Altered protein could help deliver drugs and shape the growth of engineered tissue
Collagen often pops up in beauty products and supermodel lips. But by mating collagen with a molecular hitchhiker, materials scientists at Johns Hopkins hope to create some important medical advances. The researchers have found a simple new way to modify collagen, paving the way for better infection-fighting bandages and a treatment to block the formation of unwanted scar tissue. In addition, tiss
Research published by the University of Helsinki, Finland, indicates that cytostatic and radiation therapies administered before stem cell transplantation often damage children’s permanent teeth.
Detrimental effects of cytostatic and radiation therapies on dental development have been known for a long time, but knowledge about the dental consequences of high-dose anticancer therapy preceding stem cell transplantation has so far been scarce. Päivi Hölttä, Licentiate in Dentistry,
An international team of scientists that includes a researcher from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory has determined the three-dimensional molecular structure of a promising malaria-vaccine component. This research may help lead to a successful vaccine for the disease, which currently infects approximately 400 million people worldwide and kills about two million people each year — mostly children. The study is described in the August 29, 2005, online edition of the Pr
Research by a Michigan State University cardiologist published in the September edition of Clinical Cardiology has shed new light on the role that cholesterol plays in causing heart attacks, strokes and other cardiovascular events in humans.
The work of George Abela, a professor in MSU’s Department of Medicine and chief of the department’s cardiology section, finds that cholesterol that has built up along the wall of an artery and crystallized from a liquid to a solid state can expa
Human beings are genetically adapted to conditions of scanty and irregular nutrition. In case of food abundance this advantage turned into a significant part of population’s predisposition to “diseases of civilization”. This conclusion has been made by I.S. Liberman, Doctor of Sciences, based on his own data and findings of other investigators.
Atherosclerosis, type II (insulin-independent) diabetes, primary hypertension, and obesity often accompanying them are called diseas
A device called “passive chemical dosimeter” will help to identify the quantity of poisonous substances and to determine particular substances inhaled by interlocutors of a smoker. The device is being developed by the Kazan chemists, financial support being provided by the International Science and Technology Center.
The smoking-room of the Lenin State Library – this is the proper place for catching eligible bachelors, as a heroine of the Oscar-winner film “Moscow Does Not Believe
A drug derived from an ancient Chinese herb has been shown to reduce the risk of death from severe malaria by a third, potentially saving hundreds of thousands of lives in nations on our doorstep.
A trial in malaria patients from four countries has shown a clear benefit over standard treatment with quinine, says Professor Nicholas Anstey of the Menzies School of Health Research in Darwin, Australia, which participated in the trial in partnership with the Indonesian Ministry of
Long-term hormone therapy used earlier in menopause is associated with fewer wrinkles and less skin rigidity in postmenopausal women, Yale School of Medicine researchers report in the August issue of Fertility and Sterility.
“These benefits were seen in women who had consistently used hormone therapy and had been in menopause for at least five years,” said Hugh S. Taylor, M.D., associate professor in the Division of Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility in the Department of Ob
The heart-lung bypass machine that stills the heart while surgeons bypass an adult’s clogged arteries or repair a baby’s malformed heart can also trigger a potentially deadly inflammatory response.
That unfortunate fact has Medical College of Georgia surgeons participating in an international study of a drug that may block the most deadly of these responses in adults who have coronary bypass surgery.
It also has them trying to better understand the process in children who
Inhibitory systems are essential for controlling the pattern of activity in the cortex, which has important implications for the mechanisms of cortical operation, according to a Yale School of Medicine study in Neuron.
The findings demonstrate the inhibitory network is central to controlling not only the amplitude, extent and duration of activation of recurrent excitatory cortical networks, but also the precise timing of action potentials, and, thus, network synchronization, s
Research led by Dr. Anne Mueller at Stanford University School of Medicine demonstrates that successful eradication of Helicobacter may not prevent future aggressive gastric lymphoma since resting B cells are left behind. The paper by Mueller et al., “The role of antigenic drive and tumor-infiltrating accessory cells in the pathogenesis of Helicobacter-induced MALT lymphoma,” appears in the September issue of The American Journal of Pathology.
Helicobacter pylori, a spiral bac
Dräger Medical will unveil its new remote access concept at the 9th World Congress of the World Federation of Societies of Intensive and Critical Care Medicine in Buenos Aires, August 27-31, 2005. This new concept enables physicians to remotely access their patients’ cardiopulmonary status in near real time by using an integrated remote access solution.
Components of the new remote access concept include the Infinity® Gateway Suite, which provides the tools to export vital sig
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 Republic of the Congo, the Sudan and other countries. In some regions, the tsetse fly-borne infection
MIT technique is noninvasive
MIT scientists have developed a new dye that could offer noninvasive early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease, a discovery that could aid in monitoring the progression of the disease and in studying the efficacy of new treatments to stop it.
The work will be published in the Aug. 26 issue of Angewandte Chemie.
Today, doctors can only make a definitive diagnosis of Alzheimer’s-currently the fourth-leading cause of death in the
New portable device captures pictures beneath the living brain’s surface
Researchers at Stanford University have demonstrated a promising, minimally invasive optical technique that can capture micron-scale images from deep in the brains of live subjects. The method, called two-photon microendoscopy, combines a pair of powerful optical and mechanical techniques into one device that fits in the palm of the hand. The results appear in the September 1, 2005 issue of Optics Lette
Two groups of scientists have uncovered key secrets of success of a major pathogen responsible for recent food poisoning outbreaks. The ability of Salmonella bacteria to act quickly, both on an evolutionary timescale and during the early minutes of infection, has been investigated in detail for the first time.
This month more than 1,700 cases of Salmonella food poisoning from chicken were reported in Spain and earlier outbreaks in Europe have been linked to lettuce and eggs.
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