Health News

Immune cell response triggered by vaccine used to treat cervical precancers

Date: Jan-31-2014
Preliminary results of a small clinical trial show that a vaccine used to treat women with high-grade precancerous cervical lesions triggers an immune cell response within the damaged tissue itself. The Johns Hopkins scientists who conducted the trial said the finding is significant because measuring immune system responses directly in the lesions may be a more accurate way to evaluate so-called "therapeutic" vaccines than by the conventional means of blood analysis.

Potential treatment for childhood illness 'hand, foot and mouth disease'

Date: Jan-31-2014
Researchers have discovered a potential treatment for a viral infection that causes potentially fatal brain swelling and paralysis in children. The findings also point to possible treatments for related viruses including those that cause "common cold" symptoms.The virus, called enterovirus 71 (EV71), causes yearly outbreaks of hand, foot, and mouth disease in Southeast Asian countries including China and Malaysia. Some of the infected children develop encephalitis that can be fatal or result in permanent brain damage. There are no anti-EV71therapeutic agents available.

Targeting 'sleeper agent' cells in bones of prostate cancer patients

Date: Jan-31-2014
Dormant prostate cancer cells in bone tissue can be reawakened to cause secondary tumours, according to new research published in Endocrine-Related Cancer. Targeting the wake-up call could prevent metastasis and improve prostate cancer survival rates.Metastasis is the spread of cancer from one organ to another and is a highly complex process, involving cancer cells breaking away from a primary tumour, travelling to a distant organ and colonising it. Cancer cells that fail to form a tumour in the newly-encountered tissue can fall into a dormant state.

Younger women benefit from mammography

Date: Jan-31-2014
Researchers from University Hospitals (UH) Case Medical Center and Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine have published new findings in the February issue of American Journal of Roentgenology that mammography remains beneficial for women in their 40s. According to the study, women between ages 40 and 49 who underwent routine screening mammography were diagnosed at earlier stages with smaller tumors and were less likely to require chemotherapy.In recent years, there have been contradictory guidelines related to the benefit of annual mammograms for women in their 40s.

Computer algorithm identifies genes whose activation is lethal to bacteria

Date: Jan-31-2014
Like little factories, cells metabolize raw materials and convert them into chemical compounds. Biotechnologists take advantage of this ability, using microorganisms to produce pharmaceuticals and biofuels. To boost output to an industrial scale and create new types of chemicals, biotechnologists manipulate the microorganisms' natural metabolism, often by "overexpressing" certain genes in the cell. But such metabolic engineering is hampered by the fact that many genes become toxic to the cell when overexpressed.

New ultrasound technique provides alternate way to visualize tumors

Date: Jan-31-2014
While ultrasound provides a less expensive and radiation-free alternative to detecting and monitoring cancer compared to technologies such as X-rays, CT scans, and MRIs, ultrasound has seen limited use in cancer treatment due to clarity and resolution issues. But researchers at the UNC School of Medicine have overcome this limitation by combining ultrasound with a contrast agent composed of tiny bubbles that pair with an antibody that many cancer cells produce at higher levels than do normal cells.

How Congress will alter the science landscape in 2014

Date: Jan-31-2014
The Congressional agenda for 2014 includes science issues with far-reaching implications for an array of issues including public health, job growth, pharmaceutical research and energy, according to an article in Chemical & Engineering News, the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society. The mid-term elections occurring this fall, however, promise to complicate progress on key legislative efforts, already stymied by a bitter partisan atmosphere.

Potential drug targets, similarities to several cancers revealed by TCGA bladder cancer study

Date: Jan-31-2014
Investigators with The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) Research Network have identified new potential therapeutic targets for a major form of bladder cancer, including important genes and pathways that are disrupted in the disease. They also discovered that, at the molecular level, some subtypes of bladder cancer - also known as urothelial carcinoma - resemble subtypes of breast, head and neck and lung cancers, suggesting similar routes of development.

Kidney donation and other altruistic acts more common in states with high well-being

Date: Jan-31-2014
People are much more likely to decide to donate a kidney to a stranger - an extraordinarily altruistic act - in areas of the United States where levels of well-being are high, according to a new study."Anywhere from 11% to 54% of adults say that they'd be willing to consider altruistic kidney donation, but only a tiny fraction of them actually become donors," says psychological scientist Abigail Marsh of Georgetown University, senior author on the study. "Our work suggests that subjective well-being may be a factor that 'nudges' some adults into actually donating.

Increasing incidence of wildfires may significantly degrade air quality, health in the future

Date: Jan-31-2014
As the American West, parched by prolonged drought, braces for a season of potentially record-breaking wildfires, new research suggests these events not only pose an immediate threat to people's safety and their homes, but also could take a toll on human health, agriculture and ecosystems. The study, appearing in ACS' journal Environmental Science & Technology, could help societies map out a plan to mitigate these effects in wildfire-prone regions.Matthew D. Hurteau and colleagues point out that wildfires naturally occur in many areas around the globe.