General

Finding medicines that can kill cancer cells while leaving normal tissue unscathed is a Holy Grail of oncology research. In two new papers, scientists at UC San Francisco and Princeton University present complementary strategies to crack this problem with “smart” cell therapies – living medicines that remain inert unless triggered […]

Protocell compartments used as models for an important step in the early evolution of life on Earth can be made from short polymers. The short polymers, which better approximate the likely size of molecules available on the early Earth, form the compartments through liquid-liquid phase separation in the same manner […]

Research indicates that starting school later in the morning yields health and academic benefits for high schoolers, whose natural body clock tends toward late-to-bed, late-to-rise habits. While parents raise concerns about drowsy driving, irritation and impaired school performance, a new study led by researchers at UC San Francisco suggests another […]

Male fruit flies have only one X chromosome instead of two like their female counterparts. Therefore, their X chromosome must be twice as active to achieve the same “gene dosage”. If this does not succeed, the animals die. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Immunobiology and Epigenetics in Freiburg […]

Finding just the right model to study human development—from the early embryonic stage onward—has been a challenge for scientists over the last decade. Now, bioengineers at the University of California San Diego have homed in on an unusual candidate: teratomas. Teratomas—which mean “monstrous tumors” in Greek—are tumors made up of […]

Reduced food intake, known as dietary restriction, leads to a longer lifespan in many animals and can improve health in humans. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying the positive effects of dietary restriction are still unclear. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing have now found one possible […]

Scientists have found a new mechanism responsible for regulating stem cells in fruit flies, with possible implications for cancer therapies. The study, published by University of Alberta biologists, identifies an inhibition mechanism of an enzyme called Myt1 kinase, which manages how stem cells develop and differentiate during organ development in […]

Puberty, the transformational period where a child reaches physical and sexual maturity, is a near-universal human experience, yet the fundamental processes behind how and when it starts is still a mystery. For girls, puberty can begin as early as eight years old, with most instances of early puberty linked to […]

All over the world, chemical products such as stimulants, but also beauty products, (energy) drinks, vitamins and food supplements have become an integral part of young people's daily lives. Many of these products can be potentially harmful. The University of Amsterdam studied why young people use these products and how […]

Cocoa is the cosy beverage of choice during dark winter evenings. You wrap yourself in a Christmas blanket, turn on an appropriate movie and just sip your hot cocoa. However, it is not just delicious – it is also good for your brain, as this new study from the University […]

Tiny microRNAs help destroy unwanted messenger RNAs in cells. New research finds how the body keeps them in check. MicroRNAs are short RNA sequences that maintain a tight control on which genes are expressed and when. They do this by regulating which messenger RNA (mRNA) transcripts — the single-stranded templates […]

Children under age 2 who take antibiotics are at greater risk for childhood-onset asthma, respiratory allergies, eczema, celiac disease, obesity and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, according to a paper written jointly by Mayo Clinic and Rutgers researchers. In a study published in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings, the researchers looked at 14,572 children […]

In 2015, hundreds of children were born with brain deformities resulting from a global outbreak of Zika virus infections. Recently, National Institutes of Health researchers used a variety of advanced drug screening techniques to test out more than 10,000 compounds in search of a cure. To their surprise, they found […]

How those inconspicuous animals could be immortal and what potential brings stem cells they store? Not for many of us might be obvious that jellyfish is something more than 95% of water and rest of organic matter. Lack of brain, heart and blood doesn’t indicate them on being on evolutionary […]

Within a single cell, thousands of molecules, such as proteins, ions, and other signalling molecules, work together to perform all kinds of functions — absorbing nutrients, storing memories, and differentiating into specific tissues, among many others. Deciphering these molecules, and all of their interactions is a monumental task. Over the […]

Well managed adults with type 2 diabetes have a 21% higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease (CVD) compared to the general population, according to new research. The research from The University of Manchester, led by Professor Martin Rutter and Professor Darren Ashcroft, in collaboration with the University of Edinburgh, is published in the journal […]

Our best estimates show there are over 7 billion people on the planet and 300 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy. By comparison, the adult human body contains 37 trillion cells. To determine the function and relationship among these cells is a monumental undertaking. Many areas of human health would […]

A new study, led by U.S. National Science Foundation-funded researchers at the University of California, Irvine, has deepened the understanding of epigenetic mechanisms in tumorigenesis and revealed a previously undetected repertoire of cancer driver genes. The results were published in Science Advances. Using a new prediction algorithm, called DORGE (Discovery of Oncogenes and […]

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet have studied the incidence and regional distribution of Alzheimer’s disease biomarkers in the brains of people with Down’s syndrome. The results can bring new possibilities for earlier diagnosis and preventive treatment of dementia. The study is published in Molecular Neurodegeneration. While medical advances and improvements of […]

Immunotherapy for cancer has made great advances and many patients can now receive effective treatments that were not available ten years ago. However, there are certain types of cancer that do not respond to existing immunotherapy. A study from Karolinska Institutet in Sweden published in Proceedings of the National Academy […]

Knowing precisely where proteins are frustrated could go a long way toward making better drugs. That’s one result of a new study by Rice University scientists looking for the mechanisms that stabilize or destabilize key sections of biomolecules. Atom-scale models by Rice theorist Peter Wolynes, lead author and alumnus Mingchen Chen […]

UCI’s Center for Neural Circuit Mapping is redrawing our understanding of mechanisms underlying several common disorders. Thanks to Xiangmin Xu and his team at the UCI School of Medicine’s Center for Neural Circuit Mapping, lazy eye, Alzheimer’s and other neurological diseases could become a thing of the past. Opened earlier […]

An international research team led by UC San Francisco scientists has shown, for the first time, that gut immune cells travel to the brain during multiple sclerosis (MS) flare-ups in patients. These gut cells seem to be playing a protective role, helping drive MS symptoms back into remission. Scientists know […]

When David Zeevi and Liat Shenhav began analyzing the genomes of marine microbes, their goal was to find biological tools to combat plastic pollution in the ocean. But in the course of their study, a curious observation led them to discover something much more universal: an aspect of evolution that […]

All the cells of the body come from the same tiny clump of stem cells and share the same set of genes. But by following different patterns of activating those genes, they quickly embark towards different destinies, becoming tissues as diverse as liver, blood and brain.Tracking this process in humans—who […]

Researchers at the University of Tokyo have identified how the architecture of the cell nucleus can change gene activity in plants. This discovery reveals fundamental knowledge about genome regulation and points towards future methods for potentially manipulating the expression of many genes simultaneously. The long strands of DNA and the […]

University of Virginia Cancer Center researchers have identified a gene responsible for the spread of so-called “triple-negative” breast cancer to other parts of the body – a process called metastasis – and developed a potential way to stop it. Triple-negative breast cancer is an aggressive form of breast cancer that […]

As many as 75 percent of the women in North American experience hot flashes, and many of these women still look to hormone therapy to relieve the surge of hormones, otherwise known as vasomotor symptoms, or VMS. But new research, shared recently at the Annual North American Menopause Society Conference, shows the direction of […]

Five years ago, a Yale-led partnership launched a landmark study to identify the biomarkers, or biological indicators, of autism that could help diagnose, track, and assess treatments in patients. Since then, the Autism Biomarkers Consortium for Clinical Trials has discovered the first two biomarkers for any psychiatric disorder to be accepted into […]

Prostate cancer growth is often driven by male sex hormones called androgens. Hormone therapy is commonly administered to lower the level of androgens in the body, but relapse is common when the cancer cells develop resistance to these therapies. A multidisciplinary team of cancer researchers led by Angela Koehler, the […]