Summary of the November 3, 2009 issue of JNCI

Issue 21 of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute features a study and editorial on Jewish survivors of World War II who were potentially exposed to the Holocaust and their risk for cancer occurrence. In this issue's first commentary, researchers propose a more efficient system using archived specimens for the evaluation of prognostic and predictive biomarkers. The second commentary summarizes a set of critical decision points in cancer biomarker and drug development. This issue also includes a study that found that women with increased levels of Müllerian inhibiting substance may be at a greater risk for breast cancer. In this issue's last study, researchers found that Merkel cell polyomavirus is the only human polyomavirus known to be associated with a rare skin cancer.