A new study conducted by researchers at The Wistar Institute revealed how a key protein residing in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) helps cells respond to stress. This process is especially important for B cells to respond to severe stress conditions and their ability to produce antibodies. The research was published online in the Journal of Cell Biology.
Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have used the gene-editing technology CRISPR to engineer human T cells that can attack human T cell cancers. The new approach also eliminates a dangerous side-effect called graft-versus-host disease.
New research from The University of Texas at Dallas supports the growing consensus that pain begins differently for men and women at the cellular level.
Researchers at the National University of Singapore have created a new platform with the potential to extract tiny circulating biomarkers of disease from patient blood. This simple, fast and convenient technique could help realize liquid biopsy diagnostics -- a less invasive procedure than the current gold standard: tumor biopsies. Details of the new technique, which utilizes standard laboratory equipment, are reported in this week's Biomicrofluidics.
Bacteria could be programmed to efficiently produce drugs, thanks to breakthrough research into synthetic biology using engineering principles, from the University of Warwick and the University of Surrey. Led by the Warwick Integrative Synthetic Biology Centre at Warwick’s School of Engineering and the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences at the University of Surrey, new research has discovered how to dynamically manage the allocation of essential resources inside engineered cells - advancing the potential of synthetically programming cells to combat disease and produce new drugs.
Anthelmintic drug already approved to treat infections of pinworm parasite was shown to effectively impair both mesothelioma cell growth and migration.
Increasing the body’s ability to produce lipids in the lungs after damage prevents the progression of pulmonary fibrosis in preliminary studies.
University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers have identified genetic clues that explain how breast cancer spreads, or metastasizes – findings that may lead to better treatments or approaches to prevent its spread at the onset.
Social amoebae evolve to fight with others but also to die for their kin.
Neurons that carry nerve signals to and from the lungs suppress immune response during fatal lung infections with the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus. Animal experiments show that disabling these neurons can boost immune response and promote bacterial clearance to aid recovery. Targeting neuro-immune signaling in the lungs can pave the way to nonantibiotic therapies for bacterial pneumonia.
UC San Diego School of Medicine researchers developed a visible neural network and used it to build DCell, a virtual model of a functioning brewer’s yeast cell. To do this, they amassed all knowledge of cell biology in one place and created a hierarchy of these cellular components. Then they mapped standard machine learning algorithms to this knowledgebase. DCell can be viewed at d-cell.ucsd.edu. The technical details are published March 5 in Nature Methods.
A genetics research team at Johns Hopkins Medicine has solved a dilemma facing researchers who use genomewide association studies (GWAS) by developing a new approach that strategically “filters” which genes are worth further study. The researchers hope this strategy will accelerate the study of diseases such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, schizophrenia and even addiction by helping researchers avoid “dead-end paths.” They are optimistic that this strategy will gain widespread use and will save researchers time and money.
The Castleman Disease Research Program is collaborating with Pulse Infoframe Inc., a medical informatics company, to power its global ACCELERATE Natural History Registry platform, which is designed to help improve understanding of the rare disease, facilitate research and clinical studies, and identify effective therapies.
These science news tips on everything from intercepting asteroids to learning from past extinctions come from the winter issue of Johns Hopkins Magazine
A powerful resistance mutation that appeared to emerge in melanoma after a patient received a targeted therapy combination, instead was lurking in the tumor all along, primed to thwart treatment before it began, researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center report online at Cancer Discovery.
I can still remember that giddy feeling I had seven years ago, when I first read about the “zombie ant.” The story was gruesome and fascinating
A gene discovered by Temple University researchers has proved to be an important target for cancer therapy, with the discovery of its roles in controlling cell proliferation, differentiation, apoptosis, and DNA repair.
Engineering researchers at the University of Arkansas have moved closer to developing an alternative method of detecting and possibly treating breast cancer. The researchers work with pulsed, terahertz imaging, a type of electromagnetic radiation technology previously used to find land mines. They adapted the technology to detect tumors and provide highly specific images.
Yale School of Public Health researchers have developed a new method to predict likely resistance paths to cancer therapeutics, and a methodology to apply it to one of the most frequent cancer-causing genes.
Researchers have identified a lung stem cell that repairs the organ’s gas exchange compartment. They isolated and characterized these progenitor cells from mouse and human lungs and demonstrated they are essential to repairing lung tissue damaged by severe influenza and other respiratory ailments.
The breakthrough may expand research on the roles of glycans in human diseases, including cancers.
To address embarrassing, inconvenient and costly male fertility testing, researchers from FAU are developing a home-based kit that accurately, quantitatively, and quickly, provides a complete semen evaluation using microfluidics, an app and a smartphone. After all, if women can use pregnancy tests in the comfort and privacy of their own homes, men also should be able to test their semen at home without any hassles.
Six years into Lebanon’s refugee crisis, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and the Children’s Cancer Center of Lebanon at the American University of Beirut Medical Center offer a blueprint for effective childhood cancer treatment during turmoil
Our bodies are not just passively growing older
Writing in the February 27 online issue of Science Signaling, researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine and Moores Cancer Center describe how a signaling protein that normally suppresses tumors can be manipulated (or re-programmed) by growth factors, turning it into a driver of malignant growth and metastasis.
SBP researchers have developed the first ever high-throughput, genome-scale imaging-based approach to investigate protein stability. The method has been used to identify several previously unknown human proteins that HIV degrades to enhance its infection process.
For years, researchers have attempted to harness the full potential of gene therapy, a technique that inserts genes into a patient’s cells to treat cancer and other diseases. However, inserting engineered DNA molecules into cells is difficult. A team of engineers at Washington University in St. Louis has developed a new method that could make the process easier.
A special receptor on cells that line the sinuses, throat and lungs evolved to protect mammals from developing a range of allergies and asthma, according to a study from researchers at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
A heating and freezing process known as dual thermal ablation can kill pancreatic cancer cells, according to new research from Binghamton University, State University at New York.
The University of Illinois at Chicago has been awarded a $4.6 million grant from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to study the molecular neurobiology of chronic pain in patients with sickle cell disease and to develop potential new drug treatments.
Research led by Johns Hopkins physicians and scientists shows that a test for measuring the length of DNA endcaps, called telomeres, which has a variability rate of 5 percent, can alter treatment decisions for patients with certain types of bone marrow failure.
Michelle Ozbun, PhD, is using two grants totaling $2.7 million to learn how human papillomaviruses (HPV) sneak into cells to reproduce. She and her team are also developing new ways in which to measure infections.
Researchers at The University of Texas at Dallas have devised a new technique to isolate aggressive cells thought to form the root of many hard-to-treat metastasized cancers, a significant step toward developing new drugs that might target these cells.
A living cell is able to neatly package a big jumble of DNA into tiny chromosomes while preparing for cell division. Researchers in Delft now managed for the first time to isolate and film that process, and proof that a single protein complex called condensin reels in DNA to extrude a loop.
Injections of cardiac progenitor cells help reverse the fatal heart disease caused by Duchenne muscular dystrophy and also lead to improved limb strength and movement ability, a new study shows. The study, published today in Stem Cell Reports, showed that when researchers injected cardiosphere-derived cells (CDCs) into the hearts of laboratory mice with muscular dystrophy, heart function improved along with a marked increase in exercise capacity.
Using artificial intelligence and machine learning techniques, researchers at Shiley Eye Institute at UC San Diego Health and University of California San Diego School of Medicine, with colleagues in China, Germany and Texas, have developed a new computational tool to screen patients with common but blinding retinal diseases, potentially speeding diagnoses and treatment.
Larotrectinib, a highly selective TRK kinase inhibitor, shows rapid, potent, and durable efficacy in both adult and pediatric patients with solid tumors that harbor TRK fusions, regardless of tumor type or patient age, according to results from three clinical trials published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The landmark data support the foundation of precision oncology by creating a treatment option for a genetically defined cancer while continuing to validate the concept that comprehensive molecular profiling should be strongly considered in people of all ages with advanced solid tumors.
To treat cardiovascular disease, surgery can remove blockages in large vessels in the heart or legs but is not possible in small vessels. To address this problem, researchers designed 3D-printed patches seeded with vessel-inducing endothelial cells. In a mouse model of hindlimb ischemia, the researchers identified specific patch patterns that induced growth of organized, tissue-saving blood vessels, demonstrating the potential for the novel technology to address this significant public health problem.
UCLA researchers used fluorescent colored proteins to trace how cardiomyocytes — cells in heart muscle that enable it to pump blood — are produced in mouse embryos. The findings could eventually lead to methods for regenerating heart tissue in human adults.
Three simultaneous safety and efficacy studies of the drug larotrectinib reported an overall response rate of 75 percent for patients ages four months to 76 years with 17 different cancer diagnoses.
Carbon monoxide can improve the effectiveness of antibiotics, making bacteria more sensitive to antibiotic medication, according to a study led by Georgia State University.
UNC and NC State scientists created an injectable gel-like scaffold that can hold combination chemo-immunotherapeutic drugs and deliver them locally to tumors in a sequential manner. The results in animal models suggest this approach could one day ramp up therapeutic benefits for cancer patients.
Some scientists have hypothesized that tumor-promoting changes in cells during cancer development—particularly an epigenetic change involving DNA methylation—arise from rogue cells escaping a natural cell deterioration process called senescence. Now, researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center demonstrated that instead, tumor-associated epigenetic states evolve erratically during early stages of tumor development, eventually selecting for a subset of genes that undergo the most changes during normal aging and in early tumor development.
Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found that when mature cells transition to begin dividing again, they all seem to do it the same way, regardless of what organ those cells come from.
Levels of a protein found in the brain called alpha-synuclein (α-syn) are significantly lower than normal in cerebrospinal fluid collected in Parkinson’s disease patients suffering from postural instability and gait difficulty, a study led by movement disorders experts at Rush University Medical Center has found.
Axonal and dendritic proteins embedded in the membrane at either end – called transmembrane proteins – are built in the same cellular factory and travel on the same cellular highway. But for the cell to function property, they must be delivered to the correct domain. So how does the cell regulate that voyage?
Researchers describe the role of a transcription factor called TCF-1 in targeting the condensed chromatin and regulating the availability of genome sequences in T-cell development. The new connection between TCF-1 and chromatin will aid in developing new therapies using epigenetic drugs to alter T-cell fate in cancer, autoimmune disorders, and infectious diseases.
The five-year, $2.1 million study will examine mutational spectra of environmental toxins.
A cell’s membrane is composed of a bilayer of lipids, and the inside-facing layer is made of different lipids than the outside-facing layer. Because different lipids create membranes with different physical properties, researchers wondered whether different lipid compositions in the bilayer could also lead to different physical properties. They will present their work exploring this “lipid asymmetry” during the 62nd Biophysical Society Meeting, held Feb. 17-21.
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