General

For all the attention the human microbiome has been getting over the last few years, one aspect of the research rarely makes headlines: the difficulty of observing how the microbiome changes over time in response to various stimuli. The most common analysis method is extracting bacteria from fecal samples and […]

Engineers at MIT and elsewhere have tracked the evolution of individual cells within an initially benign tumor, showing how the physical properties of those cells drive the tumor to become invasive, or metastatic. The team carried out experiments with a human breast cancer tumor that developed in the lab. As […]

In what sounds like a scene from a science fiction movie, researchers in 2005 stitched together with old and young mice so they shared a circulatory system. Youthful blood seemingly rejuvenated many tissues of the elderly rodents, boosting their cognitive and physical performance. Now, scientists are examining whether certain molecules […]

With significant funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a researcher at The University of Texas at Arlington is investigating fundamental biological processes that lead to fertility problems in humans. Sen Xu, assistant professor of biology at UTA, received a five-year, $1.89 million grant from the NIH to use […]

Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Professor Anthony Zador has taken the next step in his quest to solve exactly how the brain is wired. Zador, a neuroscientist whose lab studies how the brain’s circuitry mediates and controls complex behaviors, set out about 10 years ago to map three pillars of brain function: connectivity, […]

Caltech researchers have discovered rare brain cell types that are unique to male mice and other types that are unique to female mice. These sex-specific cells were found in a region of the brain that governs both aggression and mating behaviors. The study was done as a collaboration between the […]

“I have no family history of breast cancer,” says the woman in a public service announcement stressing the importance of mammograms for all women. “No one in my family had breast cancer. Not one. But I start chemo next week,” says the woman in another PSA. Unfortunately, people paying only partial attention, […]

One of the more recent trends among parents-to-be is the so-called gender reveal, a party complete with pink or blue cake to answer the burning question, “Is it a boy or girl?” After all, it’s presumed that there’s a 50-50 chance you’d have one or the other. In a new article […]

The immune system struggles to defeat cancer or chronic infections because many of the T cells that leap into action end up “exhausted,” rendering them ineffective against disease. That path to exhaustion and what triggers it is a crucial one that researchers aim to better understand so they can stop […]

Prolonged exposure to blue light, such as that which emanates from your phone, computer, and household fixtures, could be affecting your longevity, even if it’s not shining in your eyes. New research at Oregon State University suggests that the blue wavelengths produced by light-emitting diodes damage cells in the brain […]

During embryonic development, the entire nervous system, the skin and the sensory organs emerge from a single sheet of cells known as the ectoderm. While there have been extensive studies of how this sheet forms all these derivatives, it hasn’t been possible to study the process in humans – until now. […]

Advances in the sciences have made it easier than ever to live with and survive various kinds of cancer. One of the lingering challenges that remains is metastasis, or the ability of cancer cells to migrate to new pathological sites within the host’s body. October is National Breast Cancer Awareness […]

Transient bursts of high-frequency electrical activity in epileptic brain tissue can impair cognition even when no seizure is occurring, Stanford scientists have found. A study by Stanford University School of Medicine investigators may help explain why even people benefiting from medications for their epilepsy often continue to experience bouts of difficulty thinking, […]

Children are more likely to have higher systolic blood pressure by age six if their mom used the Swedish powdered tobacco product snus during pregnancy. This according to a new study by researchers at Karolinska Institutet published in the Journal of the American Heart Association. “Tobacco products of any type […]

Research led by the Universities of Birmingham and Manchester has made a connection between the way baby wallabies produce male hormones and how some human girls are born with genitalia that resembles those of a boy. The research, published in PNAS and supported by the Wellcome Trust, Medical Research Council, shows that […]

When cells in our bodies need to move—to attack infection or heal a wound, for example—cellular proteins send and receive a cascade of signals that directs the cells to the right place at the right time. It’s a process cancer cells can hijack to spread to new tissues and organs. […]

A new character has stepped onstage in the story of human aging: neural excitation. The brain’s neural activity, long implicated in disorders ranging from dementia to epilepsy, plays a role in human aging and life span, according to research led by scientists in the Blavatnik Institute at Harvard Medical School. The […]

A new National Institutes of Health grant merges two ongoing frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) studies to form a new, integrated consortium. FTLD is a rare disease that can affect parts of the brain responsible for personality, behavior, language, and motor function. The funding, from NIH’s National Institute on Aging (NIA) […]

National Institutes of Health scientists have developed an ultrasensitive new test to detect abnormal forms of the protein tau associated with uncommon types of neurodegenerative diseases called tauopathies. As they describe in Acta Neuropathologica, this advance gives them hope of using cerebrospinal fluid, or CSF—an accessible patient sample—to diagnose these and […]

Exercise might lower the risk of cancer recurrence and improve survival rates, according to the latest guidelines released today about exercise and cancer. “There's some provocative data coming out that says patients who exercise during and after treatment might actually even lower their risk of the disease coming back, which […]

As tumor cells multiply, they often spawn tens of thousands of genetic mutations. Figuring out which ones are the most promising to target with immunotherapy is like finding a few needles in a haystack. Now a new model developed by researchers in the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania hand-picks […]

The UCSF scientists who identified the two known human genes that promote “natural short sleep” – nightly sleep that lasts just four to six hours but leaves people feeling well-rested – have now discovered a third, and it’s also the first gene that’s ever been shown to prevent the memory […]

You have to learn to be grateful for what you have, but it is impossible to deny that some people have it much more difficult than others. Living in disadvantaged situations can and will hurt you eventually. Scientists from the University of Edinburgh and NHS Lothian found that children from […]

Squids, octopuses, cuttlefish, amphibians, and chameleon lizards are among the animals that can change the color of their skin in a blink of an eye.  They have photoreceptors in their skin that operate independently of their brains. The photoreceptors are part of a family of proteins known as opsins. Mammals […]

Researchers have discovered that a key cell type involved in liver injury and cancer consists of two cellular families with different origins and functions. The research by academics from the Universities of Edinburgh and Bristol and funded by the Wellcome Trust and Medical Research Council is published in Nature Communications. […]

Children born to women who underwent gastric bypass surgery before becoming pregnant had a lower risk of major birth defects than children born to women who had severe obesity at the start of their pregnancy. That’s according to a matched cohort study by researchers at Karolinska Institutet and Örebro University […]

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet and the Swedish School of Sport and Health Sciences have investigated the effects of testosterone supplementation in young athletically active women in a randomized, placebo-controlled trial. The results, which are published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, show that there is a causal relationship between […]

UCLA research identifies a potential strategy that may lead to treatment for the disorder. A new study examining the role that star-shaped brain cells called astrocytes play in Huntington’s disease has identified a potential strategy that may halt the disease and repair some of the damage it causes. Astrocytes interact […]

Eye gaze helps infants communicate. Through everyday interactions, eye gaze establishes a social connection between parent and child and is linked to early word learning. But can learn experiences before a baby’s first birthday prompt babies to pay more attention to their parent’s eye gaze? To test this, a research […]

A therapy developed by Yale researchers stimulates immune cells to shrink or kill tumors in mice, according to a new study published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine. The therapy is effective alone or in combination with existing cancer immunotherapies, and it appears to have lasting effects, the researchers said. The […]