Body

NEW YORK (September 10, 2012) -- An off-patent anti-inflammatory drug that costs around two cents for a daily dose in developing countries has been found by researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College to kill both replicating and non-replicating drug resistant tuberculosis in the laboratory -- a feat few currently approved TB drugs can do, and resistance to those is spreading.

PORTLAND, Ore. — A novel human liver-chimeric mouse model developed at Oregon Health & Science University and Yecuris Corporation has made possible a research breakthrough at Seattle Biomedical Research Institute that will greatly accelerate studies of the most lethal forms of human malaria.

The study findings are published online in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. Study photos were selected to appear in "Scientific Show Stoppers" on the JCI blog.

Ants have four to five times more odor receptors than most other insects, a team of researchers have discovered.

The research team, led by Lawrence Zwiebel at Vanderbilt, recently completed the first full map of olfactory system that provides ants with their sense of taste and smell. They found the industrious insects have genes that make about 400 distinct odorant receptors, special proteins that detect different odors. By comparison, silk moths have 52, fruit flies have 61, mosquitoes range from 74 to 158 and honeybees have 174.

Two different genetic mutations cooperate to induce adrenal cancer, according to a new study from researchers at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center and University of Sao Paulo in Brazil. The finding provides new clues to this rare and deadly cancer type, and researchers hope it will lead to better treatments by targeting both mutations.

About 600 Americans are diagnosed with adrenal cancer per year. It is typically diagnosed in late stages when there is nearly no chance of survival beyond five years.

It's morning, deep in the Amazon jungle. In the still air innumerable leaves glisten with moisture, and fog drifts through the trees. As the sun rises, clouds appear and float across the forest canopy ... but where do they come from? Water vapor needs solid surfaces to condense on. Airborne particles are the seeds of liquid droplets in fog, mist, and clouds.

GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- A study by University of Florida and University of Kansas researchers describing eight new cusk-eel species provides data for better understanding how disasters like the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill impact biodiversity and the environment.

URBANA - A University of Illinois microbial engineer has synthesized a sugar in human milk that is thought to protect babies from pathogens. That's important because 2FL, the shorthand scientists use to describe this human milk oligosaccharide (HMO), has not been added to infant formula because HMOs are incredibly expensive.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Researchers report that myxoma – a pox virus that afflicts rabbits but not humans, dogs or any other vertebrates so far studied – infects several different types of canine cancer cells in cell culture while sparing healthy cells. The study adds to the evidence that viruses or modified viruses will emerge as relatively benign cancer treatments to complement or replace standard cancer therapies.

Joking around can land us in hot water. Even the professionals often shoot themselves comedically in the foot. Last month, comedian Jeffrey Ross's routine at a roast of Rosanne Barr was censored when he joked about the shooting in Aurora, Colorado. "Too soon!" everyone said.

And yet, it's not quite as simple as certain topics being "too soon" to joke about. Two weeks after 9/11, The Onion was able to successfully publish a satirical issue about the terrorist attacks.

So the question is: When are tragedies okay to joke about -- and when are they not?

A program delivering collaborative maternity care resulted in fewer cesarean deliveries, shorter average hospital stays and higher breast-feeding rates for mothers, according to a study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).

Influenza vaccination rates vary widely in Canada by ethnicity, with black and white Canadians being the least likely to be vaccinated, found a new study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).

Research on vaccination rates among ethnic minorities in Canada is scarce, despite many studies in the United States showing clear disparities in vaccination rates among minorities and whites. However, the findings are not the same in Canada given existing differences in vaccine delivery and populations.

Most pharmaceutical drugs in Canada are manufactured overseas in countries such as India, China and others, yet how can we be confident the drug supply is safe, writes a drug policy researcher in an opinion piece in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).

Alarmed by alerts about potentially harmful products such as nonprescription erectile dysfunction drugs with names like Uprizing 2.0 and Ying Da Wang — most from overseas — Alan Cassels began to think about pharmaceutical drugs sold in Canada. Are they safe? Who regulates them?

Tracking malaria parasites in the liver

Iron overload increases the risk for insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes; however, the exact mechanisms that link the two are unknown. In this issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Donald McClain and colleagues at the University of Utah report that serum ferritin levels could predict the presence or absence of metabolic syndrome in humans and were inversely associated with the expression of adiponectin, a blood glucose-regulating protein produced by fat cells (adipocytes).

BOSTON––A molecule that targets the cell's machinery for breaking down unneeded proteins can kill multiple myeloma cancer cells resistant to the frontline drug Velcade, researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have found.

In a study published online by the journal Cancer Cell, the investigators report that the small molecule P5091 triggered apoptosis -- programmed cell death -- in drug-resistant myeloma cells grown in the laboratory and in animals. The anti-myeloma effect was even more powerful when researchers combined P5091 with other therapies.