Body

Sequencing RNA, not just DNA, could help doctors predict how prostate cancer tumors will respond to treatment, according to research published in the open access journal Genome Biology. Because a tumor's RNA shows the real time changes a treatment is causing, the authors think this could be a useful tool to aid diagnosis and predict which treatment will most benefit individual cancer patients.

New research published in Diabetologia (the journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes) shows that children exposed to gestational diabetes in the wombs of their mothers are themselves around six times more likely to develop diabetes or prediabetes than children not exposed. The research is by Dr Sonia Caprio, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, USA, and colleagues.

COLUMBIA, Mo. – Boron deficiency is one of the most widespread causes of reduced crop yield. Missouri and the eastern half of the United States are plagued by boron deficient soil and, often, corn and soybean farmers are required to supplement their soil with boron; however, little is known about the ways in which corn plants utilize the essential nutrient. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri have found that boron plays an integral role in development and reproduction in corn plants.

UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers have identified a crucial link between high levels of insulin and pathways that lead to obesity, a finding that may have important implications when treating diabetes.

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have found one of the keys to why certain glioblastomas – the primary form of a deadly brain cancer – are resistant to drug therapy. The answer lies not in the DNA sequence of the tumor, but in its epigenetic signature. These findings have been published online as a priority report in the journal Oncotarget.

MINNEAPOLIS – A study is shining new light on a sleep disorder called "sleep drunkenness." The disorder may be as prevalent as affecting one in every seven people. The research is published in the August 26, 2014, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

In states where it is legal to use medical marijuana to manage chronic pain and other conditions, the annual number of deaths from prescription drug overdose is 25 percent lower than in states where medical marijuana remains illegal, new research suggests.

Bottom Line: States that implemented medical marijuana laws appear to have lower annual opioid analgesic overdoses death rates (both from prescription pain killers and illicit drugs such as heroin) than states without such laws although the reason why is not clear.

Author: Marcus A. Bachhuber, M.D., of the Philadelphia Veterans Affairs Medical Center, and colleagues.

Bottom Line: Weekend admission to the hospital for pediatric patients newly diagnosed with leukemia was associated with a longer length of stay, slightly longer wait to start chemotherapy and higher risk for respiratory failure but weekend admissions were not linked to an increased risk for death.

Author: Elizabeth K. Goodman, B.A., of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and colleagues.

Bottom Line: Two female patients achieved clinical remission from the rare, debilitating neurological disease called stiff person syndrome (SPS, which can be marked by a "tin soldier" gait) after an autologous (from your own body) stem cell transplant that eventually allowed them to return to work and regain their previous functioning.

Author: Sheilagh Sanders, M.D., of the University of Ottawa, Canada, and colleagues.

Philadelphia – On average, states allowing the medical use of marijuana have lower rates of deaths resulting from opioid analgesic overdoses than states without such laws. Opioid analgesics, such as OxyContin, Percocet and Vicodin, are prescribed for moderate to severe pain, and work by suppressing a person's perception of pain. A new multi-institutional study, published in JAMA Internal Medicine and led by researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, examined the rate of deaths caused by opioid overdoses between 1999 and 2010.

A protein named p66ShcA shows promise as a biomarker to identify breast cancers with poor prognoses, according to research published ahead of print in the journal Molecular and Cellular Biology.

Cancer is deadly in large part due to its ability to metastasize, to travel from one organ or tissue type to another and malignantly sprout anew. The vast majority of cancer deaths are associated with metastasis.

COLUMBIA, Mo. — A family of proteins that promotes virus entry into cells also has the ability to block the release of HIV and other viruses, University of Missouri researchers have found.

"This is a surprising finding that provides new insights into our understanding of not only HIV infection, but also that of Ebola and other viruses," said Shan-Lu Liu, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor in the MU School of Medicine's Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology.

DURHAM, N.C. -- Scientists searching for new drugs to fight malaria have identified a number of compounds -- some of which are currently in clinical trials to treat cancer -- that could add to the anti-malarial arsenal.

Duke University assistant professor Emily Derbyshire and colleagues identified more than 30 enzyme-blocking molecules, called protein kinase inhibitors, that curb malaria before symptoms start.

The presence of Clostridia, a common class of gut bacteria, protects against food allergies, a new study in mice finds. By inducing immune responses that prevent food allergens from entering the bloodstream, Clostridia minimize allergen exposure and prevent sensitization – a key step in the development of food allergies. The discovery points toward probiotic therapies for this so-far untreatable condition, report scientists from the University of Chicago, Aug 25 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.