Health News

Temps up, blood pressures down in hot yoga study

Taking hot yoga classes lowered blood pressure in a small study of adults with elevated or stage 1 hypertension, according to preliminary research presented at the American Heart Association’s Hypertension 2019 Scientific Sessions. While there is evidence of regular, room-temperature yoga’s positive effect on blood pressure, little is known about hot yoga’s potential impact on […]

Health News

Fragmenting ions and radiation sensitizers

A new study using mass spectrometry is helping piece together what happens when DNA that has been sensitized by the oncology drug 5-fluorouracil is subjected to the ionising radiation used in radiotherapy. The anti-cancer drug 5-fluorouracil (5FU) acts as a radiosensitizer: it is rapidly taken up into the DNA of cancer cells, making the cells […]

Health News

Scientists developing way to help premature babies breathe easier: Study points to possible cell therapy for bronchopulmonary dysplasia

Researchers suggest a possible cell-based therapy to stimulate lung development in fragile premature infants who suffer from a rare condition called Bronchopulmonary Dysplasia (BPD), which in the most severe cases can lead to lifelong breathing problems and even death. Scientists at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center report in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical […]

Health News

Molecular chatter makes for a ‘hot tumor’

A Ludwig Cancer Research study has deciphered a complex molecular conversation between cancer and immune cells that is key to orchestrating the successful invasion of tumors by T cells that kill cancer cells. “We show that two key chemokines, CCL5 and CXCL9, are universally implicated in T cell infiltration across all solid tumors,” said George […]

Health News

Scientists uncover binding secret behind protein ‘superglue’: Mechanism found in Chinese herb helps to create lab-grown enzymes that may speed up drug development

Scientists from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) have pinpointed how a special class of plant-derived enzymes, known as peptide ligases, work to join proteins together. Such binding is an important process in the development of drugs, for example in specifically attaching a chemotherapy drug to an antibody that recognises tumour markers to target cancer […]

Health News

Protein that hinders advancement of prostate cancer identified

Researchers at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) have discovered that blocking a specific protein, may be a promising strategy to prevent the spread of castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC). Under the direction of BUSM’s Gerald V. Denis PhD, researchers have long studied a family of three closely related proteins, called BET bromodomain proteins, composed of […]

Health News

New ways to generate stem cells more efficiently

Induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells are among the most important tools in modern biomedical research, leading to new and promising possibilities in precision medicine. To create them requires transforming a cell of one type, such as skin, into something of a blank slate, so it has the potential to become virtually any other kind of […]

Health News

Fishing for cures: New zebrafish model identifies drugs that kill pediatric cancer cells

A new animal model developed by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators promises to be less expensive, easier to use and to improve personalized therapies for cancers and potentially other diseases. In their paper published online in Cell, the investigators describe using their immunodeficient zebrafish model to visualize drug responses at single-cell resolution in live animals. […]