Genetics News and Research

Latest Genetics News and Research

GeneDesign speeds design of artificial pieces of DNA

Johns Hopkins researchers have announced the development of a Web-based, automated computer program that they say greatly simplifies the time-consuming and error-prone process of manually designing artificial pieces of DNA.

17 Feb 2006

Tetrabenazine cuts down involuntary movements in Huntington's disease

The medication tetrabenazine cut down involuntary movement in patients with Huntington's disease on average by about 25 percent, with many patients experiencing a greater improvement, according to a study in the February 14 issue of the journal Neurology.

17 Feb 2006

Scientists put ehrlichiosis under the genomic spotlight

Ehrlichiosis is no star of science. This emerging disease has an awkward name, vague flu-like symptoms, and a nasty habit of being caused by bacteria that live inside ticks and flatworms.

17 Feb 2006

Dramatic metabolic differences in how people process drugs

A Medical College of Wisconsin study provides the strongest and most complete evidence to date of major changes occurring during human development in the types and levels of enzymes responsible for the disposition of drugs and environmental chemicals.

17 Feb 2006

New method determines in a matter of hours exposure to a bioterrorism agents

Researchers at Walter Reed Army Institute of Research are developing a method to determine in a matter of hours if someone has been exposed to a bioterrorism agent just by looking at the pattern of active genes in that person's white blood cells.

17 Feb 2006

Adjuvant hormonal therapy reduces contralateral breast cancer risk

The risk for a new cancer in the unaffected breast substantially increases in women diagnosed with unilateral, hereditary (non-BRCA) breast cancer, according to a new study.

17 Feb 2006

Genetics of human muscular dystrophy

Various forms of human muscular dystrophy result from mutations in genes encoding proteins of the nuclear envelope. A new paper in the February 15th issue of G&D reveals how.

17 Feb 2006

Genome data may contain small but significant errors

Since the genome sequence of the bacterial pathogen Haemophilus influenzae was published in 1995, the genetic code of many other large, complex, medically, and commercially significant organisms including humans has also been elucidated

17 Feb 2006

Research suggests that a common mechanism may underlie a variety of protein folding diseases

Misfolded and damaged proteins are common to all human neurodegenerative diseases. Clumps of these aggregated proteins destroy neurons within the brain and cause disease.

16 Feb 2006

Purdue biologists visualize protein interaction that may initiate viral infection

Biologists at Purdue University have taken a "snapshot" of a Velcro-like protein on a cell's surface just after it attached to the dengue virus, a linkup thought to initiate the early stages of infection.

16 Feb 2006

Advancing knowledge of diet-gene interactions

Josi Ordovas, PhD, director of the Nutrition and Genomics Laboratory at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University joined more than eighty other leading researchers in the fields of nutrition and genetics to co-author a report outlining their strategy for maximizing the impact of nutrigenomics research on global poverty and health.

16 Feb 2006

Hormone aldosterone linked to quality of hearing

Researchers have linked a hormone known to adjust levels of key brain chemicals to the quality of our hearing as we age. The more of the hormone that older people have in their bloodstream, the better their hearing is, and the less of the hormone, the worse their hearing is.

16 Feb 2006

Brain scans may detect neurological decline in normal people

Brain scans may detect neurological changes in people who exhibit no outward signs of cognitive decline but who later develop dementia or mental impairment, according to the results of a new study led by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

16 Feb 2006

Cost of sexuality in microbes

The next time you mutter about the high cost of relationship maintenance, take comfort in knowing that microbes share your pain.

16 Feb 2006

Less is more hypothesis - gene loss may explain unique human traits

Humans and chimps share most of their genes, yet they differ dramatically in many ways - their walk, the sizes of their brains and their capacities for speech and language, for example.

16 Feb 2006

Causes of type 1 diabetes

Scientists are casting a wide, tightly woven net with the goal of catching the causes of type 1 diabetes.

16 Feb 2006

New insight into pathogenic mechanisms underlying basal-like breast cancers

Basal-like breast cancers (BLC) are highly aggressive tumors with a relatively poor prognosis that account for approximately 15% of sporadic human breast cancer.

16 Feb 2006

X chromosome dosage compensation proven in germ cells

X chromosome dosage compensation does occur in germ cells. A study published today in the open access journal Journal of Biology reveals that expression of the genes on the X chromosome is doubled in Drosophila germ cells to compensate for the missing second X chromosome.

16 Feb 2006

British woman loses Herceptin court battle

A mother of three in the UK suffering from the early-stage of an aggressive form of breast cancer, has lost her high court battle to force her health authority to pay for the potentially life-saving drug Herceptin.

16 Feb 2006

Study provides animal model of depression

A Florida State University scientist used a gene transfer technique to block the expression of a gene associated with clinical depression in a new study of mice that could lead to better treatment of human beings with this condition.

14 Feb 2006