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Atherosclerosis has been presumed to be the consequence of complicated interactions between overabundant cholesterol and resulting inflammation in the heart and blood vessels. Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, with colleagues at institutions across the country, say the relationship is not exactly what it appears, and that a precursor to cholesterol actually suppresses inflammatory response genes. This precursor molecule could provide a new target for drugs designed to treat atherosclerosis.

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Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have found that recovery from an emerging, minimally invasive surgical technique called Laparo-Endoscopic Single-Site Surgery (LESS) was less painful for kidney cancer patients than traditional laparoscopic surgery.

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Researchers at Moores Cancer Center at University of California, San Diego Health System are evaluating the safety and tolerability of a synthetic cannabinoid called dexanabinol. Delivered as a weekly intravenous infusion, the drug is being tested in patients with all forms of brain cancer, both primary and metastatic.

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UC San Diego Sulpizio Family Cardiovascular Center has received Modern Healthcare’s highest design honor, the 2012 Modern Healthcare Design Award. Out of more than one hundred entries, only one other project received this honor in 2012.

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UC San Diego’s Center for Transplantation has met or exceeded all of its necessary requirements for approval as a center of excellence under the Federal Medicare program. This approval – from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) – allows UC San Diego Health System to accept into its program potential cardiac transplant patients covered by Medicare.

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Adah Almutairi, PhD, associate professor at the Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, the Department of NanoEngineering, and the Materials Science and Engineering Program at the University of California, San Diego, and colleagues have developed the first degradable polymer that is extremely sensitive to low but biologically relevant concentrations of hydrogen peroxide.

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UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center launched a bold plan today, aimed at personalizing cancer treatment. The “My Answer to Cancer” team of oncologists, bioinformaticians, pathologists and geneticists pledges to “sequence” or analyze the DNA of large numbers of patients with cancer in order to match each patient to the best available drug for his or her particular tumor.

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In a study at the University of California, San Diego and VA San Diego Healthcare, researchers were able to regenerate “an astonishing degree” of axonal growth at the site of severe spinal cord injury in rats. Their research revealed that early stage neurons have the ability to survive and extend axons to form new, functional neuronal relays across an injury site in the adult central nervous system (CNS).

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The governing board of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) has announced that six investigators from the University of California, San Diego Stem Cell Research program have received a total of more than $7 million in the latest round of CIRM funding.

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An international team of researchers, led by scientists at the University of California, San Diego and Yale University schools of medicine, have identified a form of autism with epilepsy that may potentially be treatable with a common nutritional supplement.

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A study led by researchers at the UC San Diego Stem Cell Research program and funded by the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) looks at an important RNA binding protein called LIN28, which is implicated in pluripotency and reprogramming as well as in cancer and other diseases.

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A study from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, published August 22 online by PLoS ONE, reports that muscle problems reported by patients taking statins were related to the strength or potency of the given cholesterol-lowering drugs.

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A national team of researchers led by investigators at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have developed a multidimensional set of brain measurements that, when taken together, can accurately assess a child’s age with 92 percent accuracy.

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An investigational drug currently under FDA review for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis has now shown positive results in patients with moderate-to-severe ulcerative colitis, according to researchers at the University of California San Diego, School of Medicine. The study will appear in the August 16, 2012 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

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An international team of researchers has found that certain bioactive components found in human milk are associated with a reduced risk of HIV transmission from an HIV infected mother to her breast-fed infant. Their study will be published in the August 15 online edition of American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

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John Sweetenham, MD, professor of medicine and former vice chair and director of clinical research at the Cleveland Clinic Taussig Cancer, part of Case Comprehensive Cancer Center, has been named medical director at UC San Diego Nevada Cancer Institute.

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Heavy drinking is known to affect an adolescents’ developing brain, but certain patterns of brain activity may also help predict which teens are at risk of becoming problem drinkers, according to a study by researchers in the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and VA San Diego Healthcare System.

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A study published in the online journal Hepatology reports a potential new NADPH oxidase (NOX) inhibitor therapy for liver fibrosis, a scarring process associated with chronic liver disease that can lead to loss of liver function.

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Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine say neutrophils, an abundant type of white blood cell typically tasked with attacking bacteria and other foreign invaders, also plays an unexpected role in mediating insulin resistance – the central characteristic of type 2 diabetes, which afflicts an estimated 26 million Americans.

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The greatest risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is advancing age. By age 85, the likelihood of developing the dreaded neurological disorder is roughly 50 percent. But researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine say AD hits hardest among the “younger elderly” – people in their 60s and 70s – who show faster rates of brain tissue loss and cognitive decline than AD patients 80 years and older.

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Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have identified a link between patients who undergo total nephrectomy - complete kidney removal - and erectile dysfunction. Results from the multi-center study were recently published online in the British Journal of Urology International.

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Using a new assay method to study tumor cells, researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center have found evidence of clonal evolution in chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). The assay method distinguishes features of leukemia cells that indicate whether the disease will be aggressive or slow-moving, a key factor in when and how patients are treated.

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A study conducted by researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine along with colleagues from Rural/Metro Ambulance San Diego and the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department, shows that emergency medical personnel can obtain an electrocardiogram (ECG) in the field for chest pain patients without an increase in scene time or transport time to the hospital.

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University of California, San Diego Health System’s hospitals and facilities are among "Health Care’s Most Wired," according to the 14th annual survey conducted by Hospitals & Health Networks magazine.

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An international team of scientists, led by researchers from the Department of Pediatrics at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, have identified the first reported inhibitors of a key enzyme involved in survival of the parasite responsible for malaria. Their findings, which may provide the basis for anti-malarial drug development, are currently published in the online version of the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry.

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Researchers from UC San Diego, the University of California Los Angeles and Indiana University report having found, for the first time, that atrial fibrillation or irregular heart rhythms is caused by small electrical sources within the heart, in the form of electrical spinning tops (“rotors”) or focal beats. Importantly, they found a way of detecting these key sources, then precisely targeting them for therapy that can shut them down in minutes with long lasting results.

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Using a two-photon microscope capable of peering deep within living tissue, researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have found new evidence that alpha-synuclein protein build-up inside neurons causes them to not only become “leaky,” but also to misfire due to calcium fluxes.

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Karim Kader, MD, PhD, associate clinical professor at the UC San Diego School of Medicine, together with a team of researchers from Wake Forest University School of Medicine, have developed a genetic test to predict a man’s risk for prostate cancer. Use of the test could reduce the need for repeat biopsies in men who have had a negative biopsy.

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Researchers at the UC San Diego School of Medicine are evaluating a new social media tool called Wellaho to treat patients with type I and II diabetes.

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Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have identified two key regulatory proteins critical to clearing away misfolded proteins that accumulate and cause the progressive, deadly neurodegeneration of Huntington’s disease (HD).

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In the current online issue of PLoS ONE, researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine say they have identified a set of laboratory-based biomarkers that can be useful for understanding brain-based abnormalities in schizophrenia. The measurements, known as endophenotypes, could ultimately be a boon to clinicians who sometimes struggle to recognize and treat the complex and confounding mental disorder.

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The biological mechanism of sunburn – the reddish, painful, protective immune response from ultraviolet (UV) radiation – is a consequence of RNA damage to skin cells, report researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and elsewhere in the July 8, 2012 Advance Online Publication of Nature Medicine.

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In the July 6 issue of Cell Stem Cell, researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine describe how human epidermal progenitor cells and stem cells control transcription factors to avoid premature differentiation, preserving their ability to produce new skin cells throughout life.

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Researchers at the University of California, San Diego – led by Gary S. Firestein, professor in the Division of Rheumatology, Allergy and Immunology at UC San Diego School of Medicine – investigated a mechanism usually implicated in cancer and in fetal development, called DNA methylation, in the progression of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). They found that epigenetic changes due to methylation play a key role in altering genes that could potentially contribute to inflammation and joint damage.

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A team of researchers – led by Catriona H. M. Jamieson, MD, PhD, associate professor of medicine at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Director of Stem Cell Research at UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center – studied these cells in mouse models that had been transplanted with human leukemia cells. They discovered that the leukemia initiating cells which clone, or replicate, themselves most robustly activate the NOTCH1 pathway, usually in the context of a mutation.

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In a paper published in the July 1, 2012 issue of the journal Nature, researchers at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research and the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine open the book further, mapping for the first time a significant portion of the functional sequences of the mouse genome, the most widely used mammalian model organism in biomedical research.

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Santiago Horgan, MD, chief of minimally invasive surgery at UC San Diego Health System was the first surgeon in the United States to implant the new FDA-approved LINX for GERD.

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In a paper published in the June 24, 2012 online issue of Nature Genetics, a team of doctors and scientists, led by researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, say de novo somatic mutations in a trio of genes that help regulate cell size and proliferation are likely culprits for causing hemimegalencephaly, though perhaps not the only ones.

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Experts at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine disagree with a series of new studies from Denmark that suggest consumption of up to 8 alcoholic drinks a week or occasional binge drinking during pregnancy is generally safe for the developing baby.

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Psoriasis is an autoimmune disorder in which skin cells proliferate out of control. For some hard-to-heal wounds, the problem is just the opposite: Restorative skin cells don’t grow well or fast enough. In a paper published in the June 21, 2012 issue of Immunity, researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine describe a molecule that may lead to new treatments for both problems.

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With a single drug treatment, researchers at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine can silence the mutated gene responsible for Huntington’s disease, slowing and partially reversing progression of the fatal neurodegenerative disorder in animal models.

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UC San Diego Health System has been recognized as a “Leader in LGBT Healthcare Equality” in the Healthcare Equality Index 2012 report, an annual survey conducted by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Foundation.

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Justin M. Brown, MD, reconstructive neurosurgeon at UC San Diego Health System, is one of only a few specialists in the world who have pioneered a novel technique to restore hand function in patients with spinal cord injury. In a delicate four-hour procedure, Brown splices together tiny nerve endings, only one millimeter in width, to help restore hand mobility.

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In the June 13 issue of Science Translational Medicine, an international team led by researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine reports that the new technology of exome sequencing is not only a promising method for identifying disease-causing genes, but may also improve diagnoses and guide individual patient care.

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For many beach-goers summertime means shredding waves. It is estimated that more than 17 million Americans are active surfers, including one million in California alone. Even though the benefits for the body and mind are unquestionable, there are inherent health risks associated with the sport.

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In a study of more than 1,000 adults, researchers at the University of California, San Diego, found that individuals taking cholesterol-lowering statin drugs are more likely than non-users to experience decreased energy, fatigue upon exertion, or both. The researchers suggest that these findings should be taken into account by doctors when weighing risk versus benefit in prescribing statins.

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Millions of pre-diabetic Americans may be at increased risk of future stroke, say researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine in a new meta-analysis of epidemiological studies, but the precise degree of that threat is confounded by differing medical definitions and factors that remain unknown or unmeasured.

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On June 6, 2012, UC San Diego Health System was honored with an “A” Hospital Safety ScoreSM by The Leapfrog Group, an independent national nonprofit run by employers and other large purchasers of health benefits. U.S. hospitals were assigned an A, B, C, D, or F based on safety performance.

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Researchers at the Stein Institute for Research on Aging at the University of California, San Diego have received a $4 million grant from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), part of the National Institutes of Health, to study accelerated biological aging in schizophrenia.

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Each year, approximately 8,000 Americans are bitten by venomous snakes. On average, 800 or so bites occur annually in California, home to an abundance of snake species, but only one family is native and venomous: rattlesnakes. In San Diego County, the number of rattlesnake bites is increasing as well as the toxicity of the attack.