Health News

Molecular Process Identified In Fat Cells That Influences Stress And Longevity

Date: Sep-28-2012
As part of their ongoing research investigating the biology of aging, the greatest risk factor for type 2 diabetes and other serious diseases, scientists at Joslin Diabetes Center have identified a new factor - microRNA processing in fat tissue - which plays a major role in aging and stress resistance. This finding may lead to the development of treatments that increase stress resistance and longevity and improve metabolism. The findings appear in Cell Metabolism. Over the past several years, it has become clear that fat cells (adipocytes) are more than just repositories to store fat...

Regular Screening Can Eliminate Disparity In Breast Cancer Between Black And White Women

Date: Sep-28-2012
Regular mammography screening can help narrow the breast cancer gap between black and white women, according to a retrospective study published in Breast Cancer Research and Treatment. Earlier studies have shown that black women in Chicago are more than twice as likely to die of breast cancer compared to white women. Black women with breast cancer reach the disease's late stages more often than white women, and their tumors are more likely to be larger and more biologically aggressive...

Tumors Of The Voice Box Can Safely Be Removed Through The Mouth By Robotic Surgery

Date: Sep-28-2012
Robotic surgery though the mouth is a safe and effective way to remove tumors of the throat and voice box, according to a study by head and neck cancer surgeons at the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center - Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC - James).  This is the first report in the world literature illustrating the safety and efficacy of transoral robotic surgery for supraglottic laryngectomy, the researchers say...

Eating Cherries Lowers Risk Of Gout Attacks By 35%

Date: Sep-28-2012
A new study found that patients with gout who consumed cherries over a two-day period showed a 35% lower risk of gout attacks compared to those who did not eat the fruit. Findings from this case-crossover study published in Arthritis & Rheumatism, a journal of the American College of Rheumatology (ACR), also suggest that risk of gout flares was 75% lower when cherry intake was combined with the uric-acid reducing drug, allopurinol, than in periods without exposure to cherries or treatment. Previous research reports that 8.3 million adults in the U.S...

Rhythmical Activity Of Neurons Required For Learning

Date: Sep-28-2012
The hippocampus represents an important brain structure for learning. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich discovered how it filters electrical neuronal signals through an input and output control, thus regulating learning and memory processes. Accordingly, effective signal transmission needs so-called theta-frequency impulses of the cerebral cortex. With a frequency of three to eight hertz, these impulses generate waves of electrical activity that propagate through the hippocampus. Impulses of a different frequency evoke no transmission, or only a much weaker one...

Smoking Relapse Prevention A Healthy Step For New Mothers, Babies

Date: Sep-28-2012
Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center, concerned that women who quit smoking during their pregnancies often resume smoking after they deliver their baby, tested self-help interventions designed to prevent postpartum smoking relapse. "We'd first like to see more women quit smoking when they become pregnant," said Thomas H. Brandon, Ph.D., senior member at Moffitt and chair of the Department of Health Outcomes and Behavior. "However, even among those who do quit, the majority return to smoking shortly after they give birth...

Knowledge Of The Biochemical Events Needed To Maintain Erection May Lead To New Therapies For Erectile Dysfunction

Date: Sep-28-2012
For two decades, scientists have known the biochemical factors that trigger penile erection, but not what's needed to maintain one. Now an article by Johns Hopkins researchers, scheduled to be published this week by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), uncovers the biochemical chain of events involved in that process. The information, they say, may lead to new therapies to help men who have erectile dysfunction. "We've closed a gap in our knowledge," says Arthur Burnett, M.D., professor of urology at Johns Hopkins Medicine and the senior author of the study article...

The Effects Of Aging On Muscles May Be Explained By Inadequate Cellular Rest

Date: Sep-28-2012
Is aging inevitable? What factors make older tissues in the human body less able to maintain and repair themselves, as in the weakening and shrinkage of aging muscles in humans? A new study from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators and collaborators at King's College London describes the mechanism behind impaired muscle repair during aging and a strategy that may help rejuvenate aging tissue by manipulating the environment in which muscle stem cells reside. The report will appear in the journal Nature and has received advance online release...

Dioxin Found To Cause Disease And Reproductive Problems Across Generations And The Effects Could Extend To Great-Grandchildren

Date: Sep-28-2012
Since the 1960s, when the defoliant Agent Orange was widely used in Vietnam, military, industry and environmental groups have debated the toxicity of its main ingredient, the chemical dioxin, and how it should be regulated. But even if all the dioxin were eliminated from the planet, Washington State University researchers say its legacy will live on in the way it turns genes on and off in the descendants of people exposed over the past half century...

Oscillating Microscopic Beads Could Be Key To Biolab On A Chip

Date: Sep-28-2012
If you throw a ball underwater, you'll find that the smaller it is, the faster it moves: A larger cross-section greatly increases the water's resistance. Now, a team of MIT researchers has figured out a way to use this basic principle, on a microscopic scale, to carry out biomedical tests that could eventually lead to fast, compact and versatile medical-testing devices...