James Fraser, PhD, a protein researcher who studies structural biology at the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3) at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), is one of 10 recipients of a prestigious award for young scientists given for the first time by the National Institutes of Health.

Breast Cancer Awareness Month is an opportune time to take stock of some of the recent progress being made at UCSF, home to one of the preeminent cancer centers in the nation.

Mammograms are not one-size-fits-all, says noted breast cancer researcher Karla Kerlikowske, MD, of the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Rather, they should be customized based on a woman’s age, breast density, family health history and other factors.

African American women have lower breast cancer survival rates than white women and University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) scientists are studying why – as well as how to increase their life spans.

It’s a matter of fairness: members of all ethnic groups should have the opportunity to participate in clinical trials. And it’s a matter of soundness, too: medical advancements must be tested in as many different people with as many different genetic makeups as possible.

UCSF professor Goerge Sawaya, MD, a member of the  U.S. Preventive Services Task Force that developed updated recommendations on breast cancer screening, discusses the rationale and the role of science in advancing change in clinical practice in this video.

One dose of radiation during surgery for early breast cancer is as effective as six weeks of standard treatment – which could save as much as $1.5 billion in the United States over five years.

A new way to study and treat breast cancer being launched at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) in October will screen women for the disease and provide them with individual assessments of their risk of developing the cancer.