General

The ability to synchronize behavioral, morphological and other transitions with the seasons is integral to the life cycle of most insects. A research team led by biologists at Tufts University has found two genes that may allow some insect species to survive climate change by adjusting their biological annual clocks, while others […]

A Rutgers-led team has created better biosensor technology that may help lead to safe stem cell therapies for treating Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases and other neurological disorders. The technology, which features unique graphene and gold-based platform and high-tech imaging, monitors the fate of stem cells by detecting genetic material (RNA) […]

The human brain has some remarkable capabilities – including the ability to block cancer drugs from effectively reaching cancer cells in the brain. The greatest obstacle when it comes to treating cancer that has spread to the brain is the blood-brain barrier, the brain’s natural defense mechanism that is a […]

Mitochondria burn oxygen and provide energy for the body. Cells lacking oxygen or nutrients have to change their energy supply quickly in order to keep growing. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing have now shown that mitochondria are reprogrammed under depleted oxygen and nutrients. Tumours of […]

Brain-computer interfaces (BCI) work on the principle that measurable changes in electrical brain activity occur just by thinking about performing a task. Signals can be read, evaluated, and then converted into control signals via a machine learning system, which can then be used to operate a computer or a prosthesis. […]

Hard-to-study mutations in the human genome, called short tandem repeats, known as STRs or microsatellites, are implicated in the expression of genes associated with complex traits including schizophrenia, inflammatory bowel disease and even height and intelligence. That’s the conclusion of a study published in the journal Nature Genetics by a […]

The protein adipsin helps protect insulin-secreting cells called pancreatic beta cells from destruction in type 2 diabetes, according to a new study by researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian. The study, published in Nature Medicine, may have implications for the future development of type 2 diabetes therapies that target and […]

A newly-discovered molecular mechanism that allows damaged adult liver cells to regenerate could pave the way for drugs to treat conditions such as cirrhosis or other chronic liver diseases where regeneration is impaired. The mechanism, identified in mice, was discovered by researchers at the University of Cambridge’s Gurdon Institute. It […]

New preclinical research reported in animal models shows that exposure to compounds found in marijuana called cannabinoids (CBs), which includes cannabidiol (CBD) and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), during early pregnancy can cause malformations in the developing embryo. The research also demonstrated that co-exposure to CBs and alcohol increased the likelihood of birth […]

In neurodegenerative conditions like Parkinson’s disease, a specific group of neurons start to die one by one, causing movement problems and other symptoms. Scientists have long focused on finding out why these neurons die. Now it turns out, they might not even be dead. Researchers at The Rockefeller University found […]

The Kidney Project, a national effort to develop an implantable bioartificial kidney that could eliminate the need for dialysis, announced a key milestone in the presentation at the American Society of Nephrology Kidney Week 2019 conference in Washington, DC. The project team reported that UC San Francisco scientists successfully implanted […]

Supplements of vitamin D and omega-3 fatty acids (often sold as fish oil) do not help people with type 2 diabetes stave off chronic kidney disease, according to findings from the largest clinical study to date of the supplements in this patient population. The paper was published in JAMA and presented concurrently […]

Whole-genome sequencing can be used to diagnose intellectual disability more accurately than other methods of genetic analysis, researchers at Karolinska Institutet report in the scientific journal Genome Medicine. Whole-genome sequencing using analytical tools developed by the researchers will now be introduced for first-line clinical diagnosis at Karolinska University Laboratory in […]

Fujitsu has announced the results of a joint research project it has been conducting with the Institute of Medical Science at the University of Tokyo since April 2018. As part of this joint research, Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd. has successfully developed and verified AI technology to improve the efficiency of treatment […]

Researchers at McMaster who examine the impact of exercise on the brain have found that high-intensity workouts improve memory in older adults. The study, published in the journal Applied Physiology, Nutrition and Metabolism, has widespread implications for treating dementia, a catastrophic disease that affects approximately half a million Canadians and […]

Genetically editing a cancer patient’s immune cells using CRISPR/Cas9 technology, then infusing those cells back into the patient appears safe and feasible based on early data from the first-ever clinical trial to test the approach in humans in the United States. Researchers from the Abramson Cancer Center of the University of […]

The biomedical and public health advances of the past century have increased human longevity around the globe. These great strides notwithstanding, the increase in life expectancy has resulted in the growth of an aging population worldwide, posing a set of medical, public health and socioeconomic challenges. The aging population has […]

In the 1970s, with the help of electron microscopy, scientists discovered that human RNA can also be circular. However, it was far from clear what this actually meant – and how it might be understood. And up to a few short years ago, it was widely assumed in scientific circles […]

The discovery of the UM171 molecule, by Dr. Guy Sauvageau and Anne Marinier, made headlines in 2014 following an article in Science. Hailed by some as a revolution, even a miracle, in the field of blood stem cell transplantation, the UM171 molecule is delivering on its promise. After the two-year clinical […]

With CAR T cell therapy, a patient’s own immune cells are genetically modified and inserted back into the body to find and kill cancer. This form of immunotherapy has already revolutionized some cancer treatments, but once the CAR T cells are inside a patient, where do they go? How do […]

Given the amount of wear and tear it’s subjected to on a daily basis, the skin has a phenomenal ability to replenish itself. Spread throughout it are small reservoirs of stem cells, nested within supportive microenvironments called niches, which keep a tight rein on this repair process. Too much tissue […]

Studying mice, scientists have shown that boosting the activity of specific immune cells in the heart after a heart attack can protect against developing heart failure, an invariably fatal condition. Patients with heart failure tire easily and become breathless from everyday activities because the heart muscle has lost the ability […]

As we age, our bodies tend to develop diseases such as heart failure, kidney failure and diabetes, and the presence of anyone disease increases the risk of developing others. A drug usually targets only one condition, largely ignoring the interconnectedness of age-related diseases and requiring patients to take multiple drugs, […]

Signs of frailty and the risks it brings could be identified in young and old people alike through a new assessment developed in a study by researchers at the Universities of Strathclyde, Manchester, Liverpool, Edinburgh, and Yale. Increasing the risk of frailty is a defining characteristic of the aging process […]

Synthetic molecules made at Berkeley Lab can be used to diagnose numerous devastating illnesses. There are currently no effective treatments for prion diseases, a family of fatal neurodegenerative conditions caused by accumulations of misfolded copies of a naturally occurring protein. But now, there is finally an effective way to test […]

Researchers Lorenzo Pasquali and Mireia Ramos-Rodríguez have published recently in Nature Genetics the results of a study on the mechanisms that cause an inflammatory response to trigger pancreatic beta-cell death, leading to the onset of Type 1 Diabetes (T1D). L. Pasquali is a Ramon y Cajal researcher at the Josep […]

People who have a certain type of bacteria in their guts may be at greater risk of developing bowel cancer. The findings will be presented by the University of Bristol researcher, Dr. Kaitlin Wade, at the 2019 NCRI Cancer Conference in Glasgow. While there is increasing evidence that the make-up […]

The development of a set of strategies for delivering genome editing complexes directly to stem cells has earned a group of innovators at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine a first-year grant of nearly $700,000 through the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Somatic Cell Genome Editing Program. The work […]

Can scrambled eggs unscramble themselves? Well, sort of. The cytoplasm of ruptured Xenopus frog eggs spontaneously reorganizes into cell-like compartments, according to a study by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine. “We were gobsmacked,” said James Ferrell, MD, Ph.D., professor of chemical and systems biology and of biochemistry. “If you blend a […]

Defying the odds, an individual at high risk for early-onset Alzheimer’s disease remained dementia-free for many years beyond what was anticipated. A study funded in part by the National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the National Institutes of Health, led researchers to suggest that a gene variant may be […]