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A common antibiotic used to treat arthritis and acne shows promise for limiting the severity of spinal cord and brain injuries

When a fall, car crash, bullet, or knife crushes or cuts a spinal cord, the injury does not stop there. Rather, tissues continue to discharge toxic chemicals for hours, even days and weeks. These chemicals kill and disable nerve cells some distance away from the core injury, compounding the damage and making rehabilitation more difficult or impossible.

26 Mar 2004

Growth factor protein succeeds in growing new coronary arteries

Three patients of the UC Heart & Vascular Center have grown new coronary artery branches to increase blood flow to the heart after receiving a new growth factor protein (FGF1) in November 2003. All three patients showed improved blood flow to the heart twelve weeks following the injection.

26 Mar 2004

Children with sickle cell disease are living longer, dying less often from their disease

Children with sickle cell disease, an inherited red blood-cell disorder, are living longer, dying less often from their disease and contracting fewer fatal infections than ever before, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas report. Their study, which will appear in the June edition of the scientific journal Blood, is the first to evaluate survival rates of children receiving the most modern treatments for sickle cell disease. It's also one of the largest published sickle cell studies to date. Researchers followed more than 700 Dallas-area children with the disease over two decades.

25 Mar 2004

Researchers turn off individual human genes to study their function

Researchers have produced vast libraries of short segments of ribonucleic acid (RNA) that can be used to turn off individual human and mouse genes to study their function. The libraries will be made widely available to laboratories studying human biology and disease. The researchers are optimistic that the libraries will become a powerful research tool for gene analysis and discovery.

25 Mar 2004

Discovery of new gene sheds light on human brain development

With the identification of the gene responsible for a newly recognized type of mental retardation, researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) have also discovered what appears to be the key target in the evolution of the frontal lobes of the brain's cerebral cortex. The findings offer a key insight into the complex puzzle of human brain development - and the evolution of human behavior.

25 Mar 2004

A debate over the origins of what is sometimes called "junk" DNA has been settled

A debate over the origins of what is sometimes called "junk" DNA has been settled by research involving scientists at the Center for Advanced Research in Biotechnology (CARB) and a collaborator, who developed rigorous proof that these mysterious sections were added to DNA "late" in the evolution of life on earth, after the formation of modern-sized genes, which contain instructions for making proteins.

25 Mar 2004

First US Tests of Bird-Flu Vaccine in Humans

Doctors are beginning the first test in the United States of a vaccine designed to protect people against one form of bird flu should an outbreak of the virus occur in humans. While the vaccine under study is not designed to protect against the precise bird-flu virus causing the current outbreak in poultry and in people, scientists will learn whether it protects against another strain of the virus that infects birds and people.

24 Mar 2004

Oregon Stem Cell Center Hunt for Human Disease Therapies

Oregon Health & Science University's fast-growing stem cell research program, which already has made significant strides in the hunt for human disease therapies, now has a place to call home.

23 Mar 2004

Clinical study - Diagnostic testing for epilepsy released

Bionomics Limited announced today the publication of its international clinical study involving patients with a form of epilepsy confined to early childhood in the scientific journal, Annals of Neurology. The publication details genes associated with a condition known as Benign Familial Neonatal Infantile Spasms (BFNIS), a condition in which infants experience seizures in the first few months of their life.

22 Mar 2004

Scientists identify genetic changes during infection by tuberculosis

Researchers at the Center for Biomedical Inventions at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas have identified the genetic changes that Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium that causes tuberculosis, undergoes during infection of a living host.

22 Mar 2004

New research may help treatment of Norrie disease and familial exudative vitreoretinopathy (FEVR)

Researchers have discovered that genetic mutations underlying two inherited eye disorders arise in different components of a single intracellular signaling pathway that is responsible for development of blood vessels in the eye.

22 Mar 2004

MorphoSys Obtains Patents on Antibody Technologies

MorphoSys Obtains Additional U.S. Patents on Antibody Technologies MorphoSys AG (Frankfurt Stock Exchange: MOR; Prime Standard Segment) announced today that the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office has granted two new patents, which further strengthen the Company’s IP portfolio.

22 Mar 2004

Study of three treatments of type 2 diabetes in children and teens has begun in US

A clinical study comparing three treatments of type 2 diabetes in children and teens has begun in 12 medical centers and their affiliated sites around the country, HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson announced today.

22 Mar 2004

Improvements needed in breast cancer treatment

Treatment of ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), a group of abnormal cells confined to the breast ducts, varies widely in the United States. Treatment ranges from potential over-treatment with aggressive surgical therapy to possible under-treatment by not providing radiation.

22 Mar 2004

Government, industry, and academia focus on obesity

Amid shifting scientific data on nutrition and obesity, experts from government, industry, and academia converged on Harvard Medical School last week to discuss obesity's causes and how to craft a coherent public nutritional message.

22 Mar 2004

Researchers find link that could aid in treatment of kidney cyst diseases

Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas have uncovered a link between two cyst-forming diseases that affect the kidneys, a finding that could lead to treatments for both a rare form of diabetes and a common kidney disease.

22 Mar 2004

Scientists identify blood development gene which may aid the fight against cancer and leukemia

Researchers at Harvard-affiliated Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have pinpointed a crucial gene on which the normal development of the body's entire blood system depends. If the gene is absent, even the most basic blood stem cells cannot be generated. In a mutated form, this gene can cause a rare and devastating form of leukemia.

22 Mar 2004

Drug Based on Brain Chemical Could End Narcolepsy and Insomnia

Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas have discovered a potentially new avenue for treating human narcolepsy, and the work may also lead to more effective ways for insomniacs to boost their wakefulness during the daytime.

22 Mar 2004

Gene Responsible for The Most Common Form of Diabetes

International research teams studying two distinct populations have found variants in a gene that may predispose people to type 2 diabetes, the most common form of the disease. The researchers, who collaborated extensively in their work, report their findings in companion articles in the April issue of Diabetes.

22 Mar 2004