Most people in the United States know someone affected by cancer. For some, it is a constant anxiety as eventually, more likely than not, someone they know will be diagnosed.

But there is hope for all as medical and scientific advances are sharpening our understanding of how cancer works and suggesting new ways we can beat it. And the way doctors and clinicians treat cancer is always changing, as scientists learn more about the nature and development of the disease.

This spring a group of first-year students at Middlebury College undertook a quest to learn about how cancer affects people in Addison County and how treatments are advancing and providing new hope for those afflicted. The students in Chemistry and Biochemistry Assistant Professor Lindsay Repka’s “Cancer and Community” first year seminar met with experts including Deb Wesley and Maureen Conrad of Addison County Home Health and Hospice, Anthropology Professor Kristin Bright and others, along with a few local cancer patients. Then they brought together some of what they learned in a package of stories for Addison Independent readers.

Here are those stories, which address the history of cancer treatments, newer therapies that build on increased understanding of how cancer functions, how cancer and other disease are stigmatized and how we can relieve that stigma, and how a local community member is facing their cancer diagnoses.

Click on these headlines to read the stories:

• Immunotherapies fight cancer at the molecular level

• Knowing the history of cancer research informs current treatment and research

• Illness, stigma and a path forward

• Better understanding of cancer nets better treatments

• Finding ways to limit cancer recurrence

• Contributing authors to Cancer & Community series