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Genome clues to amoebic dysentery

Each year, there are an estimated 50 million cases of amoebic dysentery, causing up to 100,000 deaths, mostly in developing countries. On Thursday 24 February 2005, researchers at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and their colleagues reported in Nature magazine the genome sequence of the parasite that causes the disease, Entamoeba histolytica.

1 Mar 2005

Genetic link to kidney damage after heart surgery

Specific variants of genes involved in inflammation and blood vessel constriction are strongly associated with kidney damage in patients undergoing major heart surgery, researchers at Duke University Medical Center have found.

1 Mar 2005

Importance of Fbw7 as an emerging tumor suppressor

The DNA tumor virus simian virus 40 produces the Large T antigen which inactivates two of the cell's most important cancer-preventing proteins, p53 and pRb.

27 Feb 2005

Childhood obesity is a serious health problem in Australia

Professor Michael Booth, co-director of the University of Sydney's Centre for Overweight and Obesity, said teenagers were already showing signs of serious illness caused by their weight.

24 Feb 2005

Protein called CK2 plays a deadly role in colorectal carcinoma

A protein called CK2 plays a deadly role in colorectal carcinoma by blocking the ability of these tumors to activate a natural self-destruct mechanism that would clear this cancer from the body. This finding, by researchers at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, is currently published in the online edition of Oncogene.

24 Feb 2005

Researchers have identified a protein called HIF-2a, which is important in retina formation

Hoping to prevent blindness in premature babies, UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers have identified a protein that responds to oxygen levels in cells and tissues and also affects the developing eye.

22 Feb 2005

State-of-the-art computer technology to tackle deadly diseases such as influenza

Researchers at the University of Bath have won a £261,000 grant to use the latest software to produce a blueprint of a designer drug that could stop influenza and some other diseases from replicating in humans.

22 Feb 2005

Lack of magnesium in diet linked to disease

The Gordon Research International Conference on Magnesium was held during the second week in February in Ventura, California, to discuss the research findings on the links between deficiencies in the mineral magnesium and a host of life-threatening diseases, including heart disease and arteriosclerosis.

22 Feb 2005

Diagnosis of prions in patients should utilize novel strategy, conformation-dependent immunoassay

A technique for detecting prions in tissue, developed in recent years by UCSF scientists, is significantly more sensitive than the diagnostic procedures currently used to detect the lethal particles in samples of brain tissue from patients, according to a study performed by a UCSF team.

22 Feb 2005

Why some lung cancers stop responding to the drugs erlotinib (Tarceva) and gefitinib (Iressa)

Researchers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) have found an explanation for why some lung cancers stop responding to the drugs erlotinib (Tarceva) and gefitinib (Iressa).

22 Feb 2005

New compound, AMN107, 20 times more potent than Gleevec for chronic myelogenous leukemia treatment

A laboratory study led by researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute has shown that a potent and highly selective therapy for chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) may ultimately be more effective than Gleevec®, the current standard of care.

21 Feb 2005

New findings on the regulation of cellular growth

A greatly increased synthesis of new proteins is one of the first and most important events that occur in both normal and tumour cells upon growth stimulation.

21 Feb 2005

Lack of collagen increases likelihood of osteoarthritis

Duke University Medical Center researchers have found that joints whose cartilage lacks a specific type of collagen will develop osteoarthritis – the so-called "wear-and-tear" form of the disease – at a greatly accelerated rate.

20 Feb 2005

Changing chemistry helps explain estrogen threat to the heart

A piece of the topical puzzle of how estrogen goes from protecting women from heart disease to apparently increasing their risk later in life may have been found.

16 Feb 2005

Schizophrenia may arise from a single genetic defect

Researchers have long puzzled over the apparently multiple causes of complex developmental disorders such as schizophrenia. Individuals seem to be predisposed to the disease by a tragic, mysterious combination of genetics, prenatal trauma, viral infection, and early experience.

16 Feb 2005

$Link between lactose malabsorption and the occurrence of bone fracture in elderly people$

Link between lactose malabsorption and the occurrence of bone fracture in elderly people

Published in January and conducted by researchers from the Universities of Helsinki and Kuopio and the National Public Health Institute, the study investigated the relation between the genotype associated with lactose malabsorption and the occurrence of bone fracture in the elderly. The study included 483 elderly people in the City of Vantaa – 377 women and 106 men – all over 85 years of age.

16 Feb 2005

Genetic manipulation cuts nerve damage, boosts life span

A novel genetic manipulation significantly extends the life spans of flies by reducing the amount of wear and tear suffered by nerve cells in adults, according to new work published in Cell Metabolism. The findings support the idea that therapies designed to protect the adult nervous system by curbing the production of damaging free radicals might effectively increase longevity in other animals, including humans, the researchers said.

15 Feb 2005

Link between diabetes and obesity

Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis used genetically modified mice to uncover a potentially important link between diabetes and obesity.

15 Feb 2005

Ebola virus outbreaks linked to infected wild animal carcasses

All recent Ebola virus outbreaks in humans in forests between Gabon and the Republic of Congo were the result of handling infected wild animal carcasses, according to a study by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and its regional partners

14 Feb 2005

Paradox suggests reasons why COX-2 inhibitors hurt and help

Laboratory studies at Johns Hopkins have revealed that certain products of the enzymes COX-1 and COX-2 can both protect and damage the brain. The findings, published in the February 2005 issue of the Journal of Neurochemistry, offer tantalizing clues to why drugs like Vioxx and Celebrex, which block COX-2, can ease arthritis but potentially harm the heart and brain.

14 Feb 2005