For patients with advanced cancer, aggressive care — chemotherapy, mechanical ventilation, acute hospitalizations and intensive care unit admissions — at the end of life is commonplace. Yet until now, little is known about the relationship between patients’ and families’ satisfaction with this aggressive care within the last 30 days of life.
A unique partnership between MTSU and the Centre of Molecular and Macromolecular Studies at the Polish Academy of Sciences will allow MTSU undergraduate students to interact daily with European scientists as the students conduct National Science Foundation-funded research on liquid crystals.
A new strategy – an injectable antibody – for lowering blood lipids and thereby potentially preventing coronary artery disease and other conditions caused by the build-up of fats, cholesterol, and other substances on the artery walls, is supported by findings from two new studies from researchers in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
Blood thinners, such as aspirin, reduce the risk of thrombus formation but also interfere with the initial clot formation that is essential for preventing blood loss from the wounds. Now researchers have discovered that a molecule plays a role in thrombus development, but not the initial clot formation, suggesting a new avenue for developing more specific and protective blood thinners.
A new study led by researchers at Roswell Park Cancer Institute establishes a connection between a sedentary lifestyle and risk of developing kidney or bladder cancer.
Researchers have developed a new device to map the brain during surgery and distinguish between healthy and diseased tissues. The device provides higher resolution neural readings than existing tools used in the clinic and could enable doctors to perform safer, more precise brain surgeries.
With mosquito season looming in the Northern Hemisphere, doctors and researchers are poised to take on a new round of Zika virus infections. Now a new study by a large group of international researchers led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) explains how Zika virus entered the United States via Florida in 2016—and how it might re-enter the country this year.
Clostridium botulinum is the bacterium that causes the neurointoxication, which produces one of the most potent toxins on earth and is classified as a potential bioterrorism threat. While no cure exists—and botulism treatment options are limited—a serendipitous discovery by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) may provide a new therapy that can stop the neurotoxin even in its more severe, advanced stages of action.
A study this month from researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) shows mindfulness training that addresses fear and pain during childbirth can improve women’s childbirth experiences and reduce their depression symptoms during pregnancy and the early postpartum period.
The identification of 16 additional genetic markers will help researchers get closer to understanding how — and why — psoriasis develops.
If every cell in our body is a factory, viruses are industrial spies who try to break in and take over. New findings about how one of the most mysterious types of spy – polyomaviruses -- accomplishes this feat could aid the fight against Merkel cell carcinoma, and diseases in organ transplant and cancer patients.
Chocolate consumption, particularly of dark chocolate, has been linked to improvements in various indicators of heart health. This study examined the possible association between chocolate intake and a lower rate of being diagnosed with atrial fibrillation. While this is an observational study, researchers believe these findings warrant further consideration to identify effective prevention strategies for atrial fibrillation.
Keck School of Medicine of USC has received a $2.2 million NIH grant to fund research on gene therapy that could help manage challenging bone repairs
A new study examines the spread of mistletoe—a parasitic plant—and finds that the plant’s success is determined not only by its compatibility with a host tree, but also whether or not the plants’ fruiting seasons overlap. Knowing what factors are necessary for the parasite to spread may help scientists better understand the variability of other parasitic interactions, including infectious diseases.
A new vulnerability affecting Android mobile devices results not from a traditional bug, but from the malicious combination of two legitimate permissions that power desirable and commonly-used features in popular apps. The combination could result in a new class of attacks, which has been dubbed “Cloak and Dagger.”
Coronary artery disease (CAD) is a leading cause of death worldwide. Despite dozens of regions in the genome associated with CAD, most of the genetic components of heart diseases are not fully understood, suggesting that more genes are out there to be found. A team found 15 new risk genes for coronary artery disease.
In a recent paper published online in the journal Critical Care Medicine, researchers at the Johns Hopkins Armstrong Institute of Patient Safety and Quality led a study that demonstrated that health care providers can take steps to curb ventilator-associated events.
Researchers have found that carbon particles released into the air from burning trees and other organic matter are much more likely than previously thought to travel to the upper levels of the atmosphere, where they can interfere with rays from the sun – sometimes cooling the air and at other times warming it.
Research from the Keck School of Medicine of USC indicates that in mice with a KRAS mutation, which is present in 90 percent of pancreatic cancer patients, expressing only half the amount of the glucose-regulated protein GRP78 is enough to halt the earliest stage of pancreatic cancer development. This results in delayed tumor development and prolonged survival.
By analyzing network traffic going to suspicious domains, security administrators could detect malware infections weeks or even months before they're able to capture a sample of the invading malware, a new study suggests. The findings point toward the need for new malware-independent detection strategies that will give network defenders the ability to identify network security breaches in a more timely manner.
A study from Indiana University published May 19 in the journal Science Advances finds that insects possess a naturally occurring resistance to the use of the gene-editing technology CRISPR-Cas9 to prevent diseases such as malaria.
A new discovery may be the key to stopping shortages of vital blood-clotting cells that can represent the difference between life and death. The finding also could offer big benefits for premature babies.
A new study of obese people suggests that changes in their brains’ reward regions make them more prone to overeating, and that women and men exhibit different brain activity related to overeating.
After analyzing the blood of a survivor of the 2013-16 Ebola outbreak, a team of scientists from academia, industry and the government has discovered the first natural human antibodies that can neutralize and protect animals against all three major disease-causing ebolaviruses. The findings, published online today in the journal Cell, could lead to the first broadly effective ebolavirus therapies and vaccines.
Johns Hopkins researchers say they have identified a new way that cells in the brain alert the rest of the body to recruit immune cells when the brain is injured. The work was completed in mouse models that mimic infection, stroke or trauma in humans.
Colon cancer patients who have a healthy body weight, exercise regularly and eat a diet high in whole grains, fruits and vegetables have a significantly lower risk of cancer recurrence or death, according to a research team led by UC San Francisco investigators. This finding represents an analysis of data collected on patients participating in a national study for people with stage III colon cancer.
A diagnostic MRI followed by one of three MRI-guided biopsy strategies is a cost-effective method to detect prostate cancer, according to a new study out of Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center.
A new technology generates cellular images detailed enough to distinguish cancerous from normal tissue. Researchers are working on speeding up the technology so it can be used during surgery, allowing surgeons to know if they have removed all the cancer while they still have time to take out more.
New biomarkers identified by a research team in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania could help predict which Parkinson’s disease patients will suffer significant cognitive deficits within the first three years of their diagnosis. The results of the analysis from the international Parkinson’s Progression Markers Initiative (PPMI) are published this week in the open-access journal PLoS ONE.
Compound could serve as basis for drugs to prevent neurological complications of Zika
Researchers have developed a new tool for detecting early pancreatic cancer. The tool bounces light off targeted tissue to detect structural changes in the tissue, a method called light-scattering spectroscopy. The researchers performed a series of pilot studies using LSS and accurately distinguished benign cysts, cancerous cysts, and those with malignancy potential 95 percent of the time. The Harvard University team reported their results in the March 13, 2017, issue of Nature Biomedical Engineering.
As thyroid cancer rates rise, more people are having surgery to remove all or part of their thyroid. A new study suggests complications from these procedures are more common than previously believed.
Researchers surveyed individuals entering NYC EDM parties about their drug usage, with almost one out of ten participants who reported no “bath salt” use as per the gate question then reported use of one or more drugs in this class, such as methylone, providing evidence of under-reporting.
The very nature of crowdsourcing means that ideators can be overwhelmed by the number of ideas generated, rather than inspired by them. In an effort to enhance idea generation within the crowd context, the researchers sought to determine what effect peripheral tasks—such as rating and combining others’ ideas had on ideation performance.
Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a nano-sized optical fiber that’s sensitive enough to feel the forces generated by swimming bacteria and hear the beating of heart muscle cells. The fiber detects forces down to 160 femtonewtons and sound levels down to -30 decibels.
Researchers have found a protein that stops cancer’s ability to prevent the immune system from destroying cancer cells. The protein, free C3d, has the potential to be developed into a cancer vaccine and a cancer treatment.
In their quest to replicate themselves, viruses have gotten awfully good at tricking human cells into pumping out viral proteins. That’s why scientists have been working to use viruses as forces for good: to deliver useful genes to human cells and help patients who lack important proteins or enzymes. A team of researchers led by Associate Professor Vijay Reddy at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) has now uncovered the structural details that make one virus a better tool for future therapies than its closely related “cousin.”
Leading hospital “superbugs,” known as the enterococci, arose from an ancestor that dates back 450 million years — about the time when animals were first crawling onto land (and well before the age of dinosaurs), according to a new study.
New methodology allowed researchers at BIDMC to more easily investigate mechanisms of infection and provide new insight into how pathogens can work together to cause disease. Using the new tool, researchers confirmed a safer model for study of Brucella species, which cause a potentially debilitating infectious disease in humans and cattle.
Using gene sequencing tools, scientists from Johns Hopkins Medicine and the University of British Columbia have found a set of genetic mutations in samples from 24 women with benign endometriosis, a painful disorder marked by the growth of uterine tissue outside of the womb. The findings, described in the May 11 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine, may eventually help scientists develop molecular tests to distinguish between aggressive and clinically “indolent,” or non-aggressive, types of endometriosis.
A research team has engineered a small peptide that binds to a protein found in high-risk prostate cancers and can be imaged using MRI. The system identified aggressive tumors in mouse models of prostate cancer, and is a promising step for reliable early detection and treatment of high-risk, life-threatening prostate cancer.
Bacteria in the gut microbiome drive the formation of cerebral cavernous malformations (CCMs), clusters of dilated, thin-walled blood vessels in the brain that can cause stroke and seizures. The research team’s research suggests that altering the microbiome in CCM patients may be an effective therapy for this cerebrovascular disease.
Six biological pigments called rhodopsins play well-established roles in light-sensing in the fruit fly eye. Three of them also have light-independent roles in temperature sensation. New research shows that a seventh rhodopsin, Rh7, is expressed in the brain of fruit flies where it regulates the fly’s day-night activity cycles. The study appears in Nature and was funded by the National Eye Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health.
Until now, scientists have only had a murky understanding of how these relationships arise. Now Colin Dale and his colleagues at the University of Utah have an answer. It’s good news and bad news, germophobes: The bad news? Mutualistic bacteria start out by invading animal cells just like malevolent disease-causing bacteria do. The good news? Once they’re in, they calm down and play nice.
Faculty members at the UofL School of Medicine have begun developing a national training program to instruct educators at universities across the United States in teaching interprofessional palliative care to those who care for cancer patients.
Using fruit flies, Johns Hopkins researchers say they have identified a specific and very small set of brain cells — dubbed dopamine wedge neurons — responsible for driving the insects’ food preferences toward what they need, rather than what they like.
A warming climate could affect the stability of alpine grasslands in Asia’s Tibetan Plateau, threatening the ability of farmers and herders to maintain the animals that are key to their existence, and potentially upsetting the ecology of an area in which important regional river systems originate.
A natural compound found in grape seed extract could be used to strengthen dentin — the tissue beneath a tooth’s enamel — and increase the life of resin fillings, according to new research at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry.
Monthly eye injections of Avastin (bevacizumab) are as effective as the more expensive drug Eylea (aflibercept) for the treatment of central retinal vein occlusion (CRVO), according to a clinical trial funded by the National Eye Institute (NEI), part of the National Institutes of Health. After six monthly injections, treatment with either drug improved visual acuity on average from 20/100 to 20/40.
An international team of researchers has discovered that a microRNA produced by certain white blood cells can prevent excessive inflammation in the intestine. The study, “Myeloid-derived miR-223 regulates intestinal inflammation via repression of the NLRP3 inflammasome,” which will be published May 9 in The Journal of Experimental Medicine, shows that synthetic versions of this microRNA can reduce intestinal inflammation in mice and suggests a new therapeutic approach to treating patients with Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis.
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