Why Dogs Now Play a Big Role in Human Cancer Research
The Cancer Moonshot initiative, launched under the Obama administration, was audacious by design: Supercharge cancer research to encourage innovation, with the mission “to end to cancer as we know it.”
Cancer researchers avoid using the word “cure.” From studying cancer at the molecular level, they know that tumors are complex—even personalized. There’s no simple cancer and no single cure. So, no single destination for a “moonshot.” Read more.
Cause of hardening of the arteries—and potential treatment—identified
A team of UK scientists have identified the mechanism behind hardening of the arteries, and shown in animal studies that a generic medication normally used to treat acne could be an effective treatment for the condition. Read more.
Disrupted Gut Microbiome Promotes Breast Cancer Spread In Mice
Written by Victoria Forster
The health of the gut microbiome has been linked with numerous diseases from depression to multiple sclerosis and even cancer and response to cancer drugs including immunotherapies. Earlier this year, an ambitious $25 million project was launched to determine the role of the microbiome in colorectal cancer, but perhaps more surprisingly, a new study in mice has linked the health of the gut microbiome to the spread of breast cancer. Read more.
Researchers identify faster, more effective drug combination regimens to treat tuberculosis
Human white blood cells infected with tuberculosis bacteria, shown in green. Photo credit: UCLA D.L. Clemens
Written by Enrique Rivero
Tuberculosis is a potentially deadly though curable disease. Each year about 10 million people develop active cases, and 1.6 million people die. In addition, about 1.7 billion people around the world are infected with TB bacteria, which can lie dormant for weeks to years, then become active and cause disease in up to 10 percent of those who are infected.
Today, people who contract tuberculosis typically take a course of drugs for six to eight months. However, the length of treatment means some patients don’t stick with the therapy or may develop adverse effects from drug toxicity. Some may develop resistance to the drugs, requiring changes in the drug regimen that can lengthen the treatment to as long as two years. Even worse, there is a high fatality rate among those with drug-resistant TB. Read more.
Major step towards individual cancer immunotherapy
T cells (left) become active in the body only when they recognise a peptide (blue, centre) located on one of the immune system’s sentinel cells (right). The ETH scientists repurposed sentinel cells in such a way that they indicate which peptides the T cells recognise. Photo credit: MedicalXpress/Science Photo Library / Keith Chambers
Medicine has great hopes for personalised cancer immunotherapy. The idea is to have a vaccine prompt the immune system to fight a tumour. Scientists at ETH Zurich have developed a method that allows them to determine which molecules are suited to patient-specific immunisation. Read more.
On The Frontier Of An Alzheimer’s Cure
In mouse brains stained for the presence of amyloid, much less is visible in the cortex of a mouse treated with sensory gamma stimulation (right) than in a mouse left untreated (left). Credit: Picower Institute for Learning and Memory/MIT – Photo credit: Science Friday
Alzheimer’s disease is known for inflicting devastating declines in memory and cognitive function. Researchers are on the hunt for treatments are taking a number of approaches to slowing or preventing the neurodegenerative disease, including immune therapy, lifestyle changes, and targeting sticky buildups of proteins called amyloid beta. Read more.
UC Berkeley gene therapy helps blind mice gain sight, could be used to cure blindness
Photo credit: SFGATE
Written by Drew Costley
A team of scientists at UC Berkeley used a breakthrough gene therapy to help blind mice gain sight, and some on the team think the same therapy could eventually be used to help cure blindness in humans. Read more.
Published March 17th, 2019 by SFGATE
Breakdowns in mitochondrial housekeeping provide another clue to Alzheimer’s culprit
Researchers have zeroed in on the role of defects in mitophagy—a process in which cells clean out damaged or defective mitochondria—as a potential new treatment target for Alzheimer’s disease in experiments with animal models and lab specimens of human neurons. An international team of scientists led by NIA Intramural Research Program investigators in the Laboratory of Molecular Gerontology published their results in the March issue of Nature Neuroscience. Read more.
Published March 13th, 2019 by NIH National Institute on Aging
Detailed new primate brain atlas could lead to disease insights
Photo credit: (Photo : CSHL) The Brain/MINDS atlas can be used in conjunction with other brain mapping and imaging methods. Here, mapped neural connections of interest (atlas annotations–colored) are laid on top of MRI scans (greyscale).
The ability to comprehensively map the architecture of connections between neurons in primate brains has long proven elusive for scientists. But a new study, conducted in Japan with contributing neuroscientists from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL), has resulted in a 3D reconstruction of a marmoset brain, as well as information about neuronal connectivity across the entire brain, that offers an unprecedented level of detail. Read more.
Oxygen-tracking method could improve diabetes treatment
MIT researchers are testing encapsulated pancreatic islet cells as a possible treatment for diabetes. These 1.5 mm capsules are embedded with a fluorine-containing compound that allows the researchers to monitor their oxygen levels with MRI once implanted in the body.
Photo credit: Virginia Spanoudaki
Written by Anne Trafton
Measurements could help scientists develop better designs for a bioartificial pancreas.
Transplanting pancreatic islet cells into patients with diabetes is a promising alternative to the daily insulin injections that many of these patients now require. These cells could act as a bioartificial pancreas, monitoring blood glucose levels and secreting insulin when needed. Read more.