lung

Association of herpesvirus with lung disorder questioned

Contrary to the results of a recent U.S. study, investigators in Japan found no association between a herpesvirus infection and a potentially life-threatening form of high blood pressure, as reported in the March 1 issue of The Journal of Infectious Diseases, now available online. The researchers reported that they were not able to detect human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8), also known as the Kap...

Newly discovered virus linked to childhood lung disorders and Kawasaki disease

Late updatetonight; my girlfriend is sick and I took care of her. First headline :a newly discovered virus causing respiratory infection. Let's hope itsjust a coincidence :) A newly discovered virus may be responsible for many respiratory tractillnesses in infants and children, and may be associated with animportant multi-organ disease whose cause has...

New vaccine means bye-bye to bacteria in the lung

Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a bacterium that can cause respiratory tract infections, which can be life threatening in patients who have cystic fibrosis. It is therefore important to develop a vaccine against this pathogen. Appearing online on 1 April 2005 in advance of print publication of the May issue of The Journal of Clinical Investigation, Ronald Crystal and colleagues from Cornell University...

High-powered gene profiles provide clues to genes involved in common form of lung cancer

Using technology that makes it possible to zoom in on smaller sections of cell chromosomes than ever before, researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have identified nearly 100 chromosome regions where genes are either over-copied or missing in non-small cell lung cancer. The findings provide new clues about the location of genes potentially involved in the most common type of lung cancer –?an...

Circulating stem cells play small role in lung repair

Circulating stem cells play a minor role in repairing lung damage, according to a team of scientists who used male and female chromosomal differences to analyze the repair process in lung transplant patients. Reporting in today's edition of the journal Transplantation, lead author Dani Zander, M.D., of The University of Texas Medical School at Houston, and colleagues at the University of F...

Successful lung cancer surgery not enough to break nicotine dependence in many smokers

A new study has found that close to half of 154 smokers who had surgery to remove early stage lung cancer picked up a cigarette again within 12 months of their potentially curative operation, and more than one-third were smoking at the one year mark. Sixty percent of patients who started smoking again did so within two months of surgery. The study, led by researchers at Washington Univers...

Most common lung cancers may begin in newly discovered cells

The most common form of lung cancer may begin in a group of newly isolated lung stem cells, according to researchers from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Working in a mouse model, the researchers isolated a novel type of lung cell that can divide into fresh copies of itself and into the two more specialized kinds of cells deep in the lung. Their experiments show that at the earliest...

Treatments have same target, different responses for lung cancer patients with genetic mutation

The gene mutation that identifies the lung cancer patients most likely to respond to the drug gefitinib (Iressa) is not associated with a response to the drug cetuximab (Erbitux), according to a new study published in the August 17 issue of the Some patients with non�small-ce...

Researchers identify genes associated with lung transplant rejection

Researchers at the San Francisco VA Medical Center (SFVAMC) and the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) have identified six genes associated with lymphocytic bronchitis, which is thought to lead to obliterative bronchitis (OB), the most common cause of long-term failure of transplanted lungs. The researchers hope their results will lead to an earlier, more sensitive, and more ac...

Naturally occurring asbestos linked to lung cancer

Everyday exposure to naturally occurring asbestos increases the risk of developing malignant mesothelioma, according to a study by UC Davis researchers. Exposure to asbestos in the workplace, particularly in shipyards, has long been recogn...

Two designer drugs hit same lung cancer target, but only one is effective

Two designer cancer drugs differed dramatically in a laboratory test comparing their ability to shut down a mutant, overactive growth signal in lung cancer cells, reports a team headed by scientists at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Although both drugs killed cells containing a normal but overactive EGFR (epidermal growth factor receptor) molecule, only gefitinib (Iressa) killed lung ca...

Smoking damages key regulatory enzyme in the lung

Study in Journal of Nuclear Medicine uses PET, radiotracer to track enzyme in smokers, nonsmokersRESTON, Va.-- Smoking appears to reduce a key enzyme in the lungs, possibly contributing to some of smoking's deleterious health effects, according to a study published in the September issue of the Journal of Nuclear Medicine. The study, which used a radiotracer to track the enzyme, also shows that s...

Building a better mouse model of lung cancer: FHIT counts

Scientists have identified some of the very earliest genetic changes involved in the development of lung cancer and have incorporated them into a new strain of mouse that develops the disease in much the same way that humans do. The discoveries, reported in the August 1 issue of Cancer Research, open the door to the possibility of new, targeted treatments that could be offered at the very...

Restoring silenced suppressor gene kills lung-cancer cells

A new study suggests that restoring a gene often silenced in lung cancer causes the cells to self-destruct. The findings could lead to a new strategy for treating the disease. The research focused on a gene known as WWOX, which is lost or silenced in a large majority of lung cancers, and in cancers of the breast, ovary, prostate, bladder, esophagus and pancreas. The work was led by scient...

Gene therapy may protect normal tissues during radiation retreatment for lung cancer

The ice ages made massive changes to the Earth's landscape In the past it has been thought that these...

How does Mycobacterium tuberculosis infect the lung?

Tuberculosis (TB) is the most common major infectious disease today. It is estimated that two billion people--or one-third of the world's population--are chronically infected without active symptoms. Nine million new cases of active disease are diagnosed annually, resulting in two million deaths. TB is predominantly a lung disease. It is caused by a microbe called Mycobacterium tuberculosis which...

Group proves it's possible to grow new lung alveoli by growing new blood vessels

The good news is that medical advances in perinatal care have allowed us to save many more premature babies. The bad news is they're often at risk of developing bronchopulmonary dysplasia--a chronic lung disease caused by having to place the tiny infants on ventilators and oxygen-rich therapy for acute respiratory failure. It's really a win-lose situation: the babies are saved but they pay...

Chemical warfare agent detection technology used to treat lung disease

A new technique based on the same technology used to detect chemical warfare agents and explosives is being employed by scientists at The University of Manchester to treat hospital patients with lung disease. The microDMx<supe...

Researchers reveal lung's unique innate immune system

For the first time, scientists have documented an organ-specific innate immune system. In research published in the April 18 edition of the journal Immunity, scientists at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine outline the unique mechanism by which the lung shapes its defensive strategies against microbial invasion. "This innate immune response is specific to th...

Advanced genomics and proteomics improve the diagnosis and treatment of a deadly lung disease

A team of Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) scientists has peeled back some of the mystery of how cells are able to turn off genes selectively to control critical events of development. The new insights arise from the first clear molecular images of the structure of Dicer, an enzyme that enables cells to dissect genetic material precisely. The finding, which is reported in the January...

The loss of a protein favors lung tumor growth

The researcher Zafira Castaño has discovered that the loss of a protein in the early phases of lung cancer favors tumor growth. This was the conclusion that the Doctor in Biochemistry reached in the dissertation which she defended at the University of Navarra. In order to perform the study she began with prior studies from her laboratory, which demonstrated that the protein αCP4 appears i...

Chemical in many air fresheners may reduce lung function

New research shows that a chemical compound found in many air fresheners, toilet bowl cleaners, mothballs and other deodorizing products, may be harmful to the lungs. Human population studies at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), a part of the National Institutes of Health, found that exposure to a volatile organic compound (VOC), called 1,4 dichlorobenzene (1,4 DCB)...

Radiation-armed robot rapidly destroys human lung tumors

Super-intense radiation delivered by a robotic arm eradicated lung tumors in some human patients just 3-4 months after treatment, medical physicist Cihat Ozhasoglu, Ph.D. of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center will report in early August at the 48th Annual Meeting of the American Association of Physicists in Medicine in Orlando. Although it is too early to determine the technique's long-...

Combined treatment extends life expectancy for lung cancer patients

Combining thermal ablation with radiation therapy extends average life expectancy and decreases recurrences of tumors in patients who have early stages of inoperable lung cancer, according to researchers at Rhode Island Hospital. In a retrospective study looking at patients over seven years, the median survival rate at three years increased from 20 months after radiation alone to 42 month...

First-ever genomic test predicts which lung cancer patients need chemotherapy to live

Duke University Medical Center scientists have developed the first-ever genomic test to predict which patients with early-stage lung cancer will need chemotherapy to live and which patients can avoid the toxic regimen of drugs. The test has the potential to save thousands of lives each year by recommending chemotherapy for patients who are currently advised against it, said the test's de...

Quitting smoking improves lung function considerably

For smokers with asthma, quitting smoking can improve lung function test scores by more than 15 percent in less than two months. Neil C. Thomson, M.D., of the Departments of Respiratory Medicine and Immunology at the...

Combination therapy shows promising results in patients with advanced lung cancer

An early phase study pairing an experimental targeted therapy with a common anti-inflammatory produced promising results in patients with advanced lung cancer, researchers at UCLA's Jonsson Cancer Center reported. Pairing the targeted therapy Tarceva with the anti-inflammatory drug Celebrex increased response rates in lung cancer patients by about three-fold, said Dr. Karen Reckamp, an as...

Gene therapy for hereditary lung disease advances

An experimental gene therapy to combat alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, a common hereditary disorder that causes lung and liver disease, has caused no harmful effects in patients and shows signs of being effective, University of Florida researchers say. In a clinical trial, researchers evaluated the safety of using a so-called gene vector - in this case an adeno-associated virus - to delive...

Common cold virus leads to death in lung transplant patients

Human rhinovirus (HRV), the leading cause of most common colds, struck two immunosuppressed lung transplant patients, leading to progressive respiratory failure, graft dysfunction and death. The two were part of a group of 11 transplant patients who suffered clinically significant respiratory infection from HRV in both the upper and lower airways, overturning the long-held belief that HRV affects...

Antioxidant protects against lung damage in silicosis

Levels of heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1), an antioxidant that protects against reactive oxygen species (damaging oxygen molecules that cause direct tissue injury), become elevated in the lungs of chronic silicosis patients and could represent a new treatment approach for the disease. These results appear in the second issue for October 2006 of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care...

Mayo Clinic: Gene expression profiling not quite perfected in predicting lung cancer prognosis

While there have been significant advances in the use of gene expression profiling to assess a cancer prognosis, a Mayo Clinic review and analysis of existing lung cancer studies shows that this technology has not yet surpassed the accuracy of conventional methods used to assess survival in lung cancer patients. The interest in and the knowledge of gene expression profiling in medical scie...

Key to acute lung injury lies in Ang2 protein

Acute lung injury caused by cell death, high and potentially toxic concentrations of oxygen (hyperoxia), and the resulting excess fluid in the lungs (pulmonary edema), may be controlled by modulating levels of the angiopoietin2 (Ang2) protein, researchers at Yale School of Medicine report in the November 5 online issue of Nature Medicine. The study, which was completed in the laboratory of...

Key to lung cancer chemo resistance revealed

Scientists at Johns Hopkins have discovered how taking the brakes off a "detox" gene causes chemotherapy resistance in a common form of lung cancer. Products made by a gene called NRF2 normally protect cells from environmental pollutants like cigarette smoke and diesel exhaust by absorbing the materials and pumping them out of the cell. Another gene called KEAP1 encodes products that sto...

Environmental toxins may cause body's defenses to worsen lung disease

The University of Cincinnati (UC) has received $2.4 million to study whether environmental toxicants can stimulate the body's natural defense system to cause additional damage in people with chronic lung diseases. Michael Borchers, PhD, believes long-term exposure to certain environmental toxicants may activate a specific receptor--known as NKG2D--in lung cells that causes the immune syst...

Vaccination with embryonic stem cells prevents lung cancer in mice

Researchers in America have discovered that vaccinating mice with embryonic stem cells prevented lung cancer in those animals that had had cancer cells transplanted into them after the vaccination or that had been exposed to cancer-causing chemicals. The findings suggest that it could be possible to develop embryonic stem cell vaccines that prevent cancers in humans, such as hereditary b...

Radiation after surgery doubles survival time for some lung cancer patients

Patients with lung cancer that has spread to mediastinal lymph nodes ?located between the chest, breastbone and spine ?who receive radiation after surgery and chemotherapy live twice as long as patients who do not receive radiation after surgery, according to a study presented at the plenary session November 6, 2006, at the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology's 48th Annual Mee...

Lungs try to repair damaged elastic fibers

The lungs of patients suffering chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) attempt to repair damaged elastic fibers, a new finding that contradicts the conventional wisdom on the capabilities of the adult lung. The study "Evidence for attempted regional elastic fiber repair in severe emphysema," was done by Jason Woods, Kristin Castillo, Alexander Patterson and Richard Pierce of Washingt...

Proteins may predict lung transplant rejection

Using the latest in high tech tools, researchers have identified three proteins that were highly predictive of chronic lung rejection up to 20 months before the rejection occurred. Lung transplant patients have the highest mortality rate of organ recipients, about 45% over five years, said lead investigator and pulmonologist Chris Wendt. Currently, there is no reliable way to predict which...

U of MN researchers turn cord blood into lung cells

Researchers at the University of Minnesota have, for the first time, coaxed umbilical cord blood stem cells to differentiate into a type of lung cell. The cord blood cells differentiated into a type of lung cell called type II alveolar cells. These cells are responsible for secreting surfactant, a substance which allows the air sacs in the lungs to remain open, allowing air to move in and...

Colour sensor breath test can detect lung cancer

A breath test can successfully pick up lung cancer with "moderate accuracy" even in the early stages, reveals research published ahead of print in Thorax. The test comprises a chemical colour sensor, which detects tiny changes in the unique chemical signature of the breath of people wit...