A new web-based calculator will better assess the risk of heart disease in British black and minority ethnic groups. These groups are often wrongly assessed.

ETHRISK is for everyday use in the doctor’s surgery and other primary care settings. It has been developed by researchers at the University of Bristol to improve prediction of the heart disease risks of seven British black and minority ethnic groups.

Ethnic groups within Britain have a different risk of coronary hear

Liquorice compounds could be a key component for cheaper, more effective liver cancer treatment, reports Lisa Richards in Chemistry & Industry magazine.

Liver cancer affects over 2,800 people in the UK each year, of which nearly 2,700 die, according to Cancer Research UK. Surgery is the best option, but is unsuitable for most patients, and liver tumours are very resistant to chemotherapy.

Studies in mice by Zhi Yuan and his team at Nankai University, China, revealed tha

Some of the cancer cells’ closest allies have been unveiled. Fortunately, the researchers from BRIC (Biotech Research & Innovation Centre) at University of Copenhagen have also discovered how to beat them. And that could prove to be the first step towards a new remedy for cancer.

The BRIC research team has discovered a family of enzymes that prevents cancer cells to age like normal cells. The good news is, that the researchers have developed small molecules that can impede the enzyme acti

Thanks to a recent study on the genetic factors that promote muscular hypertrophy among Texel sheep, Prof. Michel Georges’ team at the University of Liège has discovered a new kind of mutation that could be at the origin of many phenotypes in various species, among which humans, including genetic predispositions to certain hereditary diseases. This discovery is of significant interest to the international scientific community. The results are published in this week’s edition of the American jo

Study finds that the endoglin protein acts together with sFlt1 to rapidly escalate disease

Building on their earlier discovery which found that elevated levels of the sFlt1 placental protein leads to the onset of preeclampsia, researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), in collaboration with a research team from The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, have identified a second protein which, in combination with sFlt1, escalates preeclampsia to a severe – and

University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine researchers have successfully used gene therapy to accelerate muscle regeneration in experimental animals with muscle damage, suggesting this technique may be a novel and effective approach for improving skeletal muscle healing, particularly for serious sports-related injuries. These findings are being presented at the American Society of Gene Therapy annual meeting in Baltimore, May 31 to June 4.

Skeletal muscle injuries are the most common i

By recovering and sequencing intact DNA from an especially ancient Neandertal specimen, researchers have found evidence suggesting that the genetic diversity among Neandertals was higher than previously thought. The findings also suggest that genetic diversity may have been higher in earlier Neandertal periods relative to later periods that approached the arrival of humans in Europe. Changes in genetic diversity over time are thought to reflect population events, such as low-population bottlenec

From the beginning, arteries and veins are different in the way they branch into vascular networks, say Dartmouth heart researchers. They have identified a new defect limited to arterial development.

The discovery, reported in the June issue of Developmental Cell, upends some theories about the origins of blood vessels and could change the nature of vascular biology research that seeks to harness the mechanisms of blood vessel growth for treatment.

“This is the first

Pre-cooked mussels?

Based on current trends for both air and water temperatures, by 2100 the body temperatures of California mussels — found along thousands of miles of coast in the northeast Pacific Ocean and not just in California –- could increase between about 2 degrees F and 6.5 F depending on where they live.

For areas where mussels already are living close to the edge, chances are that increases of 6.5 F will kill them, researchers say.

Unlike humans,

The authors describe the discovery of a novel class of mutations that disrupt the function of a gene and thereby cause a specific phenotype. The mutation created the appearance of an “illegitimate” microRNA (miRNA) recognition site in a gene that did not have it in its normal form. In this study, the gene concerned is the myostatin. This gene is expressed in the skeletal muscle and the function of the derived protein is to inhibit muscular growth. The mutation discovered among sheep exposed a recogn

Faster consultation for patients globally without ties to a place and time

VTT has developed together with A*Star (Agency for Science, Technology and Research) from Singapore, Emtele and Comptel a Global Health Monitoring Platform service that offers an efficient, open, scalable and secure service environment for remote diagnostics and telemedicine services utilization. This makes it possible to streamline the health care system and reach better efficiency money wise as well as

As any expert will tell you, osteoporosis is complex and hard to predict. Most clinicians treat it only when they detect low bone density, viewing this as the definitive test. But machines to detect low bone density are expensive and far from universally available. Moreover, bone density measurements may not adequately predict osteoporosis. Therefore, given the paucity of diagnostic options, millions face unknown threats of debilitating fractures, while others may receive treatment they may not

Positron emission tomography (PET) in combination with computed tomography (CT) offers a “superior” view of atherosclerosis plaque inflammation—so much so that it may eventually be used to identify individuals who are at high risk for heart attack or stroke, according to researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. Their findings were released during SNM’s 53rd Annual Meeting June 3–7 in San Diego.

“The future is using PET/CT—and other developing technologies—to as

Worries linger even after false-positive diagnoses are ruled out

Virtually all babies in the U.S. have their heels pricked soon after birth to get a blood sample for genetic testing. These “heel stick” tests identify rare metabolic disorders before they cause irreversible damage, but as more disorders are added to the screening – many states now test for 30 or more – false-positive results are on the rise. In the June issue of Pediatrics, researchers from Children’s Hospital Bo

Findings have broad implications for design of clinical trials for advanced NSCLC

Researchers typically evaluate the effectiveness of a new cancer treatment by looking at how tumors respond to it. But in the case of advanced non-small cell lung cancer, there may be a better way to assess effectiveness.

A new Southwest Oncology Group study led by a team of UC Davis Cancer Center researchers suggests that an alternative measurement – “disease control rate” – may be a more

MIT scientists have discovered a way to monitor a crucial molecule as it goes about its business within living cells. The molecule, nitric oxide (NO), plays critical roles in the human body – from the destruction of invading microorganisms to the relaying of neural signals. But catching NO at work has long eluded scientists because it often exists in minute concentrations and for only short periods of time. Now, MIT chemists have developed a bright fluorescent sensor that