This news item from the Cornell Chronicle is about: An existing drug may one day protect premenopausal women from life-altering infertility that commonly follows cancer treatments, according to a new study. Women who are treated for cancer with radiation or certain chemotherapy drugs are commonly rendered sterile. According to a 2006 study from Weill Cornell Medicine, nearly 40 percent of all female breast cancer survivors experience premature ovarian failure, in which they lose normal function of their ovaries and often become infertile. The current study, published in the journal Genetics, was led by John Schimenti, Cornell University professor in the Departments of Biomedical Sciences and Molecular Biology and Genetics. The study builds on his 2014 research that identified a so-called checkpoint protein (CHK2) that becomes activated when oocytes are damaged by radiation.