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Researchers receive $12M NCI grant to identify biological pathways that lead to prostate cancer risk

Researchers at the USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center have received a $12 million National Cancer Institute grant to lead a multi-institution international project aimed at identifying new biological pathways critical to the development and potential treatment of prostate cancer.

21 Jul 2010

Scientists identify key genes for Silk Road disease

Scientists have identified key genes responsible for a severe inflammatory disease that has spread along the old silk trading routes from the Far East to the edge of Europe.University of Manchester researchers, working as part of a large international consortium, have revealed some of the genetic mutations that lead to Behçet's disease. The group's findings are published in Nature Genetics.

21 Jul 2010

Quantitative capabilities of Helicos' single-molecule sequencing technology demonstrated

Helicos BioSciences Corporation today announced a publication entitled "Amplification-free digital gene expression profiling from minute cell quantities" appearing on line in Nature Methods co-authored by Dr. Daniel A. Haber and colleagues from Massachusetts General Hospital. The paper demonstrates the quantitative capabilities of Helicos' single-molecule sequencing technology and its potential to reveal important genomic differences when minimal numbers of cells are available for analysis.

20 Jul 2010

New approach to understand different cancer subtypes

An international team led by St. Jude Children's Research Hospital scientists finds unique combinations of cells and mutations lie at the heart of cancer subgroup revealed for the first time in a pediatric brain tumor

20 Jul 2010

Jinfiniti Biosciences moves from clinical studies to developing biomarkers

A new biotech company has grown out of laboratory and clinical studies at the Medical College of Georgia with the goal of improving the diagnosis and treatment of diabetes and cancer.

20 Jul 2010

Researchers discover new gene regulation, DNA behavior of breast cancer cells

Cancer researchers have discovered a previously unknown type of gene regulation and DNA behavior in breast cancer cells that may lead to better insight about environmental exposure to estrogen-like compounds. A new study, published in the journal Genome Research by researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center-Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC-James), provides the first evidence that cells can regulate many genes at once by looping their DNA, contributing to cancer when it goes awry. In this study, the gene regulation was discovered in breast cancer cells as a response to the hormone estrogen and resulted in the silencing of 14 genes at one time.

20 Jul 2010

Researchers discover genetic explanation for non-diabetic kidney disease in African-Americans

Kidney disease is a growing public health problem, with approximately half a million individuals in the United States requiring dialysis treatments to replace the function of their failed kidneys. The problem is particularly acute among African-Americans, whose rates of kidney disease are four times higher than those of European Americans.

20 Jul 2010

Tet 1 protein helps stem cells renew themselves and stay pluripotent: Researchers

Take a skin cell from a patient with Type 1 diabetes. Strip out everything that made it a skin cell, then reprogram it to grow into a colony of pancreatic beta cells. Implant these into your patient and voilà! She's producing her own insulin like a pro.

19 Jul 2010

Olig1 and Olig2 genes are associated with Down syndrome, scientists identify

Down syndrome is a well known cause of mental retardation and other medical problems, including early onset of Alzheimer disease. It has long been known that Down syndrome is associated with an individual having an additional copy of chromosome 21. Research findings reported in the July 18 advanced online publication of Nature Neuroscience have narrowed down the critical genetic elements responsible for some aspects of Down syndrome.

19 Jul 2010

Cetuximab recommended for colorectal cancer tumors without mutation in KRAS gene

In a report published in the July 2010 issue of the American Society for Clinical Oncology Post, new recommendations on the use of the drug cetuximab have been issued after officials halted enrollment in a phase III clinical trial in patients with spread of colon cancer into regional lymph nodes whose tumors had been surgically removed.

17 Jul 2010

AMPK may regulate epigenetic mechanism: Research

AMP-activated protein kinase, or AMPK, is a master regulator protein of metabolism that is conserved from yeast to humans. When a cell is low on fuel, AMPK shuts down processes that use energy and turns on processes that produce energy.Biologists have been studying how AMPK works for several decades and know that once it is activated, AMPK turns on a large number of genes by passing the "make more energy" message through numerous signaling cascades in the cell. What was not known, until now, was that AMPK also works via an epigenetic mechanism to slow down or stop cell growth.

17 Jul 2010

Epizyme publishes two new review papers on epigenetics

Epizyme, Inc., a company leading the discovery and development of first-in-class, targeted cancer therapeutics against epigenetic targets, announced today the publication of two new review papers in the area of epigenetics. Together, the articles provide an overview of the major epigenetic enzyme classes, as well as chemical biology approaches for discovering small molecule inhibitors of these epigenetic enzymes, and demonstrate Epizyme's scientific leadership in the area of epigenetics.

17 Jul 2010

Research findings may help identify human TOR kinase inhibitors

A parasite estimated to afflict as many as 12 million people worldwide relies on a family of genes that should make it vulnerable to compounds developed to treat cancer and other disorders, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found.

17 Jul 2010

Largest effort to find gene-environment interactions underlying schizophrenia risk

At the 23rd ECNP Congress 2010 in Amsterdam, Professor Dr. Jim van Os, Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry and Neuropsychology at Maastricht University Medical Centre, The Netherlands, will present the EU-GEI project, involving more than 7,500 patients and their families, which brings together a multidisciplinary research team from 15 countries in the largest effort to date to find gene-environment interactions underlying schizophrenia risk.

16 Jul 2010

Study on how cellular defence systems keep themselves in check from damaging cells themselves

When cells are attacked by bacteria they use all means at their disposal to defend themselves. But cellular defence systems can damage the cells themselves and so need to be kept tightly in check. Recent results help us to understand how this is done and give pointers to new ways of combating disease. Matthias Farlik in the group of Thomas Decker at the Centre for Molecular Biology of the University of Vienna (Max F. Perutz Laboratories) and Mathias Müller of the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna have published these findings in the current issue of the journal "Immunity".

16 Jul 2010

Study compares denture stomatitis genes with whole transcriptome for salivary biomarker analysis

The goal of the study was to compare whole-transcriptome, mucosal gene expression in Candida albicans (a parasitic fungus that can infect the mouth) associated chronic denture stomatitis to that of healthy oral mucosa and perform proteomic analyses of potential salivary biomarkers. Denture stomatitis is a condition in which the mucosa underneath a denture becomes inflamed and sometimes painful.

16 Jul 2010

Researchers develop new strategy for treating multiple myeloma

Multiple myeloma is one of the most common blood cancers, and at present considered to be incurable. In a new study from Uppsala University, researchers now present a conceptually new model for the development and progression of multiple myeloma. The study was done in collaboration with Vrije Universitet Brussels and is published in the July edition of the on-line journal PLoS ONE.

16 Jul 2010

Penn researchers reverse cognitive decline in fruit flies with Alzheimer's gene mutation

Investigators have found that fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) males -- in which the activity of an Alzheimer's disease protein is reduced by 50 percent -- show impairments in learning and memory as they age. What's more, the researchers were able to prevent the age-related deficits by treating the flies with drugs such as lithium, or by genetic manipulations that reduced nerve-cell signaling.

16 Jul 2010

Study reveals improved process to obtain, store RNA from lung tumor biopsies

Analyzing the genes expressed by cancer cells allows for a better understanding of that patient's specific disease and in turn, a more personalized approach to treatment. But obtaining the RNA from a tumor in the lungs in order to conduct the genetic analysis is a challenging prospect. Currently, lung cancer researchers are limited to using RNA extracted from early-stage tumors removed during surgery. The small quantities of tissue extracted during routine diagnostic biopsies have not been useful to researchers, due to their small size and the variety of ways they have been processed.

16 Jul 2010

Study results to help researchers better understand cancer genetics, improve treatment regimens

The largest study to correlate genetics with response to cancer drugs releases its first results today. The researchers behind the study, based at Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, describe in this initial dataset the responses of 350 cancer samples to 18 anticancer therapeutics.

16 Jul 2010

Genes News and Research

Researchers receive $12M NCI grant to identify biological pathways that lead to prostate cancer risk

Scientists identify key genes for Silk Road disease

Quantitative capabilities of Helicos' single-molecule sequencing technology demonstrated

New approach to understand different cancer subtypes

Jinfiniti Biosciences moves from clinical studies to developing biomarkers

Researchers discover new gene regulation, DNA behavior of breast cancer cells

Researchers discover genetic explanation for non-diabetic kidney disease in African-Americans

Tet 1 protein helps stem cells renew themselves and stay pluripotent: Researchers

Olig1 and Olig2 genes are associated with Down syndrome, scientists identify

Cetuximab recommended for colorectal cancer tumors without mutation in KRAS gene

AMPK may regulate epigenetic mechanism: Research

Epizyme publishes two new review papers on epigenetics

Research findings may help identify human TOR kinase inhibitors

Largest effort to find gene-environment interactions underlying schizophrenia risk

Study on how cellular defence systems keep themselves in check from damaging cells themselves

Study compares denture stomatitis genes with whole transcriptome for salivary biomarker analysis

Researchers develop new strategy for treating multiple myeloma

Penn researchers reverse cognitive decline in fruit flies with Alzheimer's gene mutation

Study reveals improved process to obtain, store RNA from lung tumor biopsies

Study results to help researchers better understand cancer genetics, improve treatment regimens

Achieving and maintaining ISO/IEC 27001 and BS 10012 certifications

Expanding research and clinical options for children with cancer

Examining how pain could play a direct protective role in the gut

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