Health News

Drug protects mice against malaria brain damage and raises levels of a neuroprotective factor in humans

Date: Mar-06-2014
Cerebral malaria is a serious complication of infection with the malaria parasite, affecting approximately one in a thousand children in areas where malaria is common. Many of the patients die, and among those who survive, about a third have lasting cognitive and neurological disabilities, including epilepsy and learning disorders. A study published in PLOS Pathogens shows that a known drug can prevent brain damage in a cerebral malaria mouse model and eliminate subsequent neurological deficits.

Hearing impairment associated with depression in adults, especially women

Date: Mar-06-2014
Hearing impairment (HI) is associated with depression among American adults of all ages, especially women and individuals younger than 70 years. Depression and HI are associated with personal, societal and economic burdens. However, the relationship between depression and HI has not been reported in a national sample of U.S. adults.The authors used data on adults 18 years or older (n=18,318) from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).

Are e-cigarettes encouraging conventional cigarette smoking in adolescents?

Date: Mar-06-2014
Analyzing data from the National Youth Tobacco Survey, a new study published in JAMA Pediatrics debates whether e-cigarettes could be encouraging the use of conventional cigarettes in adolescents.Recently, Medical News Today ran a feature examining the boom in popularity of e-cigarettes, which some experts believe will become more widely used than conventional cigarettes by the next decade.In that feature, we also debated the conflicting data on e-cigarettes from scientific studies and looked at how these - currently unregulated - products might be controlled in the future.

Obese kids: inadequate sleep may increase heart disease risk

Date: Mar-06-2014
Telling adolescents to get enough sleep can sometimes be a tall order, but a new study in The Journal of Pediatrics reminds us just how important a good night's sleep can be. It suggests obese youths who do not get adequate sleep may increase their risk for developing diabetes, heart disease and stroke.The researchers, from the University of Michigan Health System and Baylor University, say the combination of inadequate sleep and obesity has been linked to raised risks of cardiovascular diseases in adults and younger children.

WHO proposes to halve advised daily sugar intake

Date: Mar-06-2014
The World Health Organization has issued draft guidelines calling for a reduction of daily sugar intake to 5% of total daily calories in order to tackle public health problems, such as obesity and tooth decay.In recent years, there has been increasing concern regarding the consumption of "free" sugars. These are defined as sugars that are added to foods by manufacturers - such as glucose, fructose and sucrose - and sugars that are naturally present in fruit juices, fruit concentrates, syrups and honey.

Gene therapy may block HIV without drugs

Date: Mar-06-2014
In a small trial, researchers have successfully used gene therapy to boost the immune system of 12 patients with HIV to resist infection. They removed the patients' white blood cells to edit a gene in them, then infused them back into the patients. Some of the patients who showed reduced viral loads were off HIV drugs completely.In fact, one of the patients showed no detectable trace of HIV at all after therapy.

Gene identified by Purdue scientists may ease the genetic modification of plants

Date: Mar-06-2014
A recent discovery could lead to easier genetic modification of plant varieties considered recalcitrant to standard methods, including varieties of economically important crops.A Purdue University research team identified a gene that influences susceptibility to infection by Agrobacterium tumefaciens, a bacterium that is used as a tool to insert genes into plants to produce traits such as resistance to pests, diseases or harsh environmental conditions or to improve the nutrition or shelf life of a crop.

Determination might be a very human expression

Date: Mar-06-2014
Humans might be using facial expressions of determination as a call for help from others, according to new research.When children and chimpanzees were both given a task that was impossible to solve, children's faces expressed determination or frustration the more they tried to solve the task, but chimpanzees did not.

International stem cell corporation announces positive interim data from primate study Parkinson's disease cell therapy

Date: Mar-06-2014
International Stem Cell Corporation, a California-based biotechnology company developing novel stem cell-based therapies and biomedical products, today announced positive data from the first interim analysis of the ongoing IND-enabling pharmacology/toxicology primate study being conducted under the supervision of Professor D. Eugene Redmond Jr. MD, of Yale University Medical School.

New molecules doom proteins with kiss of death

Date: Mar-06-2014
Like mobsters following strict orders, newly engineered molecules called "ubiquibodies" can mark specific proteins inside a cell for destruction - a molecular kiss of death that is paving the way for new drug therapies and powerful research tools.Led by professor Matthew DeLisa, chemical engineers at Cornell University have developed a new type of antibody, called a "ubiquibody," which is an antibody fragment they have inserted into the natural process known as the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway (UPP).