New study will tackle three major killer diseases
...lative roles of inheritance and the environment in causing these diseases, and will include a search for any genes that predispose strongly to illness. The volunteers taking part in the project will have the benefit of a health check and will also be contributing to improving the health of the community in O...T cell's memory may offer long-term immunity to leishmaniasis
...f cutaneous leishmaniasis, which infects the skin, causing scarring boils, and 500,000 new cases of visceral leishmaniasis, which infects internal organs, causing death if left untreated. Particularly vexing to researchers has been the fa...Cooperation to create a new tuberculosis vaccine
...btained with our DNA vaccines against the parasite causing leishmaniasis we assume that our technology can also protect against the bacteria causing TB. With Stefan Kaufmann and the MPI-IB we have found a highly renowned and experienced partner for ...Touching research: How white blood cells navigate
...g them to boost the body's immune response without causing side effects. Engineers are already working on devices that could filter out harmful cells by making them stick, and devices that capture rare but crucial cells such as stem cells and then release them as needed. The team brings a unique engineering...Channel protein converts vibrations to electrical signal
...ms an ion channel that opens in response to sound, causing electrical impulses that communicate the pitch, vo...The dye entered the normal cells, accumulating and causing them to glow. In cells where TRPA1 had been reduced, however, less dye was able to enter the cells ...Researchers find protein that makes long-term memory possible
...itters. A neuron generates an electrical impulse, causing the cell to release its neurotransmitters. The neurotransmitters, in turn, bind to special sites, or receptors, on nearby neurons. The recipient neurons then generate their own electrical impulses and release their own neurotransmitters, triggering...The long road to a promising malaria vaccine started at NYU School of Medicine
.... Malaria afflicts hundreds of millions of people, causing up to 3 million deaths every year, mostly in sub-S... various species of the parasite called Plasmodium causing malaria. They found that the CS protein coats the parasite when it is in the salivary glands of the ......articular cartilage, means the bones rub together, causing pain and loss of movement. Risk factors for osteoarthritis include age and family history. If we could understand the molecular mechanisms that create and maintain articular cartilage, it might be possible to discover what goes wrong in our joints a...Gene-altered mouse is model for rare autoimmune syndrome
...he person's tear and salivary glands are affected, causing dry eyes and mouth, as they are damaged by an attack of the person's own immune cells. According to researchers, the achievement not only offers insight into Sjgren's syndrome, but into the general developmental machinery of the immune system. The...Genetically modified parasite lets researchers probe immune system's memory
...infects approximately 12 million people worldwide, causing significant death and disfigurement. It may also help efforts to develop vaccines for other pathogens including AIDS and tuberculosis. Scientists have known that successful recovery from Leishmania infection immunizes humans and animals against subse...Gene for Joubert syndrom with excessive brain folds discovered by UCSD researchers and Harvard team
...ndrome is relatively rare, we think that the genes causing this condition are going to underlie more common childhood brain and behavioral abnormalities, such as autism, mental retardation, and poor coordination" said the UCSD paper's senior author, Joseph Gleeson, M.D., assistant professor of neurosciences ...International human genome sequencing consortium describes finished human genome sequence
...that have recently acquired one or more mutations, causing them to stop functioning, or "die." Scientists pinpointed these non-functioning genes, referred to as pseudogenes, in the human genome by aligning them with the mouse and rat genomes, in which the corresponding genes have maintained their functionali...Pesticides may promote Parkinson's disease and exercise may offer protection
... that chronic pesticide exposure may be capable of causing parkinsonian pathology in humans." The results also support epidemiological studies that suggest that chronic exposure to environmental toxins, such as pesticides, may contribute to the incidence of Parkinson's in humans. In this pilot study, two mo...Sandbagging cancer in the bloodstream
...thin blood vessels, Src kinases respond to this by causing the vascular cell cadherins to break apart and allow the tumor cell to get out of the circulation and into an environment where the tumor cell can survive and propagate. Blocking the Exits Targeting growth factors like VEGF or its downstream tar...Insects implicated in the evolution of new human infectious diseases
...uberculosis, which has been shown to be capable of causing disease insects, at least in the laboratory. Evidence suggests that the plague could have evolved from a close insect-pathogenic ancestor as little as 1,500 years ago, an eye blink in evolutionary time, suggesting that similar scenarios are possible ...Yerkes researchers to present array of new data at Society for Neuroscience Meeting
...es' opposite social behaviors and implicate CRF in causing monogamy. determined changes in gene activity of monogamous female prairie voles in the nucleus accumbens (NA), the areas of the brain associated with reward and feelings of pleasure, may explain the cellular processes responsible for social bond ...Academics work to help stressed-out cats
...cats' environments and temperaments which might be causing this condition." This latest, questionnaire-based ...e there is a conflict, this is a chronic situation causing long-term stress. We concluded that this is a significant factor in the development FIC, and will be...Mail-order drugs exposed to extreme heat become less effective
...atures can affect medications in just a few hours, causing them to deliver inaccurate dosages, making the medications less effective," said the study's lead author Gregory T. Chu, MD, FCCP, Carl T. Hayden Veterans Affairs Medical Center and Banner Good Samaritan Medical Center, Phoenix, AZ. "For patients wi...Common household fragrances may be harming aquatic wildlife, study finds
...d shampoos we casually rinse down the drain may be causing long-term damage to aquatic wildlife downstream by interfering with the animals' natural ability to eliminate toxins from their system, according to a new Stanford University study published by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Writing in the ...UCLA and Univ. of Utah researchers identify how a hormone regulates iron
... in not enough iron released into the blood stream causing chronic anemia. "We have defined how the hormone hepcidin regulates the accumulation of iron by the body," says Jerry Kaplan, Ph.D., one of the study's principal authors and a professor of pathology and assistant vice president for basic science at t...