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Jump-starting T Cells In Skin Cancer

Advanced melanoma, the most deadly form of skin cancer, can be successfully treated in some cases by vaccinating patients with tumor proteins. How these vaccines work and why they are only effective in some patients remains unclear. Pierre Coulie and colleagues now show, in two articles in the January 17 issue of the Journal of Experimental Medicine, that these vaccines work by increasing the num...

UCSB scientists probe sea floor venting to gain understanding of early life on Earth

New keys to understanding the evolution of life on Earth may be found in the microbes and minerals vented from below the ocean floor, say scientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara. The UCSB scientists are making new contributions to this field of inquiry in their studies of seafloor hydrothermal fluid discharge into the Earth's oceans, which has been occurring ever since t...

Learning to fight an adversary that won't stay down

New biomolecular technologies have largely failed to deliver the hoped-for knockout punch breakthrough against the defences of disease-causing bacteria, says a leading Canadian specialist in antibiotic resistance. Techniques such as genomic sequencing and high throughput screening were expected to make the development of new antibiotic compounds easier and more productive. But in most cas...

Mitochondrial DNA mutations play significant role in prostate cancer

Mutations in mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) playan important role in the development of prostate cancer, according toresearch by scientists at Emory University School of Medicine and theUniversity of California, Irvine. The findings are published onlinethis week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences(PNAS). Mitochondrial DNA, which is separate from nuclear DNA, is foundin the hun...

Antibiotic Resistant Bacterium Uses Sonar-like Strategy to “See?Enemies or Prey

For the first time, scientists have foundthat bacteria can use a Sonar-like system to spot other cells (eithernormal body cells or other bacteria) and target them for destruction.Reported in the December 24 issue of Science, this finding explains howsome bacteria know when to produce a toxin that makes infection moresevere. It may lead to the design of new toxin inhibitors. “Blocking orinte...

Study identifies predictors of HIV drug resistance in patients beginning triple therapy

A scientist at the Marine BiologicalLaboratory (MBL) has published the results of an EPA-funded clam embryostudy that supports her hypothesis that, when combined, the pollutantsbromoform, chloroform, and tetrachloroethylene--a chemical cocktailknown as BCE--can act synergistically to alter a key regulator in nervecell development. While scientists have previously studied the effectsof these...

Enzyme shown to help protect genomic stability

Genomes throughout the animal kingdom and beyond are characterized by extensive segments that are inactive, lengthy stretches of DNA containing multiple genes that are closed to gene transcription. Scientists believe one reason for this broad gene silencing is the vital need for genomic stability, for protection against unwanted recombinations of genetic material or other disruptions of the genom...

Weizmann Institute scientists develop a new approach for directing treatment to metastasized prostate cancer in the bones.

Few things about growing older are asinevitable and obvious as “going gray,?yet scientists have been unableto explain the precise cause of this usually unwelcome transformation.In a report posted today on the Web site of the journal Science,researchers from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Children’s HospitalBoston say they have found the cellular cause of graying hair whileinvestigating th...

First-ever Compounds To Target Only Metastatic Cells Are Highly Effective Against Breast, Prostate, And Colon Cancers

Two compounds that zero in on cancer cells spreading throughout the body, while ignoring primary tumor cells, could someday give doctors a whole new weapon in the fight against tough-to-treat metastatic disease, according to Weill Medical College of Cornell University researchers. The compounds, called synthetic migrastatin analogues, prevented 91 to 99 percent of metastatic breast cancer...

Same mutation aided evolution in many fish species, Stanford study finds

After decades of laboratory work studying how animals evolve, researchers sometimes need to put on the hip waders, pull out the fishing net and go learn how their theory compares to the real world. According to a Stanford University School of Medicine study published in the March 25 issue of Science, Mother Nature is more predictable than lab experiments suggest. In a diverse group of fish...

NYC's First Rapid HIV Drug-resistant AIDS Case Prompts Call to Step Up HIV Prevention

New York City's Public Health Department today issued a public health advisory after reporting the first documented case of an alarming, new, rapidly-progressing and highly drug resistant strain of HIV in a New York man who progressed from his initial HIV infection, thought to have occurred in mid-October 2004, to a largely untreatable strain of AIDS in just three months. According to City...

NC State scientist finds soft tissue in T. rex bones

Conventional wisdom among paleontologists states that when dinosaurs died and became fossilized, soft tissues didn't preserve ?the bones were essentially transformed into "rocks" through a gradual replacement of all organic material by minerals. New research by a North Carolina State University paleontologist, however, could literally turn that theory inside out. Dr. Mary Schweitzer, assis...

Zebrafish may hold key to understanding human nerve cell development

Glia appear essential for 'hair cells'responsible for hearing and balance. Traditionally viewed as supportingactors, cells known as glia may be essential for the normal developmentof nerve cells responsible for hearing and balance, according to newUniversity of Utah research. The study is reported in the January 6,2005 issue of Neuron and is co-authored by scientists at the Universityof Was...

First real-time view of developing neurons reveals surprises, say Stanford researchers

Scientists have believed that neurons need a long period of fine-tuning and training with other neurons before they take on their adult role. But after using new technology for the first time to watch these cells develop, a team of researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine found that neurons come into this world with a good idea about what they'll become as adults. The work...

Estrogen-like Component of Plastic Stimulates Growth of Certain Prostate Cancer Cells

An estrogen-like chemicalcommonly used to synthesize plastic food containers has been shown toencourage the growth of a specific category of prostate cancer cell,potentially affecting the treatment efficacy for a subset of prostatecancers.According to a study published in the January 1 issue of CancerResearch, such prostate cancer cells proved to be vulnerable toexposure to the chemical BP...

Novel ultrafast laser detection of cancer cells also may improve understanding of stem cells

To investigate tumors, pathologists currently rely on labor-intensive microscopic examination, using century-old cell-staining methods that can take days to complete and may give false readings. A lightning-fast laser technique, led by Sandia National Laboratories researcher Paul Gourley, has provided laboratory demonstrations of accurate, real-time, high-throughput identification of live...

Special Imaging Study Shows Failing Hearts Are 'Energy Starved'

Using magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) for the first time to examine energy production biochemistry in a beating human heart, Johns Hopkins researchers have found substantial energy deficits in failing hearts. The findings, published in the January 18 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, confirm what many scientists have conjectured for years about heart fail...

Expression Project for Oncology (expO) completes first phase of standardized gene expression analyses

The International Genomics Consortium’s (IGC) Expression Project for Oncology (expO) has released clinically annotated gene expression profiles for 60 tumor specimens, completing the initial phase of the nation’s first and eventually largest public database dedicated to standardized gene expression data. The clinically annotated dataset is available in the public domain through the National Cente...

Supercomputer Dedicated To Bioengineering, Computational Biology Installed

The University of California, San Diego, with support from the National Institutes of Health and the Whitaker Foundation, has installed a supercomputer dedicated to solving a wide range of challenging biological problems. The 210-node Dell PowerEdge Linux cluster capable of 2.6 trillion mathematical operations per second, the second most powerful computer cluster on campus, will be used to analyz...

Drug-resistant bacteria on poultry products differ by brand

The presence of drug-resistant, pathogenic bacteria on uncooked poultry products varies by commercial brand and is likely related to antibiotic use in production, according to researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Their study is the first to directly compare bacterial contamination of poultry products sold in U.S. supermarkets from food producers who use antibiotics...

Substance protects resilient staph bacteria

Researchers have identified a promising new target in their fight against a dangerous bacterium that sickens people in hospitals, especially people who receive medical implants such as catheters, artificial joints and heart valves. A substance found on the surface of Staphylococcus epidermidis has, for the first time, been shown to protect the harmful pathogen from natural human defense m...

Stem cells from brain transformed to produce insulin at Stanford

With careful coaxing, stem cells from the brain can form insulin-producing cells that mimic those missing in people with diabetes, according to a paper published in the April 26 issue of PLoS Medicine. Although the work is not yet ready for human patients, Seung Kim, MD, PhD, the lead author and assistant professor of developmental biology at the Stanford University School of Medicine, sai...

Researchers make gains in understanding antibiotic resistance

Howard Hughes Medical Institute researchers chiseling away at the problem of antibiotic resistance now have a detailed explanation of how the drugs' main cellular target in bacteria evolves to become resistant to some of these medications. The findings are already leading to new experimental antibiotics that are being engineered to circumvent resistance, which is a major worldwide health problem....

Brain-mapping technique aids understanding of sleep, wakefulness

The power of a new technique to map connections among nerve cells in the brain has a UT Southwestern Medical Center scientist dreaming of solving the mysteries of sleep. By tracking which nerve cells in the mouse brain stimulate others, researchers in Japan and at UT Southwestern found that a type of neuron responsible for keeping animals awake receives inhibitory signals from neurons act...

Human Cells Filmed Instantly Messaging for First Time

Relief from soaring prices at the gas pump could come in the form of corncobs, cornstalks, switchgrass and other types of biomass, according to a joint feasibility study for the departments of Agriculture and Energy. The recently completed Oak Ridge National Laboratory report outlines a national strategy in which 1 billion dry tons of biomass ?any organic matter that is available on a rene...

Technique may allow cancer patients to freeze eggs, preserving fertility before starting treatment

A new technique might allow women diagnosed with cancer the opportunity to have children when chemotherapy and radiation treatments rob them of their fertility, researchers at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center have found. Freezing eggs is one t...

Test for early detection of prostate cancer shows promise

In the first clinical study of a new blood protein associated with prostate cancer, researchers have found that the marker, called EPCA or early prostate cancer antigen, can successfully detect prostate cancer in its earliest stages. At the same time, the marker successfully avoids the problem of false positive results that plagues prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing. Study results ap...

PET/CT can identify new cancer lesions at early stage, allowing for prompt treatment

A team of researchers at Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions in Baltimore, Md., reports that whole-body positron emission tomography/computed tomography (PET/CT) scans may help physicians identify new, unexpected malignant cancerous tumors in patients, according to an article in the May issue of the Society of Nuclear Medicine's Journal of Nuclear Medicine. "PET/CT can help find additional...

Shift of weather patterns necessitates rethinking of reforestation methods

Forest landowners can greatly increase the survival rate of pine tree seedlings by changing when and how they plant, according to research conducted here. "Some landowners have had to replant two, three or even four years in a row beca...

New understanding of DNA repair may pave way to cancer treatments

A Burnham Institute study has found that a protein known for its role in gene regulation has another important function, that of initiating DNA repair. The study, published in the May 27th edition of Molecular Cell, points to new targets for treatment of cancer. Ze'ev Ronai, Ph.D., Director of the Institute's Signal Transduction Program, and his colleagues found that the protein ATF2 ("Ac...

MUHC scientists describe genetic resistance to rampant virus

MUHC researchers have defined genetic resistance to the widespread virus, cytomegalovirus (CMV)--a member of the viral group that causes some of the world's most prevalent diseases, such as herpes, chicken pox and mononucleosis. The groundbreaking research published in Nature Genetics last week, provides a roadmap for the development of human therapies for CMV, which could prolong the life of HIV...

NYU and MSKCC research provides model for understanding chemically induced cancer initiation

A team from the chemistry and biology departments of New York University, in collaboration with Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC), has uncovered a conformational switch--a change in shape in a carcinogen-damaged DNA site--in tumor suppressor genes altered by a known cancer-causing chemical found in cigarette smoke. This finding may open new horizons for understanding the initiation o...

Multiple-drug resistant gene expression pattern predicts treatment outcome for pediatric leukemia

A new study is providing scientists with a better understanding of why some pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) patients fail to respond to treatment even when existing clinical predictive criteria point towards a positive treatment outcome. The research, published in the April issue of Cancer Cell, is likely to facilitate development of new strategies to combat drug resistance and treat...

New polysaccharide may help combat multidrug resistance in cancer

In a recent study published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, scientists report that a molecule previously thought to play a purely structural and inert role in cells is actually involved in multidrug resistance in cancer. Using antagonists for this molecule, the researchers were able to sensitize drug resistant breast cancer cells to chemotherapeutic drug treatment. The research ap...

The circadian clock: Understanding nature's timepiece

A cluster of brain cells less than half the size of a pencil eraser tells you when to wake up, when to be hungry and when it's time to go to sleep. The same cells also cause you to be disoriented after you've flown across multiple time zones. The human circadian clock, comprised of about 20,000 time-keeping cells, has mystified scientists since it was pinpointed in the brain about 30 year...

Symbiotic bacteria protect hunting wasps from fungal infestation

Researchers have discovered a fascinating symbiotic relationship between a wasp species and a newly discovered bacterial species ?a relationship that potentially sheds light on how bacteria can be successfully utilized by higher organisms in defensive mechanisms against other microbes. In the new work, researchers show that a solitary ground-nesting wasp, the European beewolf, harbors Streptomyce...

Stanford gut check shows diversity of intestinal ecosystem

The universe of microbes that lives in your stomach may be nearly as unique as your fingerprint, according to researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine who have embarked on the early stages of exploring the intestinal ecosystem. Using molecular techniques that detect all known types of microbes and borrowing statistical techniques from field ecology and population genetics,...

Too much water may be as dangerous as too little during long-distance athletic events

Drinking water during a long-distance race may do serious harm rather than keep you safe from injury if you're drinking too much, according to a cardiologist at UT Southwestern Medical Center. Runners or any long-distance athletes who drink too much water during a race could put themselves at jeopardy for developing hyponatremia, a condition marked by a loss in the body's sodium content th...

To Stop Evolution: New Way Of Fighting Antibiotic Resistance Demonstrated By Scripps Scientists

A team of scientists at The Scripps Research Institute and the University of Wisconsin have demonstrated a new way of fighting antibiotic resistance: by stopping evolution. In the June issue of the open-access journal PloS Biology, the team describes how a protein called LexA in the bacterium Escherichia coli promotes mutations and helps the pathogen evolve resistance to antibiotics. The...

Young Blood Revives Aging Muscles, Stanford Researchers Find

Any older person can attest that aging muscles don't heal like young ones. But it turns out that's not the muscle's fault. A study in the Feb. 17 issue of Nature shows that it's old blood that keeps the muscles down. The study, led by Thomas Rando, MD, PhD, associate professor of neurology and neurological sciences at the Stanford University School of Medicine, built on previous work show...