General

Sometimes our cells employ meticulous and elegant solutions to fix things that break. Other times, they slap on some duct tape and keep going. The human body can apply these quick-and-dirty methods to even its most critical components, such as when both strands of a DNA helix suddenly snap. Such […]

Some babies act like they are in a rush. They come to this world too quickly and have to deal with some health problems because of it. Scientists know this issue, which is why they are looking for ways to aid the brain development of pre-term babies. However, nature already […]

Pretty much everyone knows that drinking has severe negative health effects – that is not a surprise to anyone. However, some people are still abusing alcohol, while completely ignoring all the warning signs. A new study from the University of Adelaide found that middle-age drinkers who only consume a moderate […]

Mysteries remain in your mitochondria, but researchers led by Rice University bioscientist Natasha Kirienko plan to bring them to light. Kirienko is the first Rice faculty member to win a new class of grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, one of the National Institutes of Health, called an R35. The five-year grant […]

Inflammation is one strategy your body uses to fight infection, but if it gets out of control it can kill instead of heal. In the journal Immunity, UConn Health immunologist Vijay Rathinam and colleagues show how the body damps down inflammation, making clever double use of a protein previously thought to be responsible […]

Through clever partner selection, animals can increase the future success of their offspring. With some species, this process continues even after the sex act. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Plön have discovered that among sticklebacks, the egg cells of the fish are involved in the […]

Mitochondrial disease is now thought to be the second most commonly diagnosed genetic disease worldwide, and, unfortunately, there are still no proven treatment strategies for those diagnosed. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing in Cologne were involved in collaborations to apply gene-therapy approaches in mice to […]

Researchers at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center have shown that autologous fecal microbiota transplantation (auto-FMT) is a safe and effective way to help replenish beneficial gut bacteria in cancer patients who require intense antibiotics during allogenic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. In their study, patients who underwent the procedure were randomly […]

Protective caps at the ends of our chromosomes called telomeres protect our cells’ genomic information but shorten each time a cell divides. This shortening of telomeres has been linked to aging and chronic diseases. For example, previous studies have shown that individuals with asthma have shorter telomeres than those without […]

Many Americans visit chiropractors to address pain, often without informing their physicians. And they might not consider eye complications that could result, says Yannis Paulus, M.D., a retina specialist at the University of Michigan Kellogg Eye Center. The energetic thrusts and rotations sometimes performed in high-velocity neck manipulation have been shown to create […]

We as human want to be mobile. We want to move around, see things and meet people. And a car is a great way to do that. However, once you reach a certain age you really shouldn‘t be driving. But that is such a difficult change. Scientists from the University […]

From aging to cancer — with quite a bit in between — Katherine Aird, assistant professor of cellular and molecular physiology at Penn State College of Medicine, and her team have a whole world of research opportunities in front of them. This is not just because they have a lot […]

The systematic review, which looked at the survival of 120,000 patients with cancer who took aspirin, compared with 400,000 patients who did not, showed that at any time following the diagnosis of some cancers the proportion of patients who were still alive was 20-30% greater in those taking the drug.  The […]

Radiotherapy is one of the most common cancer treatments. It damages the DNA, causing cancer cells to stop growing and die if the damage is left unrepaired. Unfortunately, some cancers are resistant to radiotherapy and the treatment also damages the DNA in healthy cells, thus limiting the amount of radiation […]

Hyeun Joong Yoon, Ph.D, is new to the College of Engineering this fall. An assistant professor in the electrical and biomedical department, Yoon's research interests focus on developing engineering methods in nanomaterial science and advanced bioMEMS tools to improve diagnostics for cancer research. Yoon joined the University of Nevada, Reno […]

It happens to everyone. You are talking to someone and just for a second you lose concentration and start veering off topic. Sometimes it is really hard to keep the conversation on track when people do not seem to be interested. However, for some it happens more often that to […]

A new study by scientists at the University of Liverpool highlights how a clinically-approved lung cancer drug could potentially be ‘repurposed’ to design new treatments for future cancer therapies. The research, published in Science Signaling, focuses on a protein called TRIB2, which is linked to promoting survival and drug resistance in […]

One of the most cited researchers in Denmark, Professor Jun Wang, participates in DTU High Tech Summit and urges all Danes to digitize their health data. Chinese top researcher and former Head of Beijing Genome Institute, Jun Wang, believes that digitization of health information is crucial for the choice of […]

“4 get cancer from donated organ,” blared the headline above a news story. It described the case of a woman in Europe who died in 2007. Her undetected breast cancer was transmitted via transplant to four individuals who received her lungs, liver and kidneys. Only one recipient is alive today, after […]

New research from the University of Minnesota's Center for Bioethicsshows 30 Canadian businesses are marketing unproven stem cell treatments directly to consumers at 43 clinics across the country. Without new regulations and guidance, researchers say the Canadian direct-to-consumer marketplace for these purported treatments could result in patients making health-related decisions informed solely […]

Imagine a situation where one child is teasing another. While the child doing the teasing means it playfully, the other child views it as hostile and responds aggressively. Behavior like this happens all the time with children, but why some react neutrally and others act aggressively is a mystery. In a new […]

In Greek mythology, Zeus punishes the trickster Prometheus by chaining him to a rock and sending an eagle to eat a portion of his liver every day, in perpetuity. It was the right organ to target – the liver has the ability to regenerate itself, though not overnight nor for […]

In the wake of media and public reports about increased mortality linked to a new drug for treating Parkinson’s disease psychosis (PDP) — a symptom of the progressive nervous system disorder in which patients experience hallucinations and delusions — researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine conducted […]

Patients undergoing cancer treatment confront a number of well-documented side effects. Chemotherapy and other cancer therapies can wreak havoc on the taste buds and olfactory senses, depriving recipients of the intricate interplay between taste and smell that is critical to grasping flavors and enjoying foods. Over time, taste and smell […]

Six years ago, Donna Poole was diagnosed with a brain aneurysm during a follow-up exam for a stroke she had suffered three years earlier. Due to unusual symptoms — including pain behind her right eye and ocular migraines — Poole was referred by her family doctor to a specialist who […]

Scientists with the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute say a gene involved in the body’s sleep cycle is a potential target for therapies to help patients with a deadly form of brain cancer known as glioblastoma. This discovery, published in the journal Scientific Reports, points to a subtype of a particular […]

Persistent lung inflammation may be one possible explanation for why having asthma during childhood increases your risk for developing anxiety later in life, according to Penn State researchers. In a study with mice, researchers found that childhood exposure to allergens was linked with persistent lung inflammation. It was also connected […]

A team of Caltech researchers has developed a biological toolkit of proteins that can be assembled together in different ways, like Legos, to program new behaviors in cells. As a proof-of-concept, they designed and constructed a circuit that can be added to human cells growing in a laboratory dish, detect […]

A decade-long effort led by Stanford University School of Medicine scientists has been rewarded with the identification of the human skeletal stem cell. The cell, which can be isolated from human bone or generated from specialized cells in fat, gives rise to progenitor cells that can make new bone, the spongy stroma […]

For the first time, researchers have shown in preclinical models that it’s possible to treat cancer by delivering a gene that naturally suppresses tumors. Although no two tumors are alike, most cancer cells do a combination of two things: overexpress genes that drive tumor growth and lose normal genes that […]