Roundworm News and Research

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Roundworm infection, or toxocariasis, is a zoonotic disease — a disease that can be transmitted from animals to humans. Dogs and cats are the definitive hosts for the roundworm species that commonly cause human disease.

Scientists discover how new drug kills roundworms

A PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases study found how a new drug developed by scientists in China effectively kills roundworms – "a parasite that lurks in the intestines and which affects nearly two billion people in tropical countries," Reuters reports. "Roundworms are particularly harmful to children and pregnant women," Reuters writes.

12 Aug 2009

microRNAs manipulate cells to one day create safe embryonic-like stem cells

A team of UCSF researchers has for the first time used tiny molecules called microRNAs to help turn adult mouse cells back to their embryonic state.

12 Apr 2009

Research defines neurons that control sociability in worms

Ants colonize. Fish shoal. Flamingos flock and caribou herd. Earth is populated by inherently social beings. Even lowly worms seek out the benefits of companionship.

12 Apr 2009

Scientists show how a neuron gets its shape

Ask a simple question, get a simple answer: When Abraham Lincoln was asked how long a man's legs should be, he absurdly replied, "Long enough to reach the ground."

6 Apr 2009

River blindness under control in Escuintla, Guatemala

An international team of researchers led by Rodrigo Gonzalez of the Universidad del Valle de Guatemala reports that the transmission of onchocerciasis or river blindness has been broken in Escuintla, Guatemala, one of the largest endemic areas in the Western Hemisphere to date to stop the transmission of the parasitic disease.

30 Mar 2009

C. elegans worms may hold key to new treatments for obesity in humans

A previously unknown mutation discovered in a common roundworm holds the promise of new treatments for obesity in humans, McGill University researchers say.

8 Dec 2008

New insights into cell division

Biologists have discovered a mechanism that is critical to cytokinesis -- nature's completion of mitosis, where a cell divides into two identical daughter cells.

5 Dec 2008

Tribendimidine shows promise for intestinal worm infections

Researchers have reported positive results from a safety and efficacy study pertaining to tribendimidine, a broad-based treatment for intestinal worm infections.

14 Oct 2008

You may not be what you eat after all!

A new study shows that increased eating does not necessarily lead to increased fat. The finding in the much-studied roundworm opens the possibility of identifying new targets for drugs to control weight, the researchers say.

3 Jun 2008

Research finds genes and processes that may underlie what makes some people more susceptible to Parkinson's disease

Better understanding of Parkinson's disease onset during aging is important for improving diagnostics and developing strategies for therapeutic intervention.

24 Mar 2008

Scientists identify 25 genes that regulate lifespan

Scientists at the University of Washington and other institutions have identified 25 genes regulating lifespan in two organisms separated by about 1.5 billion years in evolutionary change.

13 Mar 2008

Worm defecation holds clues to widespread cell-to-cell communication process

The focus of two recent Nobel prizes, a species of roundworm has made possible another advance in the understanding of how cells talk to one another, according to a study published online Feb. 21 in the journal Current Biology.

22 Feb 2008

Why we sleep - roundworm C. elegans unlocks sleep mysteries

The roundworm C. elegans, a staple of laboratory research, may be key in unlocking one of the central biological mysteries: why we sleep.

15 Jan 2008

Overexcited neurons not good for cell health

Neurotransmitters have consequences. They initiate events that are critical to a healthy life, giving us the ability to move, to talk, to breathe, to think. But that's if the neurotransmitters are getting it right and sending proper signals downstream to muscle cells, neurons or other cells.

18 Dec 2007

New gene findings show that controls of lifespan and cancer have deep, common roots

A person is 100 times more likely to get cancer at age 65 than at age 35. But new research reported in the journal "Nature Genetics" identifies naturally occurring processes that allow many genes to both slow aging and protect against cancer in the much-studied C. elegans roundworm.

15 Oct 2007

Mechanism for the in-vivo transport of siRNA

It all started with flowers: in the nineties of the last century Norwegian researchers discovered that additional copies of a particular gene in petunias inhibited its activity instead of reinforcing it as had been assumed.

18 Sep 2007

Left-right wiring determined by neural communication in the embryonic worm

Most animals appear symmetrical at first glance, but we're full of internal lop-sidedness.

18 May 2007

Analysis of Rhesus monkey genome provides new clues to primate biology

An international consortium of researchers has published the genome sequence of the rhesus macaque monkey and aligned it with the chimpanzee and human genomes.

12 Apr 2007

How stem cells are regulated

Researchers from Biotech Research & Innovation Centre (BRIC) at University of Copenhagen have identified a new group of proteins that regulate the function of stem cells. The results are published in the new issue of Cell.

22 Feb 2007

Genetic switch that links animal growth and cancer

Laboratory discoveries by scientists at two universities may lead to new directions in cancer therapy drugs. The researchers have discovered that a genetic switch involved in growth and development of an animal is the same one used to prevent normal cells from becoming cancerous.

18 Apr 2006