Curated News: Grant Funded News

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A “decoy” mechanism has been found in human and animal cells to protect them from potentially dangerous toxins released by foreign invaders, such as bacteria.

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Johns Hopkins Medicine researchers report that the number of disabled students admitted to U.S. medical schools rose from 2.9% to 4.9% over the last three years. However, the percentage of NIH-funded researchers with disabilities declined between 2008 and 2018. The grant success rate for this group was lower than for researchers without a disability, indicating that despite more people with disabilities prepared to enter biomedical research, their prospects as professionals are weakening.

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A new culprit — hydrogen sulfide — worsens the deadly disease tuberculosis. When Tb bacteria invade the lung, the amounts of hydrogen sulfide in the lung microenvironment greatly increase, and this makes the microbe more virulent and better able to block the body’s protective immune response.

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The U.S. Department of Energy is investing $74 million dollars in research to develop and test technologies and construction practices that will help “improve the energy performance of the nation’s buildings and electric grid.” The Lighting Enabled Systems & Applications (LESA) Center, housed at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, will receive more than $2.8 million as part of this nationwide effort.

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The National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) Oncology Research Program (ORP) today announced three research projects selected to receive funding to improve healthcare provider performance and/or healthcare quality, focusing on enhancing patient care and outcomes for people with NSCLC.

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Doctors face a difficult decision when they must choose a drug combination that will benefit the person sitting before them in an exam room. Statistics can’t show how any one person will respond to a reatment.works in people. Dr. Sarah Adams is using a $1.2M to find better ways to predict which women will benefit from her drug combination, now in clinical trials.

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Turning adhesion on and off is what makes a glue smart. Inspired by nature, catechols are synthetic compounds that mimic the wet-but-still-sticky proteins found in mussel feet and offer promise for underwater glue, wound dressings, prosthetic attachments or even making car parts and in other manufacturing. A Michigan Tech team has used electricity for the first time to deactivate a catechol-containing adhesive in salt water.

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A new study from the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing has examined how hospital organizational factors influence nurse burnout and patient satisfaction. Using data from 463 hospitals in four states, researchers learned that hospitals with the best work environments were also those with the lowest burnout and highest patient satisfaction.

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Researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center and University of Chicago have discovered that bacteria that usually live in the gut can accumulate in tumors and improve the effectiveness of immunotherapy in mice. The study, which will be published March 6 in the Journal of Experimental Medicine (JEM), suggests that treating cancer patients with Bifidobacteria might boost their response to CD47 immunotherapy, a wide-ranging anti-cancer treatment that is currently being evaluated in several clinical trials.

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An announcement that the Harrington Discovery Institute at University Hospitals is accepting letters of intent for the 2021 Harrington Scholar-Innovator Award. The award offers inventive physician-scientists resources and expertise to advance their discoveries into medicines.

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The Women’s Prison Project is a first-of-its-kind collaboration between Tulane’s Domestic Violence and Criminal Justice clinic.

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Two scientists from Wake Forest School of Medicine, part of Wake Forest Baptist Health, have received a total of $1.5 million in research funding from the American Cancer Society (ACS) to study new chemotherapy and immunotherapy treatments for cancer.

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Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center have made significant progress toward development of a simple, noninvasive liquid biopsy test that detects prostate cancer from RNA and other specific metabolic chemicals in the urine.

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In a recent study, led by UC San Diego’s Rommie Amaro, researchers broke new ground with their molecular simulations in terms of size, complexity and methodological analyses of the viral envelope.

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A team of researchers from Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center and the CDC report new evidence that inhalation of vitamin E acetate is strongly linked to e-cigarette, or vaping, product use-associated lung injury (EVALI).

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Human fingers are sculpted from a primitive pad-like structure during embryonic development. Sometimes, this process goes awry and babies are born with fused fingers or toes. A new study from the University of California, Irvine reveals new factors involved in the congenital malformation called syndactyly.

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NIGMS grantee and presidential award recipient Sohini Ramachandran, Ph.D., is challenging our understanding of genetic variation among human populations. She discusses her research on how the genetic composition of traits and diseases varies among populations, the value of statistical and computational work in human genetics, and what this all means for patient treatment.

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New research by University of Wisconsin–Madison scientists reveals how a cellular filament helps neural stem cells clear damaged and clumped proteins, an important step in eventually producing new neurons.

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Using ultrasound waves propagating through a solid surface, researchers at Washington University in St. Louis were able to read text messages and make fraudulent calls on a cellphone sitting on a desk up to 30 feet away.

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Sugars are the body’s primary energy source, but they also play signaling roles in the cell by acting as tags on proteins and lipids. NIGMS grantee and Presidential award recipient Michael Boyce discusses the importance of these sugar tags and their role in disease, as well as his efforts toward diversity, equity, and inclusion in the scientific workforce.

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Nanoparticles have been used to treat disease for decades, but scientists are now learning more about how they move through human tissue. PECASE honoree and NIGMS grantee Elizabeth Nance is enlisting minds across different scientific fields to solve the challenge of using nanoparticles to target the right site within the body to increase the effectiveness of treatments for newborn brain injury.

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Parkinson’s disease researchers have used gene-editing tools to introduce the disorder’s most common genetic mutation into marmoset monkey stem cells and to successfully tamp down cellular chemistry that often goes awry in Parkinson’s patients.

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Led by Tony Hu, the Weatherhead Presidential Chair in Biotechnology Innovation at Tulane University School of Medicine, researchers are now developing a rapid, reliable and highly specific test to allow rapid diagnosis of all forms of Tuberculosis (TB).

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Researchers at Case Western Reserve University, funded in part through a Gund-Harrington Scholar grant at University Hospitals in Cleveland, have used used chemically modified lipids—instead of the viruses most commonly used as carriers— to safely deliver gene therapy to fight a rare, but irreversible, genetic eye disorder known as Stargardt disease.

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New study reveals potential for developing novel antibody-based antitoxins against botulinum neurotoxins (BoNTs), including the most commonly used, yet most toxic one, Botox.

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New research shows brain imaging may be able to predict when a blood test known as a liquid biopsy would or would not produce clinically actionable information

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The ATS Foundation Research Program and the American Lung Association have awarded Donald Sullivan, MD, of Oregon Health & Science University a $100,000 Foundation Partner grant. The ATS Foundation Partner Grants provide crucial support to talented investigators from around the world, launching careers dedicated to scientific discovery and better patient care.

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The Clare Boothe Luce (CBL) Program has awarded $192,000 to support undergraduate research at Olin College. The award, which will be spread over three years, will go toward establishing a CBL Research Scholars Program under which up to 24 students will have the opportunity to do paid research in the fields of science, engineering or mathematics over the summer months.

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The deadly brain cancer glioblastoma (GBM) is often resistant to chemotherapy and radiation, but new research shows targeting stromal cells – the cells that serve as the connective tissue of the organs – may be an effective way of overcoming that resistance

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Scientists at Johns Hopkins report they have designed and successfully tested an experimental, super small package able to deliver molecular signals that tag implanted human cancer cells in mice and make them visible for destruction by the animals’ immune systems. The new method was developed, say the researchers, to deliver an immune system “uncloaking” device directly to cancer cells.

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Using e-cigarettes alters the mouth’s microbiome—the community of bacteria and other microorganisms—and makes users more prone to inflammation and infection, finds a new study led by researchers at NYU College of Dentistry.

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Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with higher measures of tumor mutations that show up in a blood test generally have a better clinical response to PD-1-based immunotherapy treatments than patients with a lower measure of mutations.

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More than $3.7 million was awarded to Mahesh Mohan, DVM, MS, Ph.D., Professor at the Texas Biomedical Research Institute, and Chioma M. Okeoma, Ph.D., Associate Professor at Stony Brook University, to explore the link between cannabinoids (THC) and chronic intestinal inflammation in patients infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

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Adults who drank sugary beverages daily had an increased risk of developing abnormal blood cholesterol and triglycerides compared to those who did not, according to new findings from a prospective study by researchers at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University.

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DHS S&T announced today the selection of the University of Nebraska Omaha to lead a consortium of U.S. academic institutions and other partners for a new COE for TPCR.

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The grant will help create a new multi-disciplinary educational program of self-advocacy at UIC

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At the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing (Penn Nursing), researchers conducted an online survey of 362 Pennsylvania school nurses (elementary, middle, and high school) to better understand how they have a supply, administer, and perceive storing naloxone in their schools. The results illustrate that though many nurses have a supply of naloxone in their school, important barriers to access and use of this life-saving medication still exist.

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Cognitive processing in people with intellectual disability can now be accurately assessed thanks to UC Davis Health researchers who updated and validated series of tests, part of the NIH Toolbox Cognitive Battery.

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Testing of small molecules in mouse models of Duchenne muscular dystrophy shows promise for restoration of muscle structure and function.

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In search of new ways to sequence human genomes and read critical alterations in DNA, researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine say they have successfully used the gene cutting tool CRISPR to make cuts in DNA around lengthy tumor genes, which can be used to collect sequence information.

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A method developed by a team of geneticists, archaeologists and demographers may make it possible to identify thousands of individuals whose remains lie in unmarked graves.

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Experts believe that tuberculosis, or TB, has been a scourge for humans for some 15,000 years, with the first medical documentation of the disease coming out of India around 1000 B.C.E. Today, the World Health Organization reports that TB is still the leading cause of death worldwide from a single infectious agent, responsible for some 1.5 million fatalities annually. Primary treatment for TB for the past 50 years has remained unchanged and still requires patients to take multiple drugs daily for at least six months. Successful treatment with these anti-TB drugs — taken orally or injected into the bloodstream — depends on the medications “finding their way” into pockets of TB bacteria buried deep within the lungs.

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Exposure to alcohol advertising changes teens’ attitudes about alcohol and can cause them to start drinking, finds a new analysis led by NYU School of Global Public Health and NYU Grossman School of Medicine. The study, which appears in a special supplement of the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs funded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, uses a framework developed to show causality between tobacco advertising and youth smoking and applies it to alcohol advertising.

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The insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas unwittingly produce a signal that may aid their own demise in Type 1 diabetes, according to a study of the lipid signals that drive macrophage cells in the body to two different phenotypes of activated immune cells.

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Although 1 in 7 adults smoke cigarettes the year prior to undergoing weight-loss surgery, nearly all successfully quit at least a month before their operation. However, smoking prevalence steadily climbs to pre-surgery levels within seven years, according to new research.

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New cancer immunotherapy approaches are revolutionizing treatment options for breast cancer patients. However, many lead to insufficient immune responses rendering the therapies incapable of completely eradicating tumors. In a new study, published today in Science Immunology, University of California, Irvine researchers determined the molecular features of certain cells associated with breast cancer, which may open up new avenues into improving cancer immunotherapy.

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Two leaders of the University of Arkansas at Little Rock have donated $25,000 to honor academic units who are going above and beyond the call of duty to support student success.

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Researchers at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health have demonstrated the use of stem-cell-derived “mini-brains” to detect harmful side effects of a common drug on the developing brain. Mini-brains are miniature human brain models, developed with human cells and barely visible to the human eye, whose cellular mechanisms mimic those of the developing human brain.

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Scientists find that normal intestinal cells “de-differentiate” en masse into stem cells that generate the cells needed for a healthy intestinal lining. New study establishes de-differentiation as the predominant mode of stem cell recover in the intestine

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The ATS Foundation Research Program/Pulmonary Hypertension Association has awarded Rahul Kumar, PhD, of the University of California, San Francisco, a $80,000 Foundation Partner grant. A $50,000 Foundation Partner grant was awarded to Jason Boehme, MD, also of the University of California, San Francisco. Ke Yuan, PhD, of Boston Children’s Hospital is the 2019 recipient of the Aldrighetti Research Award for Young Investigators. The award, in the amount of $80,000, is sponsored by Actelion Pharmaceuticals US, Inc, through a partnership with the Pulmonary Hypertension Association.