Researchers developed a mathematical model to estimate the rates of mutation as a function of the nearby sequences of DNA ‘letters’ -- called nucleotides. This new model not only provides clues into the process of mutation, but also helps discover possible genetic risk factors that influence complex human diseases, such as autism spectrum disorder.
In the first study of intravital microscopy in humans, Roswell Park scientists report that this approach for visualizing tumor blood vessels in real time during surgery is not only feasible, but that it revealed unexpected findings about the vasculature of human tumors.
NIH-funded researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital find surprising link between the death of tumor-support cells and an increased risk of cancer metastasis in mice.
Headlines about America’s worsening drug epidemic have focused on deaths from opioids—heroin and prescription painkillers such as OxyContin. But overdose deaths have also soared among the millions of Americans using benzodiazepine drugs, a class of sedatives that includes Xanax, Valium, and Klonopin, according to a study led by researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Montefiore Health System and the Perelman School of Medicine at University of Pennsylvania. Their findings appear online today in the American Journal of Public Health.
Reporting on the results of a phase III international clinical trial, Johns Hopkins Medicine physicians say use of a cardiac clot-busting drug to treat strokes that cause brain bleeding safely decreased the death rate in patients by 10 percent, compared to a control group receiving saline.
An international team of scientists, led by researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI), have created the first comprehensive, cross-species genomic comparison of all 20 known species of Leptospira, a bacterial genus that can cause disease and death in livestock and other domesticated mammals, wildlife and humans.
The germinal centers that form in the body’s lymph nodes work as a fitness boot camp in which B cells evolve to produce antibodies of increasingly higher affinity to an invading pathogen. This new finding from Whitehead Institute scientists overturns a previously held notion that only a narrow range of B cells can survive this training and go on to secrete high-affinity antibodies. This revised understanding may aid development of effective vaccines against HIV, influenza, and other viruses that mutate rapidly.
The use of clot-busting drugs to clear blood from the brain’s ventricles may be the first effective strategy to decrease mortality for a type of catastrophic bleeding stroke, according to phase-3 clinical trial results. Treatment also significantly reduced post-stroke disability in some patients.
SBP researchers have identified specific ways in which fetal muscle stem cells remodel their environment to support their enhanced capacity for regeneration, which could lead to targets for therapies to improve adult stem cells’ ability to replace injured or degenerated muscle.
The increased cancer detection and reduced call backs associated with 3D mammography, also known as Digital Breast Tomosynthesis (DBT), can be maintained years after a patient’s first DBT screening with regularly scheduled DBT imaging, according to a JAMA Oncology study published online today from researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
Can the degree of meningeal inflammation and cortical pathology be used to stratify early progressive MS patients? Roberta Magliozzi, Ph.D., Imperial College, London, UK
Dr. Palamar and his team of researchers are the first to examine whether ecstasy users are unknowingly or unintentionally using "bath salts" and/or other novel psychoactive drugs.
Biodiversity in bird communities indicates healthier ecosystems and may also be connected to local human communities' wellbeing. Michigan Tech researcher David Flaspohler looks at how bird diversity relates to bioenergy.
Epigenetic age is a new way to measure your biological age. When your biological (epigenetic) age is older than your chronological age, you are at increased risk for getting and dying of cancer, reports a new study. And the bigger the difference between the two ages, the higher your risk of dying of cancer. The research could be used to develop an early detection blood test for cancer.
In a new study published in the American Association of Cancer Research’s journal Cancer Research, a pair of investigators at Rutgers and Columbia universities has identified a gene that may provide a new source of potential drug targets for tumors that arise in pulmonary tuberous sclerosis complex (TSC). The discovery may change what is known about tumor formation and help to slow or halt tumor growth, therefore having broader implications in cancer research.
Researchers are getting closer to learning how to turn white fat cells into brown fat cells, in a process called “beiging,” to bring down blood sugar levels and fight diabetes.
Attending public preschool is linked to an increase in students taking the admissions test for gifted and talented programs, reducing the disparity in test taking between disadvantaged students and their peers, finds a study of New York City students by NYU’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development.
Two drugs that mimic a common plant hormone effectively cause DNA damage and turn off a major DNA repair mechanism, suggesting their potential use as an anti-cancer therapy.
Swimmers and divers who are prone to a sudden and potentially life-threatening form of pulmonary edema in cold water could benefit from a simple and readily available dose of sildenafil, according to findings from a small study by Duke Health researchers.
Viewing graphic anti-smoking images on cigarette packs triggers activity in brain areas involved in emotion, decision-making and memory as observed via brain scans. Researchers from Georgetown University Medical Center and Truth Initiative reported their findings online this week in Addictive Behaviors Reports.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins have used a precision sensor in a chicken embryo to find dramatic differences in the use of copper between developing and fully mature neurons.
UAB researchers have found a marker on blood cells that may help the most pressing problem in chronic myelogenous leukemia today — an inability to get patients off treatment. This marker shows heterogeneity among the leukemia stem cells and correlates with leukemic potential.
Physicians and biomedical engineers from Johns Hopkins report what they believe is the first successful effort to wiggle fingers individually and independently of each other using a mind-controlled artificial “arm” to control the movement.
While working to improve a tool that measures the pushes and pulls sensed by proteins in living cells, biophysicists discovered one reason spiders’ silk is so elastic: Pieces of the silk’s protein threads act like supersprings, stretching to five times their initial length. The investigators say the tool will shed light on many biological events, including the shifting forces between cells during cancer metastasis.
Research from investigators at Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey and colleagues shows the intracellular process of autophagy plays a role in the development of prostate cancer.
A study reported Feb. 12 in the journal PLOS Biology employs genome-wide sequencing to reveal highly specific details about the evolutionary mechanisms that drove genetic divergence in 13 species of wild tomatoes that share a recent common ancestor.
Scientists at UCLA have developed a new approach that could eventually be used to treat Duchenne muscular dystrophy. The stem cell gene therapy could be applicable for 60 percent of people with Duchenne, which affects approximately 1 in 5,000 boys in the U.S. and is the most common fatal childhood genetic disease.
As the Arctic continues to change due to rising temperatures, melting sea ice and human interest in developing oil and shipping routes, it’s important to understand belugas’ baseline behavior, argue the authors of a new paper.
University of Washington scientists have successfully combined two different ultrathin semiconductors — each just one layer of atoms thick and roughly 100,000 times thinner than a human hair — to make a new two-dimensional heterostructure with potential uses in clean energy and optically-active electronics.
A recent study examined injection risk behaviors among heroin injectors in the Colombian cities of Medellín and Pereira to explore the implications for possible increased HIV transmission within PWID.
Scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute have won nearly $1.7 million from the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke to investigate the mechanisms that contribute to Huntington’s disease.
The human brain is wired to pay attention to previously pleasing things — a finding that could help explain why it’s hard to break bad habits or stick to New Year’s resolutions.
Scientists at The Wistar Institute have defined the role of how a master genomic organizer influences the behavior of these ovarian-associated dendritic cells, revealing a previously unseen way in which cancer is able to manipulate our immune system.
In a first large-scale systematic study, researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, and McGill University found that most sibling proteins – known as “protein isoforms” encoded by the same gene – often play radically different roles within tissues and cells, however alike they may be structurally.
The team researched a quasi-random assignment of 84 ACHIEVEability participants to their housing units. Investigators evaluated whether micro-neighborhood environments – the group of city blocks immediately surrounding housing units – affected participants’ progress in achieving college credits.
Faulty bioelectric signaling has been found to be responsible for the skull and facial abnormalities that characterize the rare genetic disorder Andersen-Tawil Syndrome (ATS). It may therefore be possible to alter bioelectrical signaling to correct effects of fetal alcohol syndrome and other developmental defects or genetic mutations.
Alcohol itself can directly damage liver cells. Now researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine report evidence that alcohol is also harmful to the liver for a second reason — it allows gut bacteria to migrate to the liver, promoting alcohol-induced liver disease. The study, conducted in mice and in laboratory samples, is published February 10 in Cell Host & Microbe.
For most women, expecting a baby brings intense joy --and a fair amount of worry. But what about women with post-traumatic stress disorder? Contrary to what researchers expected, a new study shows that pregnancy may actually reduce their PTSD symptoms. Or at the least, it won’t cause a flare-up.
Recently, a new mutation signature found in cancer cells was suspected to have been created by a family of enzymes found in human cells called the APOBEC3 family. The study, “Strand-biased Cytosine deamination at the Replication Fork causes Cytosine to Thymine Mutations in Escherichia coli,” led by Ashok Bhagwat, Ph.D., professor of chemistry in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Wayne State University, was recently published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Differences in the neural wiring across development of men and women across ages, matched behavioral differences commonly associated with each of the sexes, according to an imaging-based study from researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania published February 1 in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.
A new way of mapping the collection of RNA read-outs that are expressed by a cell’s active genes has been devised to shed additional light on the role of RNAs in cells. These “dark” variations in RNA likely have roles in gene regulation across tissues, development, and in human diseases. The team will use the now-free software to interrogate cells in brain disorders, cancers, and other illnesses.
Using a model blood vessel system built on a polymer microchip, researchers have shown that the relative softness of white blood cells determines whether they remain in a dormant state along vessel walls or enter blood circulation to fight infection.
Vanderbilt engineers have modified the cotton candy machine to create complex microfluidic networks that mimic the capillary system in living tissue and have demonstrated that these networks can keep cells alive and functioning in an artificial three-dimensional matrix.
Stem cell-derived heart muscle cells may fail to effectively replace damaged cardiac tissue because they don’t contract strongly enough, according to a study in The Journal of Cell Biology. The study, “Coupling Primary and Stem Cell-Derived Cardiomyocytes in an In Vitro Model of Cardiac Cell Therapy,” by Yvonne Aratyn-Schaus and Francesco Pasqualini and colleagues, may help explain why stem cell-based therapies have so far shown limited benefits for heart attack patients in clinical trials.
Research published in 2012 garnered international attention by suggesting that a possible early human ancestor had lived on a diverse woodland diet including hard foods mixed in with tree bark, fruit, leaves and other plant products. But new research by an international team of researchers now shows that Australopithecus sediba didn’t have the jaw and tooth structure necessary to exist on a steady diet of hard foods.
A look-back analysis of HPV infection antibodies in patients treated for oropharyngeal (mouth and throat) cancers linked to HPV infection suggests at least one of the antibodies could be useful in identifying those at risk for a recurrence of the cancer, say scientists at The Johns Hopkins University. A report on the study is published in the February issue of Cancer Prevention Research.
The way to better wearable electronics is dotted with iron steppingstones. Check out how Michigan Tech researcher Yoke Khin Yap’s nanotubes bridge the gap with quantum tunneling.
One of the most common cancer-causing genes has continuously stymied researchers’ efforts to develop treatments against it. Now, researchers at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center have dug deeper and exposed a key interaction that may contribute to why mutations in KRAS lead to cancer.
Pursuing scientific or engineering careers in industry, government or private research after getting a Ph.D. used to be considered a one-way ticket out of academia. But new University of Washington research finds numerous benefits — to students, researchers and academic institutions looking to diversify their faculty — in making that return trip easier.
The incidence of childhood and adult obesity has increased significantly over the past three decades. New research shows that there is an association between obesity development during adulthood and childhood attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
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