Body

AUSTIN, Texas—Molecular biologists at The University of Texas at Austin have solved one of the mysteries of how double-stranded RNA is remodeled inside cells in both their normal and disease states. The discovery may have implications for treating cancer and viruses in humans.

The research, which was published this week in Nature, found that DEAD-box proteins, which are ancient enzymes found in all forms of life, function as recycling "nanopistons." They use chemical energy to clamp down and pry open RNA strands, thereby enabling the formation of new structures.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Scientists have restored the sense of smell in mice through gene therapy for the first time -- a hopeful sign for people who can't smell anything from birth or lose it due to disease.

The achievement in curing congenital anosmia -- the medical term for lifelong inability to detect odors -- may also aid research on other conditions that also stem from problems with the cilia. Those tiny hair-shaped structures on the surfaces of cells throughout the body are involved in many diseases, from the kidneys to the eyes.

Calcium is required for the function of the nervous, muscular, and skeletal systems and must be maintained within a very narrow range in the blood. When blood calcium levels are too low, the parathyroid secretes parathyroid hormone (PTH), triggering increased absorption of dietary calcium in the intestines and removal of calcium from bones.

When calcium levels are too high, calcium-sensing receptors (CaSR) on the parathyroid block the release of PTH and increase uptake of calcium by the kidneys for excretion in urine.

Aberrant regulation of cell growth pathways is required for normal cells to become cancerous, and in many types of cancer, cell growth is driven by a group of enzymes known as receptor tyrosine kinases (RTKs).

The RTK epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is overexpressed in over 30% of breast cancers; however, drugs that target RTKs, known as tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) have not been effective in treating breast cancer.

Researchers believe that the cancer cells escape TKIs by circumventing the RTKs and utilizing other enzymes that are not TKI-sensitive.

A population-based case-control study of the rare but devastating neurological disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) has shown that the risk of such disease is increased among smokers, as has been shown previously. However, surprisingly, the risk of ALS was found to be markedly lower among consumers of alcohol than among abstainers.

Staph infections are responsible for an increasing number of life threatening infections and the bacteria that cause these infections are widespread in the community and the health care system.

The bacterium Staphylococcus aureus normally resides on skin and in noses and typically infects tissues through cuts or rashes. The infections can remain minor, but they can also lead to illnesses ranging from abscesses and boils to necrotizing skin infections, pneumonia, or blood stream infections.

Vienna, Austria: New research has shown that despite electronic cigarettes being marketed as a potentially safer alternative to normal cigarettes, they are still causing harm to the lungs.

A new study, presented today (Sunday 2 September 2012) at the European Respiratory Society's Annual Congress in Vienna, has added new evidence to the debate over the safety of alternative nicotine-delivery products.

Second-generation antipsychotics (SGAs) for treating schizophrenia were developed to address the safety and efficacy issues associated with first-generation antipsychotics (FGAs).

Today, three-quarters of adult patients prescribed antipsychotic medications take SGAs, accounting for 93 percent of the $2.8 billion spent each year on these medications. But recent published articles have questioned whether there are clinically important differences in patient outcomes between FGAs and SGAs.

Antibodies play an essential role in protecting against viral infection by preventing viral entry into host cells and eliminating cells infected with virus. A few viruses, including HIV and SIV, have developed mechanisms to evade the body's antibody response, allowing the virus to persist and making it very difficult to develop effective vaccines.

Muscular dystrophy is a complicated set of genetic diseases in which genetic mutations affect the various proteins that contribute to a complex that is required for a structural bridge between muscle cells and the extracellular matrix (ECM) that provides the physical and chemical environment required for their development and function. The affects of these genetic mutations in patients vary widely, even when the same gene is affected.

Vienna, Austria: Children who are exposed to polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), which were commonly used in a range of industrial products, could be at risk of an increase in asthma symptoms, according to new research.

The study will be presented in a poster discussion this week (Sunday 2 September 2012) at the European Respiratory Society's Annual Congress in Vienna.

In a recent paper published in the Journal of Animal Science, meat scientists report that a method called blast chilling could affect pork tenderness. Researchers at the USDA-ARS, Roman L. Hruska US Meat Animal Research Center (USMARC) recently conducted a study that compares pork longissimus muscle (LM) tenderness and other meat quality traits between different stunning methods and carcass chilling rates at slaughter facilities.

Prostate cancer in African-American men is associated with specific changes in the IL-16 gene, according to researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine.

The study, published online in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, establishes the association of IL-16 with prostate cancer in men of both African and European descent.

"This provides us with a new potential biomarker for prostate cancer," says principal investigator Rick Kittles, UIC associate professor of medicine in hematology/oncology.

Obesity rates in North America are a growing concern for legislators. Expanded waistlines mean rising health-care costs for maladies such as diabetes, heart disease and some cancers. One University of Alberta researcher says that if people do not take measures to get healthy, they may find that governments will throw their weight into administrative measures designed to help us trim the fat.

DETROIT — While many might see the case for programs to prevent adolescent cigarette smoking as already made, a pair of Wayne State University researchers believes that due to increasingly challenging economic times, policymakers need to be reminded to continue allocating funding for such programs.

Xinguang Chen, M.D., Ph.D., professor of pediatrics in the School of Medicine, and Feng Lin, Ph.D., professor of electrical and computer engineering in the College of Engineering, have found a way to provide policymakers with some hard evidence.