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Scientists watch agents of brain-wasting diseases invade and move within brain cells

Scientists for the first time have watched agents of brain-wasting diseases, called transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSE), as they invade a nerve cell and then travel along wire-like circuits to points of contact with other cells.

25 May 2005

Cytogen Corporation and Dowpharma collaborate to create a targeted oncology product designed to treat prostate and other cancers

Under the agreement, Dowpharma's proprietary MeO-DOTA bifunctional chelant technology will be used to radiolabel Cytogen's prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) antibody with a therapeutic radionuclide. PSMA is a protein highly expressed on the surface of prostate cancer cells and the neovasculature of many solid tumors.

10 May 2005

Researchers determine mechanism of action of chemotherapy drug motexafin gadolinium

The chemotherapy drug motexafin gadolinium (brand name: Xcytrin, manufactured by Pharmacyclics, Inc.) works to thwart cancer cells by disrupting key enzymes involved in cellular metabolism, according to a team of researchers led by Joseph Hacia, Ph.D., assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California.

1 May 2005

Autistic children found to have abnormal metabolic profile

Autism, a neurodevelopment disorder which has increased tenfold over the last 15 years, now affects 30 of every 10,000 children in the United States.

4 Apr 2005

Could NAADP/cholecystokinin-combo attack fat from inside and out?

One traditional approach to pharmaceutical design uses so-called “first messengers” – hormones, other natural facilitators or synthetic products – to initiate various cellular cascades for the desired physiological effect. To date, despite concerted efforts at all levels of research, this approach has failed to develop a truly successful obesity drug to address this major global health problem.

3 Apr 2005

Children with autism have a severely abnormal metabolic profile

Chronic biochemical imbalance is often a primary factor in the development of many complex diseases but a possible metabolic basis for autism has not been well explored. Now Arkansas Children's Hospital Research Institute researchers report for the first time that children with autism have a severely abnormal metabolic profile indicating increased vulnerability to oxidative stress.

3 Apr 2005

Discovery could lead to new drug targets for heart disease

Mice with glowing green hearts have yielded the latest clue in the search for molecules involved in structural heart disease. Vanderbilt University Medical Center investigators found that blocking the activity of a single protein, called CaM kinase, in the mouse heart protects against the damaging effects of a heart attack.

30 Mar 2005

Latest findings in male reproduction research

The XVIII North American Testis Workshop, chaired by Population Council senior scientist Matthew Hardy, will be held 30 March - 2 April in Seattle, Washington. Participants will discuss findings from the large body of recent research on male reproduction.

28 Mar 2005

Ultrafast laser detection of cancer cells also may improve understanding of stem cells

To investigate tumors, pathologists currently rely on labor-intensive microscopic examination, using century-old cell-staining methods that can take days to complete and may give false readings.

23 Mar 2005

Tiny scaffolding allows stem cells to become working fat cells

Researchers here have used a new microscopic, three-dimensional scaffolding to coax mouse stem cells to transform themselves into fat cells, and then to function identical to how fat cells naturally do in the body.

22 Mar 2005

Scientists provide insight into the molecular mechanisms behind Listeria monocytogenes

When the bacterium Listeria monocytogenes invades the body, it commandeers its host cell's actin cytoskeleton to invade other cells. In a report published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, a group of scientists provide insight into the molecular mechanisms behind this infection technique.

21 Mar 2005

Revlimid results look promising for multiple myeloma patients

The Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation (MMRF) applauded today's Celgene announcement regarding Revlimid, a new class of novel immunomodulatory drugs currently being evaluated to treat a broad range of hematology and oncology conditions, including multiple myeloma.

8 Mar 2005

Scientists identify immune-system mutation

A team of Fox Chase Cancer Center scientists led by immunologist Dietmar J. Kappes, Ph.D., has identified the genetic mutation that keeps a mouse strain from developing white blood cells, or lymphocytes, called helper T cells. The report by Kappes and his colleagues appears in the Feb. 24 issue of Nature.

27 Feb 2005

New way of transporting medicines into the brain

Dutch researcher Corine Visser investigated a new way of transporting medicines into the brain. Her approach made use of an iron transport system located on the blood-brain barrier. The smaller the medicine, the more easily it penetrates the brain.

13 Feb 2005

Scientists show knocking out key signals will cause diabetes

Using a revolutionary technique to turn off chemical signals inside the cell, scientists at Joslin Diabetes Center have discovered that the different metabolic abnormalities present in type 2 diabetes can be caused by knocking out two key signals in liver cells.

11 Feb 2005

Viagra protects cardiomyocytes against cell death

Virginia Commonwealth University researchers have shown that a widely used drug for treating erectile dysfunction, Viagra, reduces the death of heart cells under heart attack-like conditions in a laboratory model.

31 Jan 2005

Ubiquitination protects against improper Notch signaling

The Notch pathway is an important molecular signaling mechanism whose existence has been known, or at least hinted at, for nearly a century since the identification of a mutant strain of Drosophila fruit flies with "notched" wings in Thomas Hunt Morgan's lab in 1910.

28 Dec 2004

New findings clarify the role of NOD2, a key molecular player in Crohn's Disease

This week, researchers report new findings that clarify the role of NOD2, a key molecular player in Crohn's Disease, in the cellular signaling pathways that control inflammatory responses. NOD2's clinical relevance is clear from the fact that it is encoded by a Crohn's Disease susceptibility gene.

28 Dec 2004

Stem cells use inflammatory signals to find injured tissue

A joint effort led by stem cell biologist Evan Y. Snyder, M.D., Ph.D., of The Burnham Institute, and Samia J. Khoury, M.D., of Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, report data suggesting that stem cells use inflammatory signals to “know” where they must home.

20 Dec 2004

New advances in sickle cell disease

Excruciating pain episodes, recurrent pneumonias, strokes, severe infections, chronic hemolytic anemia, and secondary pulmonary hypertension are common complications of sickle cell disease, a life-threatening inherited defect in blood that causes normally disc-shaped red blood cells to take on a sickle shape.

6 Dec 2004