Body

PULLMAN, Wash. – A class of drugs used to treat parasitic infections such as malaria may also be useful in treating cancers and immune-related diseases, a new WSU-led study has found.

Researchers discovered that simple modifications to the drug furamidine have a major impact on its ability to affect specific human proteins involved in the on-off switches of certain genes.

RICHLAND, Wash. -- Tiny electrical wires protrude from some bacteria and contribute to rock and dirt formation. Researchers studying the protein that makes up one such wire have determined the protein's structure. The finding is important to such diverse fields as producing energy, recycling Earth's carbon and miniaturizing computers.

In the quest for fusion energy on earth, researchers use magnetic fields to insulate hot plasma from the walls of the chamber to maintain the reaction and prevent damage to interior surfaces. In the tokamak, a leading contender to achieve a sustained fusion burn, electrical currents flowing in the plasma inside the doughnut-shaped vacuum chamber can become unstable if the plasma current or pressure gets too high or the control system breaks, leading to a sudden termination of the discharge.

(Nov. 12, 2013) — The American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association today released a new clinical practice guideline to help primary care clinicians better identify adults who may be at high risk for developing atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, potentially serious cardiovascular conditions caused by atherosclerosis, and who thus may benefit from lifestyle changes or drug therapy to help prevent it.

Atherosclerosis is a buildup of plaque that can eventually harden and narrow the arteries, potentially leading to heart attack and stroke.

(Nov. 12, 2013) — Healthcare providers are on the front line of the obesity epidemic – poised to identify who needs to lose weight for health reasons and in a prime position to direct successful weight loss efforts. The American Heart Association, American College of Cardiology and Obesity Society have developed comprehensive treatment recommendations to help healthcare providers tailor weight loss treatments to adult patients affected by overweight or obesity.

(Nov. 12, 2013) — The American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association today released a new clinical practice guideline for the treatment of blood cholesterol in people at high risk for cardiovascular diseases caused by atherosclerosis, or hardening and narrowing of the arteries, that can lead to heart attack, stroke or death.

(Nov. 12, 2013) — Eating an overall heart-healthy diet and being physically active is critical for preventing heart attacks, strokes and other cardiovascular diseases according to a new lifestyle guideline.

Viewed as one of the most feared outcomes of breast cancer treatment, doctors struggle detecting and diagnosing breast-cancer related Lymphedema--a condition affecting the lymphatic system and causing psychosocial distress and physical challenges for patients.

Modulating the hormonal environment in which endometrial cancers grow could make tumors significantly more sensitive to a new class of drugs known as PARP inhibitors, UCLA researchers have shown for the first time.

The findings could lead to a novel one-two punch therapy to fight endometrial cancers and provide an alternative option for conventional treatments that, particularly in advanced disease, have limited efficacy.

Pancreatic cancer death rates in whites and blacks have gone in opposite directions over the past several decades in the United States, with the direction reversing in each ethnicity during those years. The finding comes from a new study by American Cancer Society researchers, who say the rising and falling rates are largely unexplainable by known risk factors, and who call for urgent action for a better understanding of the disease in order to curb increasing death rates. The study appears early online in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Arlington, Va. — CONRAD Head of drug delivery, Meredith Clark, PhD, today presented preclinical data on a new intravaginal ring that provides contraception as well as HIV-1 and HSV-2 prevention at the 2013 American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) Annual Meeting and Exposition in San Antonio, Texas. This multipurpose prevention technology (MPT) can remain in the vagina for up to 90 days and releases the contraceptive levonorgestrel (LNG) and tenofovir (TFV), an antiretroviral that inhibits HIV and HSV replication in susceptible cells.

WASHINGTON, Nov. 14, 2013 — The latest episode in the American Chemical Society's (ACS') award-winning Global Challenges/Chemistry Solutions podcast series highlights a first-of-its-kind process that can convert vegetable and animal fats and oils into a key ingredient for plastics. The development could lead to a more sustainable source of the ingredient, which currently comes from petroleum.

DETROIT — Collaborating with researchers from the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, a research team at Wayne State University's School of Medicine led by Kezhong Zhang, Ph.D., has contributed to an important discovery in the inflammatory stress mechanism and specific inhibitor for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis.

The immune system is a double-edged sword. While its primary role is to fight infections, it can also become overactive, leading to problems like allergies and autoimmune diseases.

For example, the part of the immune system responsible for resisting parasites acts by releasing white blood cells called eosinophil granulocytes into the blood. But elevated eosinophil levels are also responsible for allergic reactions, including most forms of asthma, gastrointestinal diseases, blood disorders, and cancers.

The normal height to which plants grow is a critical trait. In the wild Arabidopsis thaliana uses the same genetic changes in the biosynthesis of the growth factor gibberellin to cut its size in half as found in semi-dwarf varieties of rice and barley that have been bred by people. When expressing the same phenotype, various plant species apparently fall back on the same genes in their genotype. There must therefore be so-called "hot spots" whose repeated mutation produces the same traits that are beneficial in some conditions.