Santa Barbara, Calif. — The body has a veritable army constantly on guard to keep us safe from microscopic threats from infections to cancer. Chief among this force is the macrophage, a white blood cell that surveils tissues and consumes pathogens, debris, dead cells, and cancer. Macrophages have a delicate...
Latest News
Los Angeles, California – Researchers from the UCLA Health Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center show for the first time that a gene usually linked to giant axonal neuropathy, a rare and severe neurological condition, also plays a role in inhibiting aggressive tumor cell growth in head and neck cancers. The team...
San Francisco, Calif. – Scientists at UC San Francisco may have discovered a new way to test for autism by measuring how children’s eyes move when they turn their heads. They found that kids who carry a variant of a gene that is associated with severe autism are hypersensitive to...
Amherst, MA – In the largest genome-wide association study to date on Type 2 diabetes, a team of international researchers, co-led by a University of Massachusetts Amherst genetic epidemiologist, has located 1,289 genetic markers associated with Type 2 diabetes (145 of which are newly identified) and generated risk scores for...
AMHERST, Mass. – In a first-of-its-kind research breakthrough, a team of scientists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has analyzed and described what they call the “mosquito effect,” which sheds light on how certain pathogens, such as cancerous tumor cells, can outwit the body’s immune system. Just as mosquitoes ingest...
Uppsala, Sweden – Scientists at Uppsala University have discovered a new class of antibiotics with potent activity against multi-drug resistant bacteria, and have shown that it cures bloodstream infections in mice. The new antibiotic class is described in an article in the scientific journal PNAS. Antibiotics are the foundation of modern...
Leuven, Belgium – Microglia are known to play an important role in Alzheimer’s disease, but exactly what they do has remained a mystery. Scientists in the Bart De Strooper Lab at the VIB-KU Leuven Center for Brain & Disease have unraveled the varying roles of microglia in Alzheimer’s at different...
Rockville, Maryland – New research by Joseph Reiner and colleagues at Virginia Commonwealth University shows promise for a urine-based test for ovarian cancer. Reiner will present their research at the 68th Biophysical Society Annual Meeting, to be held February 10 – 14, 2024 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Previous research showed that...
New York, NY – Researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine have discovered a protein called SEL1L that plays a critical role in clearing collagen from tissue, and which may be a therapeutic target to help prevent fibrosis, scar tissue that interferes with organ function. The paper, published on Feb. 20 in...
Cambridge, UK – The microbiome can identify those who benefit from combination immunotherapy across multiple different cancers, including rare gynaecological cancers, biliary tract cancers and melanoma. Researchers from the Wellcome Sanger Institute, the Olivia Newton-John Cancer Research Institute in Australia, and collaborators, have identified specific strains of bacteria that are...