A Johns Hopkins study of patients with ischemic stroke suggests that many of those who receive prompt hospital treatment with "clot-busting" tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) therapy can avoid lengthy, restrictive monitoring in an intensive care unit (ICU).
Researchers have found the first direct evidence of a link between prenatal vitamin A deficiency and postnatal airway hyperresponsiveness, a hallmark of asthma. The study, conducted in mice, shows that short-term deficit of this essential vitamin while the lung is forming can cause profound changes in the smooth muscle that surrounds the airways, causing the adult lungs to respond to environmental or pharmacological stimuli with excessive narrowing of airways. The findings were published online in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
Scientists engineer the first berry-based chemopreventive confections that can withstand the rigors of a large-scale clinical trial. An ongoing prostate cancer study is trying to determine if the medical edibles can improve post-surgery outcomes
The risk of a kidney donor developing kidney failure in the remaining organ is much lower than in the population at large, even when compared with people who have two kidneys, according to results of new Johns Hopkins research.
Juggling may seem like mere entertainment, but a study led by Johns Hopkins engineers used this circus skill to gather critical clues about how vision and the sense of touch help control the way humans and animals move their limbs in a repetitive way, such as in running. The findings eventually may aid in the treatment of people with neurological diseases and could lead to prosthetic limbs and robots that move more efficiently.
After a child’s stem cell transplant, parents feel increased distress at the time of the procedure, but eventually recover to normal levels of adjustment.
Studying a cycle of protein interactions needed to make fat, Johns Hopkins researchers say they have discovered a biological switch that regulates a protein that causes fatty liver disease in mice. Their findings, they report, may help develop drugs to decrease excessive fat production and its associated conditions in people, including fatty liver disease and diabetes.
New genetic evidence strengthens the case that one well-known type of cholesterol is a likely suspect in causing heart disease, but also casts further doubt on the causal role played by another type. The findings may guide the search for improved treatments.
In most cases of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig’s disease, a toxin released by cells that normally nurture neurons in the brain and spinal cord can trigger loss of the nerve cells affected in the disease, Columbia researchers reported today in the online edition of the journal Neuron.
Scientists at the University of Utah identified mutations in three key genes that determine feather color in domestic rock pigeons. The same genes control pigmentation of human skin and can be responsible for melanoma and albinism.
With a $3.1 million National Institutes of Health grant, orthopedic researchers and engineers at Washington University in St. Louis are looking to improve the outcome of surgical repairs by studying the natural attachment of tendon to bone.
Using electrons more like photons could provide the foundation for a new type of electronic device that would capitalize on the ability of graphene to carry electrons with almost no resistance even at room temperature – a property known as ballistic transport.
Medical associations widely recommend that women visit their obstetricians and primary care doctors shortly after giving birth, but slightly fewer than half make or keep those postpartum appointments, according to a study by Johns Hopkins researchers.
Minimizing a person’s sight for as little as a week may help improve the brain’s ability to process hearing.
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital scientists led a study showing that mutations in a gene responsible for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) disrupt the RNA transport system in nerve cells. The findings appear in the current issue of the scientific journal Neuron and offer a new focus for efforts to develop effective treatments.
New research is lighting up yet another reason for women to quit smoking. In a study published online in the journal Menopause, researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania report the first evidence showing that smoking causes earlier signs of menopause – in the case of heavy smokers, up to nine years earlier than average – in white women with certain genetic variations.
Two surprising risk factors – diminished lung function and low serum potassium levels - appear to have nearly the same impact as obesity in explaining why African-Americans are disproportionately prone to developing type 2 diabetes, researchers at Duke Medicine report.
African American women today are almost twice as likely to deliver a preterm baby as white, Hispanic or Asian women in the US - a disparity that medical conditions, socioeconomic status, access to prenatal care and health behaviors haven’t been able to fully account for. Two new studies explore the complex relationship between race, stress and inflammation and potential impacts on pregnancy in the hope of reducing preterm births and infant mortality, and improving maternal mental health.
A team of Woods Hole Research Center (WHRC) scientists created maps of habitat corridors connecting protected areas in the tropics to incorporate biodiversity co-benefits into climate change mitigation strategies. Drs. Patrick Jantz, Scott Goetz, and Nadine Laporte describe their findings in an article entitled, “Carbon stock corridors to mitigate climate change and promote biodiversity in the tropics,” available online in the journal Nature Climate Change on January 26.
People seriously injured by violence are no more likely to die in the years after they are shot, stabbed or beaten than those who are seriously injured in accidents, Johns Hopkins researchers have found.
Scientists have engineered a microchip coated with blood vessel cells to learn more about the conditions under which nanoparticles accumulate in the plaque-filled arteries of patients with atherosclerosis, the underlying cause of myocardial infarction and stroke.
People living with Sjögren’s syndrome, an autoimmune disorder, appear to function at a level comparable to their healthier peers, according to a cross-sectional study published online in advance of print in Clinical Rheumatology. The study from researchers at Tufts reveals that people living with Sjögren’s perceive significant decline in cognitive, psychological and physical function. Nonetheless, despite the burdens of the disease, levels of function approach that of healthy controls.
The same physics that gives tornadoes their ferocious stability lies at the heart of new University of Washington research, and could lead to a better understanding of nuclear dynamics in studying fission, superconductors and the workings of neutron stars.
The accumulation of age-associated changes in a biochemical process that helps control genes may be responsible for some of the increased risk of cancer seen in older people, according to a National Institutes of Health study.
Roswell Park team reports that the disabling of two key genes, SSeCKS/AKAP12 and Rb, led to early development of prostate cancer and was also associated with high rates of metastasis to nearby lymph nodes.
Disruptive clumps of mutated protein are often blamed for clogging cells and interfering with brain function in patients with the neurodegenerative diseases known as spinocerebellar ataxias. But a new study in fruit flies suggests that for at least one of these diseases, the defective proteins may not need to form clumps to do harm.
A research team led by Wayne State University, in collaboration with Michigan State University, has identified a single gene in honeybees that separates the queens from the workers. The scientists unraveled the gene’s inner workings and published the results in the current issue of Biology Letters. The gene, which is responsible for leg and wing development, plays a crucial role in the evolution of bees’ ability to carry pollen.
Dana-Farber researchers have found that a combination of two already-in-use drugs may have an effect on stopping the growth of the most common genetic subtype of lung cancer setting the stage for clinical trials.
Age is a key risk factor for breast cancer. A recent study by researchers from the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Norris Cotton Cancer Center (NCCC), “Age-related DNA methylation in normal breast tissue and its relationship with invasive breast tumor methylation,” examines the connection between cancer and the aging process to see if epigenetic DNA alterations might contribute to age-related increases in breast cancer risk.
A team of researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania has found that moderate to severe hot flashes continue, on average, for nearly five years after menopause, and more than a third of women experience moderate/severe hot flashes for 10 years or more after menopause. Current guidelines recommend that hormone therapy, the primary medical treatment for hot flashes, not continue for more than 5 years.
Dartmouth researchers developed a new biological pathway-based computational model, called the Pathway-based Human Phenotype Network (PHPN), to identify underlying genetic connections between different diseases as reported in BioDataMining this week.
Scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute have been awarded approximately $1.8 million from the National Cancer Institute to identify signaling pathways that underlie lung cancer and to develop new therapeutic approaches.
The development of DNA-based vaccines with cytokine adjuvants has emerged as particularly promising for inducing antiviral and anti-tumor, cell-mediated immune responses. The protein IL-33 boosts the immune system of a human papilloma virus animal model of cancer.
In the first whole-genome analysis conducted through the Roswell Park Center for Personalized Medicine, and the second ever in bladder cancer, researchers found two distinct patterns of genetic alteration in tumors and identified a potential target.
Whitehead Institute researchers have determined that poly(A) tails on messenger RNAs (mRNAs) shift their role in the regulation of protein production during early embryogenesis. This finding about the regulation of mRNA translation also provides insight into how microRNAs control protein production.
Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered that valproic acid, a widely prescribed drug for treating epilepsy, has the additional benefits of reducing fat accumulation in the liver and lowering blood sugar levels in the blood of obese mice.
Fewer than one in two children and young adults treated for anxiety achieve long-term relief from symptoms, according to the findings of a study by investigators from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center and five other institutions.
Preliminary results of a small clinical trial show that a vaccine used to treat women with high-grade precancerous cervical lesions triggers an immune cell response within the damaged tissue itself. The Johns Hopkins scientists who conducted the trial said the finding is significant because measuring immune system responses directly in the lesions may be a more accurate way to evaluate so-called “therapeutic” vaccines than by the conventional means of blood analysis.
CU Cancer Center study: bladder and lung cancers are marked by shared differences in the genetics that control the cell cycle, with diagnostic, prognostic and treatment implications.
Aside from the 2013 Nobel Prize in Medicine going to the discoverers of this highly organized transport system, scientific interest in a particular group of vesicles called exosomes has accelerated over the last several years. Andrew K. Godwin, Ph.D., professor and director of molecular oncology at the University of Kansas Medical Center, is among the researchers studying the potential clinical applications of these specialized structures.
Study: patients taking crizotinib for ALK+ non-small cell lung cancer may safely and durably use up to three courses of targeted radiation therapy to eradicate pockets of drug-resistant disease.
Researchers have come up with a method to convert adult cells into epithelial stem cells, the first time anyone has achieved this in either humans or mice. The epithelial stem cells, when implanted into immunocompromised mice, regenerated the different cell types of human skin and hair follicles, and even produced structurally recognizable hair shaft, raising the possibility that they may eventually enable hair regeneration in people.
Specific compounds found in exhaled breath may help diagnose lung cancer in its early stages
Various muscular diseases are associated with changes in the elasticity of the protein titin, but whether these changes are a cause or an effect of disease has been unclear. Researchers help solve this “chicken or the egg” conundrum and identify a key player in determining titin’s size and stiffness.
The ultraviolet radiation (UVR) present in sunlight is the most common environmental carcinogen. To develop better methods of protection from the sun, we need to understand how the human skin detects and responds to UVR. Researchers provide new insight into the molecular pathway underlying this process.
In normal development, all cells turn off genes they don’t need, often by attaching a chemical methyl group to the DNA, a process called methylation. Historically, scientists believed methyl groups could only stick to a particular DNA sequence: a cytosine followed by a guanine, called CpG. But in recent years, they have been found on other sequences, and so-called non-CpG methylation has been found in stem cells, and in neurons in the brain.
Deprivation of vision during critical periods of childhood development has long been thought to result in irreversible vision loss. Now, researchers from the Schepens Eye Research Institute/Massachusetts Eye and Ear, Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have challenged that theory by studying a unique population of pediatric patients who were blind during these critical periods before removal of bilateral cataracts. The researchers found improvement after sight onset in contrast sensitivity tests, which measure basic visual function and have well-understood neural underpinnings. Their results show that the human visual system can retain plasticity beyond critical periods, even after early and extended blindness.
Researchers at Duke Medicine report that health care costs increase in parallel with body mass measurements, even beginning at a recommended healthy weight. Pharmacy and medical costs may even double for obese people compared with those at a healthy weight, according to a recent study published in the journal Obesity.
Poor-quality sleep with frequent awakenings can speed cancer growth, increase tumor aggressiveness and dampen the immune system’s ability to control cancer. This study demonstrates the effects of sleep loss on tumor growth and invasiveness and points to a mechanism for therapy.
Dartmouth engineers and radiologists develop new approach for diagnostic imaging of dense breasts with suspicious lesions. MRI/NIRS technique offers greater flexibility, speed, and accuracy. Technology shows promise for improving MRI’s ability to distinguish cancer from benign abnormalities.
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