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Gene found that increases risk for Alzheimer's disease

A study comparing more genetic markers in the DNA of people with and without Alzheimer's disease than ever before has enabled researchers to identify a common gene that appears to increase a person's risk for developing Alzheimer's disease.

8 Jun 2007

Largest ever genetics study of common diseases

The Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium, the largest ever study of the genetics behind common diseases such as diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and coronary heart disease, publishes its results in the journals Nature and Nature Genetics.

8 Jun 2007

Reprogrammed fibroblasts resemble embryonic stem cells

Stem cell biology takes another exciting leap forward as scientists report that normal tissue cells can be reprogrammed to exhibit many of the properties that are characteristic of embryonic stem cells, including the ability to give rise to multiple cell types and contribute to the germline.

8 Jun 2007

Tumor cell activity may provide clues for treating breast cancer in young women

When women under 50 develop breast cancer the disease tends to be more aggressive and less responsive to treatment than when it occurs in older women.

5 Jun 2007

Gene responsible for Leber Congenital Amaurosis

A MUHC-led study identifies a gene responsible for Leber Congenital Amaurosis (LCA), the most common cause of congenital blindness in infants and small children.

5 Jun 2007

New strategy for treating rare muscle disease, kidney disorders

Based on clues provided by a study with transgenic mice, a research group at the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has developed a strategy that will be tested as the first treatment for people with hereditary inclusion body myopathy (HIBM), a rare, degenerative muscle disease.

3 Jun 2007

New discoveries on genes implicated in Fanconi anaemia

An international research consortium, which included the participation of the Mutagnesi Group from the UAB, has made outstanding progress in the study of Fanconi anaemia.

3 Jun 2007

Smoking can cause changes in the DNA sequence of sperm cells

The science has long been clear that smoking causes cancer, but new research shows that children could inherit genetic damage from a father who smokes.

3 Jun 2007

Virus widely used in gene therapy research yields important clues to genomic instability

Genomic instability, the rearrangement of chromosomes or an abnormal number of chromosomes, is a hallmark of many human cancers.

1 Jun 2007

Complete sequencing of DNA pioneer James D. Watson

454 Life Sciences Corporation, in collaboration with scientists at the Human Genome Sequencing Center, Baylor College of Medicine, announced in Houston, Texas, the completion of a project to sequence the genome of James D. Watson, Ph.D., co-discoverer of the double-helix structure of DNA.

1 Jun 2007

Breakthrough for breast cancer research

The most powerful genetic analysis of the DNA codes of over 40,000 women -- including those with breast cancer as well as those without the disease, has uncovered five common genetic variants that increase an individual's risk for breast cancer.

30 May 2007

New candidate breast-cancer susceptibility gene

Researchers at the Abramson Family Cancer Research Institute of the University of Pennsylvania and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute describe in this week's issue of Science a new candidate breast-cancer susceptibility gene.

28 May 2007

Scientists develop a more human-like mouse model of cancer

A team led by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists has developed a more human-like mouse model of cancer they say will aid the search for cancer-causing genes and improve the predictive value of laboratory drug testing.

28 May 2007

Largest ever Affymetrix GeneChip Microarray study

The Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) at Virginia Tech has announced that it has completed the largest ever Affymetrix GeneChip Microarray study for a plant experimental system in an academic research setting.

28 May 2007

Genome detectives discover four more breast cancer genes

An international team of scientists say they have identified another four genes that increase a woman's likelihood of developing breast cancer.

28 May 2007

Scientists 'home in' on new breast cancer genes

Cancer Research UK scientists have isolated five regions of the genome containing genes which can increase a woman's risk of developing breast cancer, reveals a major international study published online in Nature.

27 May 2007

MicroRNAs may increase cancer susceptibility

New evidence indicates that small pieces of noncoding genetic material known as microRNAs (miRNAs) might influence cancer susceptibility.

24 May 2007

Researchers find alteration in gene associated with uterine cancer

Researchers at the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen) today announced the discovery of previously unrecognized alterations in a gene called FGFR2 in a subset of endometrial cancers, the most common gynecologic cancer in the United States.

24 May 2007

Tool will revolutionise functional genomic studies in clostridia

The genome of the organism that produces the world's most lethal toxin has been revealed.

24 May 2007

Status of malaria in the world today

In an editorial in this week's JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association, Gianna Zuccotti, M.D., Contributing Editor, and Catherine D. DeAngelis, M.D., M.P.H., Editor in Chief, JAMA, comment on the status of malaria in the world today.

24 May 2007