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New clue to why some people fight infections better than others

As influenza spreads through the northern hemisphere winter, Dr Linda Wakim and her colleagues in the Laboratory of Professor Jose Villadangos from the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, believe they have a new clue to why some people fight infections better than others.

30 Jan 2013

UCLA's Laboratory of Neuro Imaging to use expertise to piece together brain's puzzle

UCLA's Laboratory of Neuro Imaging (LONI) has entered into a partnership with academic centers from Europe and around the world in a massive, unprecedented effort to understand the human brain.

30 Jan 2013

Researchers create CoQ9-deficient mutant mouse model with mitochondrial encephalomyopathy

At three to six months of life, this genetic alteration in mice -similar to that occurred in human- causes a rapid degeneration in the lower limbs to death for cardiac arrest.

30 Jan 2013

RIKEN, OIST partner on Human Brain Project

One of the major frontiers of modern science is a comprehensive understanding of the human brain and its functions to guide the development of new technologies in information and communication.

30 Jan 2013

Hydrogen sulfide may play a wide-ranging role in staving off aging

Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) may play a wide-ranging role in staving off aging, according to a paper published online ahead of print in the journal Molecular and Cellular Biology.

30 Jan 2013

Insight into reasons why precocious puberty occurs in females

New research from Oregon Health & Science University has provided significant insight into the reasons why early-onset puberty occurs in females.

30 Jan 2013

Brain areas work together at the same time to recall memories

Working with patients with electrodes implanted in their brains, researchers at the University of California, Davis, and The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) have shown for the first time that areas of the brain work together at the same time to recall memories. The unique approach promises new insights into how we remember details of time and place.

30 Jan 2013

ADRB receptors play a direct role in Src activation by PKA-mediated mechanism

Scientists at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center have discovered the signaling pathway whereby a master regulator of cancer cell proteins - known as Src - leads to ovarian cancer progression when exposed to stress hormones. The researchers report in the current issue of Nature Communications that beta blocker drugs mitigate this effect and reduce cancer deaths by an average of 17 percent.

30 Jan 2013

HIV-positive patients have higher incidence of non-melanoma skin cancers

HIV-positive patients have a higher incidence of non-melanoma skin cancers, according to a Kaiser Permanente study that appears in the current online issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Specifically, basal cell and squamous cell carcinomas occur more than twice as often among HIV-positive individuals compared to those who are HIV-negative.

30 Jan 2013

FBH1 gene helps turn up the effect of chemotherapy

Chemotherapy is one of the most common treatments for cancer patients. However, many patients suffer from serious side-effects and a large proportion does not respond to the treatment. Researchers from the Biotech Research and Innovation Centre (BRIC) and Center for Healthy Aging, University of Copenhagen, now show that the gene FBH1 helps turn up the effect of chemotherapy.

30 Jan 2013

SOD1 enzyme protects cells by regulating cell energy and metabolism

Just like a comic book super hero, you could say that the enzyme superoxide dismutase (SOD1) has a secret identity. Since its discovery in 1969, scientists believed SOD1's only role was to protect living cells against damage from free radicals. Now, researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health have discovered that SOD1 protects cells by regulating cell energy and metabolism. The results of their research were published January 17, 2013, in the journal Cell.

30 Jan 2013

Phenformin decreases size of lung tumors and increases survival in mice

Ever since discovering a decade ago that a gene altered in lung cancer regulated an enzyme used in therapies against diabetes, Reuben Shaw has wondered if drugs originally designed to treat metabolic diseases could also work against cancer.

30 Jan 2013

Mice with mitochondrial mutation live longer, have less fat

If findings of a new study in mice are any indication, it might be possible to fine-tune cellular powerhouses called mitochondria, tweaking one aspect to increase insulin sensitivity, reduce body and fat mass, and even extend life. Exploiting this target could one day lead to novel treatments for type 2 diabetes - an endocrine system disease that affects 8 percent of the U.S. population. The research also points to promising new avenues of investigation in the biology of aging.

30 Jan 2013

Non-coding RNA essential for normal embryonic cardiogenesis

Many different tissues and organs form from pluripotent stem cells during embryonic development. To date it had been known that these processes are controlled by transcription factors for specific tissues. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics in Berlin, in collaboration with colleagues at MIT and the Broad Institute in Boston, have now been able to demonstrate that RNA molecules, which do not act as templates for protein synthesis, participate in these processes as well.

30 Jan 2013

Human Brain Project to link basic research with disease treatment

King's College London is part of an international consortium of scientists who have today been awarded a grant of over one billion euros, over ten years, to simulate 'everything we know about the human brain' in supercomputers.

30 Jan 2013

Researchers identify mechanism by which S. aureus colonises nasal passages

A collaboration between researchers at the School of Biochemistry and Immunology and the Department of Microbiology at Trinity College Dublin has identified a mechanism by which the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) colonises our nasal passages.

29 Jan 2013

One-step, off-the-shelf tool can help evaluate genetic cause of mitochondrial diseases

More powerful gene-sequencing tools have increasingly been uncovering disease secrets in DNA within the cell nucleus. Now a research team is expanding those rapid next-generation sequencing tests to analyze a separate source of DNA—within the genes inside mitochondria, cellular power plants that, when abnormal, contribute to complex, multisystem diseases.

29 Jan 2013