Good morning, myeloma world.

We hope your weekend has gotten off to a good start. We've been looking over the latest myeloma-related research since the last edition of Myeloma Morning, and it appears we have just a short list of new material to discuss today.

In fact, we will be focusing today on just two new research articles.

The first is from a team of U.S. researchers, most of whom are based at the Uni­versity of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS). The study looks at a novel way of …

The International Myeloma Working Group (IMWG) has issued updated criteria for the diagnosis of multiple myeloma.

The criteria have been published in The Lancet Oncology and are ac­com­panied by recommendations for monitoring and updated criteria for other related plasma cell disorders.

The new diagnostic criteria represent a paradigm shift in the approach to multiple myeloma and will have considerable impact on the management of the disease.

For decades, the diagnosis of multiple myeloma required the presence of “end-organ” damage that could be attributed to the underlying plasma cell disorder. Thus, in order …

This year’s American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting in Chicago ended last Tuesday.

The day before the meeting ended was the busiest day at the meeting with re­gard to myeloma research.  It featured a session of oral pre­sen­ta­tions in the morn­ing and a poster session in the afternoon. In addi­tion, an education ses­sion was held in the afternoon that included one myeloma-related talk, given by Dr. Leif Bergsagel of the Mayo Clinic, about progress in the treat­ment of mul­ti­ple myeloma (article in the ASCO 2014 Edu­ca­tional Book).

This update …

Results of a recent observational study show that all known molecular subtypes of multiple myeloma are already present at the early, smol­der­ing myeloma and monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance stages of the disease.

According to the investigators, these findings indicate that the various molecular subtypes of myeloma, which have different genetic char­ac­ter­istics, are es­tab­lished early in the course of the disease.

The researchers defined the different molecular subtypes of myeloma they investigated based on a method called gene ex­pres­sion profiling. Using this method, they found that one subtype in particular was as­soc­i­ated …

A number of studies to be presented at this year’s American Society of Hema­tol­o­gy (ASH) meeting look at diseases that can progress to mul­ti­ple mye­lo­ma.

These 'myeloma precursor diseases,' as they are sometimes called, in­clude mono­clon­al gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) and smoldering myeloma.

In today's ASH preview article, The Beacon turns its attention to myeloma pre­cursor diseases, reviewing the key studies about them that will be presented at ASH this weekend and early next week.

The results discussed in this article are those that have been …

Findings from a German retrospective study indicate that whole-body magnetic resonance imaging can help identify patients with monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance who are at increased risk of progressing to symptomatic multiple myeloma.

The whole-body magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) results show that almost one-fourth of the MGUS patients in the study had clearly defined (focal) lesions in their bone marrow.  These lesions, or areas of ab­nor­mal cells, were solely within the patients' bone marrows.  They were not lesions in the outer (hard) area of the bone -- lesions which are often called …

Findings from a recent study conducted by a group of European re­searchers show that genetically diverse abnormal plasma cells, known as clones, are pres­ent in all stages of myeloma, from its precursor stages through to its symp­tom­at­ic stage.

These sets of abnormal plasma cells compete against one another, the re­searchers argue, and pro­mote disease progression through a Darwin­ian evolu­tion­ary model -- not by ac­cumu­la­tion of additional muta­tions over time, as was previously believed to be the case.

In addition, the investigators found that abnormal plasma cells acquire more genetic mutations as myeloma …