Degenerative Disease News and Research

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Researchers pursuing new approach to treating arthritis

Researchers at ETH Zurich, Empa and the Norwegian research institute SINTEF are pursuing a new approach to treating arthritis.

23 Aug 2017

Scientists reveal differences between human and murine microglia used in degenerative disease research

The results of a new research showed that many of the genes that are expressed by microglia are different between humans and mice, which are frequently used as animal models in research on Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative disorders.

18 Aug 2017

Drug blocked by regulators found to improve quality of life for MS patients

A drug that is blocked by the EU regulatory system has now been found to improve the quality of life of people with multiple sclerosis (MS), according to a study by Queen Mary University of London.

18 Aug 2017

Study: Patients operated by higher volume mitral surgeons experience lower mortality and reoperations

Surgeons who perform more than 25 mitral valve operations a year are more likely to perform repairs that are durable, and their patients are more likely to be alive a year after the operation, than when operations are performed by lower-volume surgeons, an Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai study has found.

3 May 2017

Newly-discovered mechanism for compound may help prevent neurologic damage

Researchers at Oregon State University have found that a compound called rapamycin has unusual properties that may help address neurologic damage such as Alzheimer's disease.

5 Apr 2017

New test could accelerate development of better treatments for Motor Neuron Disease

A cutting-edge test developed in South Australia has the potential to expedite the worldwide quest to develop better treatments, or even a cure, for the Motor Neuron Disease (MND).

24 Feb 2017

Hand-grip test proves to be easy, reliable way to examine muscle strength decline in PD patients

UBC researchers Jenn Jakobi and Gareth Jones, both Health and Exercise Sciences professors at UBC's Okanagan campus, recently completed a study that examined the methods used to monitor the progressive advancement of Parkinson's disease (PD)--a degenerative disease that affects the central nervous system.

1 Feb 2017

Scientists investigate role of mitochondria in Alzheimer's disease pathology

On Nov. 25, 1901, a 51-year-old woman is admitted to a hospital in Frankfurt, Germany, displaying a bizarre constellation of symptoms.

8 Nov 2016

Brain inflammation may have direct involvement in development of chronic traumatic encephalopathy

For the first time, researchers have shown that inflammation in the brain may have direct involvement in the development of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). In addition, they found that the number of years one plays contact sports may predict the occurrence of CTE and that this association is partly due to increased inflammation in the brain.

3 Nov 2016

Two leading non-profit organizations sign strategic affiliation to hasten drug development

The Scripps Research Institute and the California Institute for Biomedical Research - two leading non-profit research organizations - today announced the signing of a strategic affiliation that combines the two organizations into a new biomedical research entity with the tools and know-how to rapidly translate its scientific discoveries into life-saving medicines for the public benefit.

20 Oct 2016

First-ever neuroscience conference to explore ultra-personal approach to brain health

For three days this week, Roanoke, Virginia, is the capital of the precision neuroscience world.

7 Oct 2016

Novel device for mitral valve repair shows success in human study

Researchers investigating a novel device to repair the mitral heart valve report 100 percent procedural success in a safety and performance study, the first such study done in humans.

19 Jul 2016

New imaging methods could help identify early stages of arthrosis

Arthrosis, a degenerative disease that affects the joints, becomes more common as people become older. The disease is becoming increasingly common among older people in Finland as well. Arthrosis is currently the subject of research in a number of projects funded by the Academy of Finland.

26 May 2016

Key gene changes reveal four previously unknown conditions within schizophrenia

Changes in key genes clearly define four previously unknown conditions within the umbrella diagnosis of schizophrenia, according to a study led by researchers from NYU Langone Medical Center published online April 28 in EBioMedicine, a Lancet journal. Cases associated with changes in each of the four genes were different from each other in terms of symptoms, intelligence level and other disease features.

29 Apr 2016

Removing immunomodulatory protein improves symptoms of muscular dystrophy in mice

Removing an immunomodulatory protein called osteopontin improves the symptoms of mice with muscular dystrophy by changing the type of macrophages acting on damaged muscle tissue, according to a paper published in The Journal of Cell Biology.

19 Apr 2016

Computational method helps assess patient-specific progression of osteoarthritis in knee joint

Osteoarthritis is a degenerative disease in which the articular cartilage protecting the joint starts to degenerate and wear off over time. The main risk factors of osteoarthritis are advanced age and overweight-induced significant stresses on the knee joint.

25 Mar 2016

UW-Madison neuroscientist discover genetic machinery that causes maturation in young nerve cells

In one of the first studies to 'read' the genetic activity inside individual brain cells, University of Wisconsin-Madison neuroscientist Xinyu Zhao has identified the genetic machinery that causes maturation in a young nerve cell. The cells under study came from the hippocampus, a memory-related structure that is the only place in a mammal's brain where new neurons can form throughout life.

18 Mar 2016

SOM0226 (tolcapone) drug could significantly improve pharmacological treatment of ATTR

Researchers at the Institute of Biotechnology and Biomedicine, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (IBB-UAB), in collaboration with the biopharmaceutical company SOM Biotech, located in the Barcelona Science Park (PCB), have published, in Nature Communications, the results of a drug repositioning study in which they describe a powerful drug, SOM0226 (tolcapone) that could significantly improve the pharmacological treatment of familial transthyretin amyloidosis (ATTR).

24 Feb 2016

Study illuminates ways to better treat knee meniscus tears, other injuries

Fibrocartilage tissue in the knee is comprised of a more varied molecular structure than researchers previously appreciated, according to a new study by researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Delaware.

11 Jan 2016

CTE can be diagnosed by neuropathological examination of brain tissue

For the first time, CTE has been confirmed as a unique disease that can be definitively diagnosed by neuropathological examination of brain tissue. A consensus panel of expert neuropathologists concluded that CTE has a pathognomonic signature in the brain, an advance that represents a milestone for CTE research and lays the foundation for future studies defining the clinical symptoms, genetic risk factors and therapeutic strategies for CTE.

16 Dec 2015