study and professor of developmental cell biology and biological chemistry, says "We found that progesterone plays a role in the development of breast cancer by encouraging the proliferation of mammary cells that carry a breast cancer gene. Mifepristone can block that response. We're excited about this discovery and hope it leads to new options for women with a high risk for developing breast cancer".

BRCA 1 is widely studied by cancer geneticists because a mutated version of this gene significantly raises the possibility of breast or ovarian cancers. By age 70, more than 50 percent of women with the mutated gene with develop breast or ovarian cancer. The researchers studied mice with the BRCA 1 mutation. The mice that were treated with mifepristone, an anti-progesterone compound did not develop breast cancer by the time they reached one year of age. All of the untreated mice developed tumors by eight months of age.

The researchers found that progesterone encourages the development of cancer when the mutated BRCA 1 gene is present because it speeds up the division of cancer cells. Mifepristone was found to block a binding process that is necessary for progesterone to cause the cell division. The researchers feel that anti-progesterone therapy could provide women with an increased risk for breast cancer with more treatment options in the future.

A new compound developed by the healthcare company Abbott might have the power to end the prolonged life of cancerous tumor cells.

The compound, ABT-737, is being researched by experts at Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, Melbourne's world leading medical research body. And the drug is showing great promise.

Melbourne scientists discovered in 1989 how to keep cells alive. Then they determined how cancer cells are formed. After months of assessment, scientists believe ABT-737 could turn a switch back on in the body to ensure tumor cells die.

"Rather than attempting to poison the rogue cells, the new drug attempts to reactivate the normal cell death program that failed to kill the unwanted cells on cue," said one researcher. "ABT-737 is a switch flicker that kicks the cell death machinery into action."

FREEEEEDOM! is the cry made famous with Mel Gibson's portrayal of William Wallace in the movie Braveheart. The movie stayed true to the reenactment of the Scottish warriors painting faces and chests a bright blue before battle to visually intimidate the enemy. The plant used to create the blue dye is called Woad.

While the ancient Scottish warrior Wallace met with a gruesome fate at the hands of the enemy, women in the modern world diagnosed with breast cancer might gain advantage in the war against cancer with the same plant used as an ancient blue dye in battle.

Italian researchers from the University of Bologna have discovered that the Woad plant, belonging to the same Brassicaceae plant family as Brussels sprouts, cauliflower and broccoli, contains 20 times more glucobrassicin than broccoli. They also discovered that by wounding the Woad plant, they were able to increase the concentration of glucobrassicin seven times the normal level found in Woad. Glucobrassicin is known for its breast cancer-fighting abilities, and researchers are hopeful that isolating this compound will enable them to conduct clinical trials to better understand and clarify its effectiveness against cancer.

According to the Wikipedia entry on Woad, the first archaeological find of woad seeds were found in the French cave of l'Audoste, Bouches du Rhone. It is reported that Julius Caesar spoke of ancient Britons going into battle naked and using blue dye derived from Woad in face and body painting to terrify their opponents during battle. In addition, the blue dye from Woad was used as a tattooing ink and medicinally as an astringent.