Body

RICHMOND, Va. (Oct. 23, 2008) – Three Virginia Commonwealth University epidemiologists are downplaying the value of mandatory universal nasal screening of patients for MRSA, arguing that proven, hospital-wide infection control practices can prevent more of the potentially fatal infections.

The pain is debilitating. The only option: smoking medical marijuana. That's the reality for many hepatitis C patients whose road to health includes a liver transplant. Although Canadian transplant centres are more willing than those in the United States, not everyone says yes to liver patients who smoke marijuana, and a University of Alberta researcher says that decision-making process is unacceptable.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – The leading cause of death in all cancer patients continues to be the resistance of tumor cells to chemotherapy, a form of treatment in which chemicals are used to kill cells.

Now a study by UC Riverside biochemists that focuses on cancer cells reports that ingesting apigenin – a naturally occurring dietary agent found in vegetables and fruit – improves cancer cells' response to chemotherapy.

Researchers from McGill University, along with colleagues from the California Institute of Technology, the Curie Institute in Paris, Princeton University and other institutions, have unearthed crystalline magnetic fossils of a previously unknown species of microorganism that lived at the boundary of the Paleocene and Eocene epochs, some 55 million years ago. Their results were published Oct. 21 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Charles Rosenblatt, professor of physics and macromolecular science at Case Western Reserve University, and his research group have developed a method of 3D optical imaging of anisotropic fluids such as liquid crystals, with volumetric resolution one thousand times smaller than existing techniques. A research paper detailing the team's findings appeared in the advanced online publication of Nature Physics.

Researchers at National Jewish Health are testing an investigational treatment to learn if poking holes in the lungs of emphysema patients can immediately help them breathe more easily. Destruction of lung tissue caused by emphysema can leave lungs stiff and overinflated with air that cannot escape. The holes, kept open by small stents inserted during a minimally invasive procedure, could relieve the hyperinflation of the lungs, allowing the healthy parts of the lungs to more easily inflate and take in air.

HOUSTON -- (Oct. 23, 2008) -- A study seeking possible cancer genes elucidated the mutations and the genetic pathways activated in the most common form of lung cancer – lung adenocarcinoma – and could lead to improved diagnosis and treatment, said the director of the Baylor College of Medicine Human Genome Sequencing Center that played a major role in the project led by the National Human Genome Research Institute.

A multi-institution team, funded by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), today reported results of the largest effort to date to chart the genetic changes involved in the most common form of lung cancer, lung adenocarcinoma. The findings should help pave the way for more individualized approaches for detecting and treating the nation's leading cause of cancer deaths.

Scientists today announced the results of the largest genomic study to date of lung adenocarcinoma, the most common form of lung cancer. Led by researchers from the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and other research institutions nationwide, the collaborative study unearthed a variety of genetic alterations in patient tumors and pinpointed 26 frequently altered genes — more than doubling the number already linked to the disease.

BOSTON--Scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have identified a previously undetected trigger point on a naturally occurring "death protein" that helps the body get rid of unwanted or diseased cells. They say it may be possible to exploit the newly found trigger as a target for designer drugs that would treat cancer by forcing malignant cells to commit suicide.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Scientists have taken a critical step toward the development of new and more effective antibacterial drugs by identifying exactly how a specific antibiotic sets up a road block that halts bacterial growth.

The antibiotic, myxopyronin, is a natural substance that is made by bacteria to fend off other bacteria. Scientists already knew that this antibiotic inhibited the actions of an enzyme called RNA polymerase, which sets gene expression in motion and is essential to the life of any cell.

PASADENA, Calif.-- An international team of scientists has discovered microscopic, magnetic fossils resembling spears and spindles, unlike anything previously seen, among sediment layers deposited during an ancient global-warming event along the Atlantic coastal plain of the United States.

The researchers, led by geobiologists from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and McGill University, describe the findings in a paper published online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Children are exposed to a wide range of environmental threats that can affect their health and development early in life, throughout their youth and into adulthood. Writing in a forthcoming issue of the International Journal of Environmental Health scientists from the World Health Organization and Boston University suggest that it is time for both industrialized and developing countries to assess the environmental burden of childhood diseases with the aim of improving children's environments.

A missing piece of the puzzle of how neurons and muscle cells establish lifelong communication has been found by researchers who suspect this piece may be mutated and/or attacked in muscular dystrophy.

Agrin is a protein that motor neurons release to direct construction of the nerve-muscle contact or synapse. MuSK on the muscle cell surface initiates critical internal cell talk so synpases can form and receptors that enable specific commands will cluster at just the right spot.

Researchers at National Jewish Health are testing an investigational treatment to learn if poking holes in the lungs of emphysema patients can immediately help them breathe more easily. Destruction of lung tissue caused by emphysema can leave lungs stiff and overinflated with air that cannot escape. The holes, kept open by small stents inserted during a minimally invasive procedure, could relieve the hyperinflation of the lungs, allowing the healthy parts of the lungs to more easily inflate and take in air.