USC researchers have moved one step closer to understanding how the body fights harmful antigens – foreign molecules that trigger an immune response.

The team successfully simulated a mutation process that diversifies the proteins, or antibodies, responsible for immunity – a phenomenon known as somatic hypermutation. This process enables the body to fight off a wide range of diseases.

Their findings are detailed in the July 3 issue of the journal Nature.

“When performin

Madrid, Spain: Scientists believe that they are an important step nearer to success in creating an artificial egg from the combination of the nucleus of a somatic cell and an oocyte which has had its DNA-carrying nucleus removed, a conference of international fertility experts heard today (Tuesday 1 July).

Dr Peter Nagy, from Reproductive Biology Associates, Atlanta, collaborating with the University of Connecticut, USA, told the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology annual

Research News in the Journal of Pathology

Doctors working near to the first outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) Guangdong, China, have just published the first histopathological description of the effects of this viral infection in the Journal of Pathology.

Basing their findings on autopsies of three people who died of SARS, Dr Yanqing Ding and his colleagues showed the virus causes extensive disruption throughout the body.

The main pathological cha

A research study under way at Northwestern Memorial Hospital is trying to find out if the popular anti-inflammatory drug Celebrex might do more than ease arthritis pain. Researchers at Northwestern Memorial are enrolling patients with early stage head and neck cancers or non-small cell lung cancers in a research study to see if Celebrex reduces the return of old tumors or the chance of getting a new cancer when taken after surgery or radiation treatments.

The double-blind, randomized study

Injections of a stimulant agent into rat brains expanded blood vessels and improved blood flow, a finding that may lead to a new, non-invasive way to prevent stroke, researchers reported in today’s rapid access issue of Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association.

Rats treated with the growth-promoting substance granulocyte macrophage-colony stimulating factor (GM-CSF) had almost twice as much arteriogenesis, the expansion of a brain artery, after one week compared to rats given s

A strain of E. coli that causes severe, sometimes deadly, intestinal problems relies on signals from beneficial human bacteria and a stress hormone to infect human cells, a researcher at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas has discovered.

The finding, which will appear online today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could lead to the development of beta blockers as a therapy to impede this cellular signaling system, causing the harmful bacteria to pass blindly through t

A novel method of preserving sperm through air drying is showing initial promise and has the potential to revolutionize sperm storage, allowing men awaiting in vitro fertilization (IVF) to take care of their sperm at home.

Dr Daniel Imoedemhe, a consultant in reproductive medicine and endocrinology, working in Saudi Arabia, told the annual meeting of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology, that for the first time studies on human embryos fertilized with air-dried sperm ha

About 200 genes identified

Tracing all the genetic changes that flow from a single mutation, UCSF scientists have identified the kinds of genes and systems in the body that ultimately allow a doubling of lifespan in the roundworm, C. elegans. Humans share many of these genes, and the researchers think the new findings offer clues to increasing human youthfulness and longevity as well.

Using DNA microarray technology, the researchers found that the single life-extending mutat

Research by Austrian geneticists has raised the possibility that stem cells[1] could be isolated from amniotic fluid – the protective ’bath water’ that surrounds the unborn baby.

Geneticist Professor Markus Hengstschläger and his team at the University of Vienna have isolated a subgroup of cells from amniotic fluid that express a protein called Oct-4 – known to be a key marker for human pluripotent stem cells.

Reporting the findings today (Monday 30 June) in Europe’

When staff at the Reptile House in London Zoo thought they had an unidentified species of cobra on their hands, they turned to an expert in snake species identification- Dr Wolfgang Wüster of the University of Wales, Bangor’s School of Biological Sciences for assistance.

Dr Wüster, who has been involved in the identification of three other new snake species, agreed with keepers at the Zoo that this spitting cobra species was different to the red spitting cobra which it was originally thought

The Royal Academy of Engineering sponsored a UK technology mission to Japan on behalf of the DTI’s International Technology Service, to investigate recent developments in tissue engineering and related advanced technologies. The Mission team, comprising a number of high-level experts visited Japan from 7 to 12 April. On 30 June, team leader Professor David Williams FREng, and the rest of the mission’s team, will outline the results of their visit at the Royal Academy of Engineering in London. Several

Pretreating transplanted livers with the immune molecule interleukin-6 (IL-6) dramatically increased survival of rats receiving organs with fatty degeneration–a common condition in humans that typically reduces transplant viability. The results suggest a means of making it possible to use a higher percentage of available donor livers for transplantation in humans. With over three times as many Americans needing transplants as there are available donor livers, an effective approach to increasing the

High-Tech Device Allows Quadriplegic Man to Take Medication Without a Nurse’s Help

Four Johns Hopkins undergraduates have a designed and constructed a computer-guided pill dispensing machine that will enable a quadriplegic man to lead a more independent life. Using a mouth stick, Robert Arthur Williams will be able to order one of up to 12 different medications stored inside the machine. Then, when Williams taps a “slam switch” (he has limited mobility in his right arm), the mac

In the current issue of the Journal of Neuroscience, Johns Hopkins researchers report that injection of human stem cells into the fluid around the spinal cord of each of 15 paralyzed rats clearly improved the animals’ ability to control their hind limbs — but not at all in the way the scientists had expected.

“Our first hypothesis was that functional recovery came from human cells reconstituting the nerve circuits destroyed by the paralysis-inducing virus we gave the rats,” says first

Pelvic floor exercises for men have been found to be highly effective in restoring erectile function according to recently published research. Research at the Faculty of Health and Social Care at the University of the West of England, Bristol, shows that pelvic floor exercises result in the same overall improvement rate seen in a large trial of men taking Viagra.

Fifty-five men with an average age of 59 years who had experienced erectile dysfunction for 6 months or more took part in the tri

A group of scientists from The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) and several other institutions has solved the structure of an antibody that effectively neutralizes human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS).

The antibody binds to sugars on the surface of HIV and effectively neutralizes the virus because of its unique structure, which is described in the latest issue of the journal Science.

“What we found was an unusual conf