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Cambridge researchers have discovered how T cells – an important component of our immune system – are able to keep on killing as they hunt down and kill cancer cells, repeatedly reloading their toxic weapons. Cytotoxic T cells are specialist white blood cells that are trained by our immune system […]

Cambridge researchers have developed ‘mini brains’ that allow them to study a fatal and untreatable neurological disorder causing paralysis and dementia – and for the first time have been able to grow these for almost a year. A common form of motor neurone disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, often overlaps with […]

For the first time, researchers have used human data to quantify the speed of different processes that lead to Alzheimer’s disease and found that it develops in a very different way than previously thought. Their results could have important implications for the development of potential treatments. The international team, led […]

COVID-19 may bring high risks of severe disease and death in many patients by disrupting key metabolic signals and thereby triggering hyperglycemia, according to a new study from researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian. In the study, reported in Cell Metabolism, the researchers found that hyperglycemia – high blood […]

Lymphomas can turbo-charge their ability to proliferate by crowding growth-supporting enzymes into highly concentrated compartments within tumor cells, according to a study led by researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine. The preclinical study, published in Cancer Research, demonstrated that certain aggressive B-cell lymphomas use a protein-shepherding molecule called HSP90 to form and […]

A new study reveals how sperm change their swimming patterns to navigate to the egg, shifting from a symmetrical motion that moves the sperm in a straight path to an asymmetrical one that promotes more circular swimming. This change in behavior, called hyperactivation, enables the sperm to sweep the area […]

The effectiveness of fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) in treating ulcerative colitis depends on a small set of beneficial bacterial strains, suggests a new study from researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian. In the study, reported in Gastroenterology, the researchers sampled gut bacteria from healthy FMT donors and from FMT recipients […]

Senescent cell accumulation is a feature of aging, a growing imbalance between the rate of creation and rate of destruction. Senescent cells perform a number of useful tasks in the short-term, but when present for the long-term, their inflammatory secretions disrupt tissue function and contribute meaningfully to the onset and […]

Senolytic treatments are those that selectively destroy senescent cells, a form of intervention that has produced rejuvenation in older animals. A high dose of the flavonol fisetin is not yet proven to be usefully senolytic in humans, but has shown a surprising degree of efficacy in mice. The only senolytic […]

New study identifies molecular players in ‘dead man’s switch’ that triggers key immune organ’s regeneration after damage. The pandemic has put immune function — and how to boost it — at top of mind. Most recommendations for boosting immune responses focus on lifestyle choices, including adequate sleep, a solid exercise […]

An enormous amount of data can be derived from analysis of the cells and molecules found in a blood sample. Researchers will be kept busy for decades yet, ever more efficiently gathering and mining this data, in search of ways to assess the progression of aging and specific age-related diseases. […]

The practice of calorie restriction, eating fewer calories while still obtaining sufficient micronutrients, is well demonstrated to reduce cancer risk in animal models, and also appears to improve outcomes in the case of an established cancer. This is similarly the case for practices such as intermittent fasting or fasting mimicking […]