Might

Circles Of DNA Might Help Predict Success Of Stem Cell Transplantation

Measuring the quantity of a certain type of immune cell DNA in the blood could help physicians predict whether a bone marrow stem cell transplant will successfully restore a population of infection-fighting cells called T lymphocytes in a child. This research, by investigators at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, is published in the journal Blood. This finding could help physicians p...

Antibiotic might fight HIV-induced neurological problems

By studying animals, Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered that the antibiotic minocycline might help alleviate HIV's negative effects on the brain and central nervous system, problems that can develop even though antiretroviral therapy controls the virus elsewhere in the body. Five monkeys infected with simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV), a very close relative of HIV, and treated wi...

Newly discovered pathway might help in design of cancer drugs

Johns Hopkins chemists have discovered a new way to sabotage DNA's ability to reproduce, a finding that could eventually lead to the development of new anti-cancer drugs and therapies. The method could enable future doctors to target treatment more precisely, rather than directing chemotherapeutic medication or radiation to tumors through a scattershot approach, said Marc Greenberg, a chem...

Protein That Promotes Survival Of Stem Cells Might Be Key To Poor Leukemia Prognosis

The complex and life-sustaining series of steps by which hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) give rise to all of the body's red and white blood cells and platelets has now been discovered to depend in large part on a single protein called Mcl-1. This finding, from an investigator at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, is published in the February 18 issue of Science. Mcl-1 blocks the biochem...

Compound might defeat African sleeping sickness, clinical trial beginning this month

One of the most devastating diseases in sub-Saharan Africa almost disappeared in the late 1950s. That disease, African sleeping sickness, or trypanosomiasis, largely succumbed to heroic public health efforts -- including relocating entire villages. But in the past several decades, because of post-colonial turmoil, the catastrophic illness has come back to ravage parts of Angola, the Democratic Re...

Stem cells' electric abilities might help their safe clinical use

Researchers from Johns Hopkins have discovered the presence of functional ion channels in human embryonic stem cells (ESCs). These ion channels act like electrical wires and permit ESCs, versatile cells that possess the unique ability to become all cell types of the body, to conduct and pass along electric currents. If researchers could selectively block some of these channels in implanted...

Software might revolutionize glucose monitoring in critically ill patients

Researchers have developed a new computerized system to easilymonitor the levels of glucose in the blood of patients in intensivecare. A study published today in the open access journal BMC MedicalInformatics and Decision Making reports that GRIP, a computersoftware that assists in the monitoring of glucose levels incritically ill patients, saves nurses time and effort and is moreefficient...

Free-radical busting antioxidants might not promote healthy hearts

Antioxidants, such as beta-carotene and Vitamin E, have been touted for their ability to protect against heart disease. This protective effect is attributed to their ability to prevent the oxidation of bad cholesterol by free radicals—a process thought to contribute to the build-up of disease-causing fatty deposits on artery walls. But a new study, published online on April 10 in The Journal of E...

HIV-1's high virulence might be an accident of evolution

The virulence characteristic of HIV-1--the virus predominantly responsible for human AIDS--might amount to an accident of evolution, new evidence reveals. A gene function lost during the course of viral evolution predisposed HIV-1 to spur the fatal immune system failures that are the hallmarks of AIDS, researchers report in the June 16, 2006 Cell. AIDS has killed more than 25 million peopl...

Epstein-Barr virus might kick-start multiple sclerosis

Researchers have found that patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) carry a population of immune cells that overreact to Epstein-Barr virus. The virus, which causes mononucleosis and may contribute to some cancers, has long been suspected to play a role in MS. However, the mechanism linking the virus to the disease was poorly understood. Scientists think that MS--which can cause vision prob...

Giant insects might reign if only there was more oxygen in the air

The delicate lady bug in your garden could be frighteningly large if only there was a greater concentration of oxygen in the air, a new study concludes. The study adds support to the theory that some insects were much larger during the late Paleozoic period because they had a much richer oxygen supply, said the study's lead author Alexander Kaiser. The study, "No giants today: tracheal oxy...

Hopkins researchers discover how brain protein might control memory

Researchers at Johns Hopkins have figured out how one particular protein contributes to long-term memory and helps the brain remember things longer than an hour or two. The findings are reported in two papers in the Nov. 9 issue of Neuron. The protein, called Arc, has been implicated in memory-linked behaviors ranging from song learning in birds to rodents being aware of 3-D space. In peop...

Protein averts cell suicide but might contribute to cancer

Scientists have discovered how an unusual protein helps a cell bypass damage when making new DNA, thereby averting the cell's self-destruction. The findings by researchers with Ohio State University 's C...

Cold sore virus might play role in Alzheimer's disease

A gene known to be a major risk factor for Alzheimer's disease puts out the welcome mat for the virus that causes cold sores, allowing the virus to be more active in the brain compared to other forms of the gene. The new findings, published online in the journal Neurobiology of Aging, add some scientific heft to the idea, long suspected by some scientists, that herpes somehow plays a role in brin...

NIDA study identifies genes that might help some people abstain from smoking

Scientists supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health, have for the first time identified genes that might increase a person’s ability to abstain from smoking. The breakthrough research was conducted by Dr. George Uhl at NIDA’s Intramural Research Program and a team led by Dr. Jed Rose at the Center for Nicotine and Smoking Cessation Resear...

Snoring in children might be an allergic type disease

The study published in the latest edition of the international medical journal, Pediatric Pulmonology has established children with rhinitis who were first born, were...