T Cell News and Research

Latest T Cell News and Research

Researchers detail types of genes necessary for brain

Researchers from Harvard Medical School and Brandeis University have successfully completed a full-genome RNAi screen in neurons, showing what types of genes are necessary for brain development. Details of the screen and its novel methodology are published July 4th in the open-access journal PLoS Genetics.

8 Jul 2008

A paradigm shift for targeted cancer therapy

We already know that recycling benefits our planet; and now new research suggests that the cellular version might be useful for battling cancer.

8 Jul 2008

Japanese encephalitis damages the brain in two ways

Japanese encephalitis (JE), commonly known as brain fever, is one of the prevalent mosquito-borne encephalitis in India and entire South East (SE) Asia.

8 Jul 2008

Novel ways to boost vaccination or natural defenses

Our bodies rely on the production of potent, or 'high affinity', antibodies to fight infection. The process is very complex, yet Sydney scientists have discovered that it hinges on a single molecule, a growth factor, without which it cannot function.

8 Jul 2008

Compound in red wine may prevent breast cancer

Red wine, or rather the natural compound resveratrol found in the red grapes used to make the wine, is in the news again for all the right reasons.

8 Jul 2008

Discovery of new function for an old enzyme in sialidosis

The lack of a single protein usually thought of as a run-of-the-mill enzyme that helps to recycle molecules in cells causes an incurable and often fatal disease of children, according to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital investigators.

7 Jul 2008

Discovery of molecule that kills kidney cancer cells

Kidney cancer patients generally have one option for beating their disease: surgery to remove the organ. But that could change, thanks to a new molecule found by Stanford University School of Medicine researchers that kills kidney cancer cells. Ideally, the researchers said, a drug created from this molecule would help fight the life-threatening disease while leaving patients' kidneys intact.

7 Jul 2008

Radioactive "tag" added to formaldehyde helps monitor body chemistry, disease

Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have devised a simple, fast method for adding a radioactive "tag" to formaldehyde, a common organic chemical.

7 Jul 2008

New method to evaluate variations identified in breast cancer susceptibility genes

Using mouse embryonic stem cells, researchers at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health, have developed a new method to evaluate which mutations, or changes, in a gene known to increase breast cancer susceptibility, may lead to cancer. The new test, called a functional assay, is more comprehensive and reliable than most current methods.

7 Jul 2008

Protein thought to promote cancer instead functions as a tumor suppressor

A protein previously thought to promote colorectal cancer instead suppresses the growth of human cancer cells in culture, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have found.

7 Jul 2008

Resveratrol shown to reduce age related health problems

Researchers in the U.S. have found that a compound found in grapes and red wine can significantly reduce age related health problems.

7 Jul 2008

RNAs emerge as major players in gene regulation

Tiny strands of genetic material called RNA - a chemical cousin of DNA - are emerging as major players in gene regulation, the process inside cells that drives all biology and that scientists seek to control in order to fight disease.

6 Jul 2008

Counting tumor cells in blood predicts treatment benefit in prostate cancer

Counting the number of tumor cells circulating in the bloodstream of patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer can accurately predict how well they are responding to treatment, new results show.

6 Jul 2008

Researchers reveal types of genes necessary for brain development

4 Jul 2008

Breast cancer: How tumor cells break free and form metastases

When tumor cells acquire the capacity to move around and invade other tissues, there is a risk of metastases and cancer treatment becomes more difficult. At the Institut Curie, CNRS Director of Research Philippe Chavrier and his group have just discovered how breast cancer cells break the bonds that tether them to the tumor. The basement membrane around the mammary gland is a barrier to the spread of cancer cells. Three proteins in the tumor cells transport enzymes needed to perforate this barrier, and another protein puts these enzymes in the right place.

4 Jul 2008

Gene technique that alters CCR5-producing gene increases resistance to HIV in mice

Altering the gene that produces CCR5 protein on the surface of immune cells using a harmless virus was found to significantly increase resistance to HIV in mice, according to a study published Sunday in the journal Nature Biotechnology, the Press Trust of India reports (Press Trust of India, 7/1).

4 Jul 2008