Body

Scientists from the University of Leicester and University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) have announced a breakthrough advance in tackling dangerous 'bad' cholesterol in the body.

They have filed two patents for developing targeted drugs that would act as a catalyst for lowering levels of 'bad' cholesterol.

Two research papers published by the academics enhance the understanding of the regulation of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) or "bad" cholesterol.

LANSING, Mich. -- Americans seeking a better night's sleep may need to look no further than tart cherry juice, according to a new study in the European Journal of Nutrition. 1 An international team of researchers found that when adults had two daily glasses of tart cherry juice, they slept 39 minutes longer, on average, and had up to 6 percent increase in overall sleep efficiency (significantly less non-sleep time in bed), compared to when they drank a non-cherry, fruit cocktail.

Professor Roger Short, from the University of Melbourne, and Dr Kara Britt, from Monash University, argue in a comment piece in The Lancet, that since the contraceptive pill reduces overall mortality and mortality specifically linked to ovarian and uterine cancer, nuns should be given the pill for health, rather than contraceptive, reasons.

Fifty years after the pioneering discovery that a protein's three-dimensional structure is determined solely by the sequence of its amino acids, an international team of researchers has taken a major step toward fulfilling a tantalizing promise: predicting the structure of a protein from its sequence alone. This advance could open a series of doors for previously intractable research into important biological processes and development of novel therapeutic drugs.

An unusual regulatory mechanism that controls the swimmer/non-swimmer option in genetically identical Salmonella also impacts the bacteria's ability to cause infection.

University of Washington scientists reported the discovery this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

As Salmonella divides into genetically identical clones, either of the two forms of the bacteria can emerge. Some individuals sport flagella – thin, whip-like projections that propel the bacterium. Others do not.

SAN ANTONIO — Quantitative magnetic resonance imaging measures were associated with prognostic tumor markers, demonstrating the potential of magnetic resonance imaging for prediction of disease prognosis and stratification of patients to appropriate therapies, according to preliminary data presented at the 2011 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, held Dec. 6-10, 2011.

SAN ANTONIO -- Obese patients with early-stage HER2-positive breast cancer may have worse outcomes than patients who are normal weight or overweight, Mayo Clinic researchers found in a study presented today at the 2011 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. HER2-positive breast cancer gets its name from a protein called human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 that promotes cancer cell growth.

PISCATAWAY, NJ – Many young women who steer clear of alcohol while they're in high school may change their ways once they go off to college. And those who take up binge drinking may be at relatively high risk of sexual assault, according to a study in the January issue of the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.

The college years are famously associated with drinking. But little has been known about how young women change their high school drinking habits once they start college.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. – Hospitals are working harder than ever to prevent hospital-acquired infections, but a nationwide survey shows few are aggressively combating the most common one – catheter-associated urinary tract infections.

In the survey by the University of Michigan Health System and the Veterans Affairs Ann Arbor Healthcare Center, as many as 90 percent of U.S. hospitals surveyed increased use of methods to prevent central line-associated bloodstream infections and ventilator-associated pneumonia, between 2005 and 2009.

SAN ANTONIO — Adding pertuzumab to a combination of trastuzumab and docetaxel chemotherapy extended progression-free survival by a median of 6.1 months in patients with metastatic HER2-positive breast cancer compared with patients who received the combination therapy with placebo.

SAN ANTONIO — Data evaluated by an independent review committee revealed that the addition of bevacizumab to trastuzumab and docetaxel significantly improved progression-free survival in HER2-positive breast cancer, despite findings from an investigator assessment that the improvement was present but statistically non-significant.

SAN ANTONIO — Hispanic women are more likely to die from breast cancer than non-Hispanic white women, according to research presented at the 2011 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, held Dec. 6-10, 2011.

San Antonio, TX - In an international Phase III randomized study, everolimus, when combined with the hormonal therapy exemestane, has been shown to dramatically improve progression

San Antonio, TX - In an international Phase III randomized study, everolimus, when combined with the hormonal therapy exemestane, has been shown to dramatically improve progression-free survival, according to research from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.

The Bowel Cancer Screening Programme in England is on track to cut bowel cancer deaths by its target of 16%, reveals an analysis of the first one million test results, published in Gut.

But the results also show a much higher proportion of cancers detected were left sided, suggesting that different strategies may need to be deployed to pick up disease on both sides of the body, as right sided cancers are thought to be more aggressive, say the authors.

Heart disease and stroke are emerging complications of treating prostate cancer with drugs to suppress testosterone production, yet standard management of the disease is ignoring this risk, warn specialists in a viewpoint published online in Heart.

Drugs to suppress production of the male hormone testosterone, known as androgen suppression therapy (AST), are a mainstay of treatment for advanced prostate cancer, write the authors. And there is good evidence to show that they work well.