General

Although there is little evidence that opioids effectively reduce pain from rheumatic diseases, a new study finds nearly one in three patients with lupus uses prescription opioids, often lasting longer than a year. Lupus, a chronic autoimmune disease, often leaves those affected with inflammation and pain throughout the body. “Rheumatic diseases, such […]

In the study, researchers from King’s  and UCL analysed the genetic data from over 250,000 participants of the UK Biobank aged 40-69 years to see which genes were associated with people who had reported having or not having hearing problems on a questionnaire. 44 genes were identified to be linked […]

Break any bone in the human body, and the body can repair the tissue and fix the damage. Yet tooth enamel — the strongest tissue in the human body — cannot repair itself. Still, our teeth last a lifetime. “We apply huge pressure on tooth enamel every time we chew, […]

As you might have noticed by talking to your grandma, people start losing their hearing as they age. One third of 65 year olds report have impaired hearing. Worse still, we don’t know why that happens, although 5 genes have been identified. Now scientists from UCL and King’s College London […]

Immune system becomes weaker as you age – everyone knows that.That is why older people are more susceptible to various bacterial and viral infections. But is is the same with animals? Scientists from the University of Edinburgh conducted a long-term study with a Scottish sheep breed and found out that […]

Over 30 million people worldwide are living with Alzheimer’s disease. It is a debilitating condition, which has no known cure. It is a primary cause of dementia and with ageing population it is expected that we are going to have more and more cases of Alzheimer’s in the coming decades. […]

University of Warwick researchers have developed a superior method to describe the very earliest effects that Alzheimer’s Disease proteins have on the properties of brain cells. In the paper ‘Introduction of Tau oligomers into cortical neurons alters action potential dynamics and disrupts synaptic transmission and plasticity’ published in the journal […]

Myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), one of the most common blood cancers, has very few treatment options. Now, researchers at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) have discovered a new and promising drug target for this deadly condition. “At the moment, only a small portion of patients benefit from the standard therapy for […]

Intestinal epithelial cells (IECs) are exposed to diverse types of environmental stresses such as bacteria and toxins, but the mechanisms by which epithelial cells sense stress are not well understood. New research by the universities of Bristol, Heidelberg and the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) have found that Nox-ROS-ASK1-MKK3-p38 signaling […]

A new therapeutic being tested by University of Alberta researchers is showing early promise as a more effective treatment that could help nearly half of patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). The treatment—a cocktail of DNA-like molecules—results in dramatic regrowth of a protein called dystrophin, which acts as a support […]

Everyone is a mutant but some are prone to diverge more than others, report scientists at University of Utah Health. At birth, children typically have 70 new genetic mutations compared to their parents (out of the 6 billion letters that make both parental copies of DNA sequence). A new study published […]

Researchers believe they have identified a way to prevent type 1 diabetes by restoring the immune system’s natural balance. The approach may also prove effective for battling other autoimmune diseases such as lupus and eczema, they hope. It could also have benefits for people who have already developed diabetes: The […]

When a 9-year-old girl with anemia, breathing problems, and recurrent infections sought help for her mysterious ailments, Yale researchers and their collaborators at the National Institutes of Health sequenced her genes to pinpoint a cause. What they discovered was not only a new disease but unexpected new roles for a […]

USC scientists have surmounted a big roadblock in regenerative medicine that has so far constrained the ability to use repurposed cells to treat diseases. The researchers figured out how to reprogram cells to switch their identity much more reliably than present capabilities allow. The technique uses enzymes to untangle reprogramming […]

The way we see the world around us is the result of a marriage of two neural pathways — one shared by all vertebrates and one that evolved in mammals more recently. It has been a mystery to scientists how these two networks emerge in development to help us form […]

Telomeres are the protective caps of our chromosomes and play a central role in the ageing process. Shorter telomeres are associated with chronic diseases and high stress levels can contribute to their shortening. A new study now shows that if telomeres change in their length, that change is also reflected […]

A completely new, comprehensive human genome reference will be created in a National Institutes of Health-funded, multi-institutional initiative. The Human Pangenome Project will be based on the complete genome sequences of 350 individuals from a variety of the world’s populations. The international Human Genome Project in 2000 produced the first working draft […]

The Yale laboratory of Sidi Chen, assistant professor of genetics in the Systems Biology Institute and Yale Cancer Center, has developed advanced gene-editing and screening technology to find new targets for cancer immunotherapy. In a new study published in Nature Biotechnology, Chen and colleagues report that using T cells containing […]

New grants totaling approximately $29.5 million will enable scientists to generate and maintain the most comprehensive reference sequence of the human genome. The awards, made over five years pending the availability of funds, are managed by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health. […]

According to a recent study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, the biological clock influences immune response efficacy. Indeed, CD8 T cells, which are essential to fight infections and cancers, function very differently according to the time of day. The study was […]

Many neurodegenerative diseases have a common feature that may make them amenable to the same treatment, investigators at the Stanford University School of Medicine have found. “We’ve identified a potential new way to reduce nerve-cell death in a number of diseases characterized by such losses,” said Daria Mochly-Rosen, PhD, professor of chemical and […]

Over the past three years, in hopes of accelerating research on the genetic causes and treatments for autism, University of Miami psychology faculty have recruited nearly 700 children affected by the neurodevelopmental disorder, and both of their parents, to join the world’s largest autism research project. This month they began […]

A treatment for psoriasis could be repurposed to treat a rare but aggressive form of youth cancer, new findings from the Garvan Institute of Medical Research suggest. In an animal model, researchers demonstrated that the immune molecule IL23 is central to the development of osteosarcoma, a cancer of the bone. […]

Which treatment will benefit this patient best? Which substances are most promising for pharmaceuticals companies to develop? These are questions that scientists at Linköping University are seeking to answer with the aid of the tiny zebrafish embryo. Zebrafish embryos are colourless transparent balls. We see some only a few days […]

Restricting sleep for just several days alters how we metabolize fats and changes how satisfied we are by a meal, according to new research conducted at Penn State and published in the Journal of Lipid Research. According to Orfeu Buxton, researcher on the project and professor of biobehavioral health at Penn […]

For patients diagnosed with a certain type of brain cancer called glioblastoma, long-term survival is rare. Surgery can remove tumors visible to the surgeon’s eye. It cannot, however, take out the diseased tendrils of tumor cells that extend beyond what the doctor sees. While current immunotherapy drugs are effective for […]

A drug used to treat chronic myeloid leukemia appears to be more effective at stopping a type of medulloblastoma in mouse models than existing treatments for the deadly pediatric brain tumor, reports a multi-institutional team led by researchers at Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at University of California […]

Researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine say they are getting closer to identifying the mechanisms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and biomarkers that can aid in early diagnosis and predictions of symptom severity. A team of scientists analyzed blood gene expression data from 302 one- to […]

UQ researchers have discovered a potential drug target for Alzheimer’s disease — an enzyme which has effects on both the immune and nervous systems. Dr Ramón Martínez-Mármol and Professor Frédéric A. Meunier from the Queensland Brain Institute Clem Jones Centre for Ageing Dementia Research found that targeting one enzyme could combat the disease on two fronts. […]

Despite confirming that benefits of exercise for breast cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy wear off quickly once they stop, a new University of Alberta study also showed that patients prescribed a training regimen with a resistance-training component were more likely to continue exercising once their treatment ended. In the study, led by U […]