EurekAlert! - National Institutes of Health

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Nature Medicine
Joslin scientists advance understanding of human brown adipose tissue and grow new cells
Joslin scientists report significant findings about the location, genetic expression and function of human brown adipose tissue (BAT) and the generation of new BAT cells.

NIH/National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, Harvard University, Harvard Stem Cell Institute, Eli Lilly Foundation

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

International Journal of Cancer
Screening detects ovarian cancer using neighboring cells
Pioneering biophotonics technology developed at Northwestern University is the first screening method to detect the early presence of ovarian cancer in humans by examining cells easily brushed from the neighboring cervix or uterus, not the ovaries themselves. The results have the potential to translate into a minimally invasive early detection method using cells collected by a swab, exactly like a pap smear.

National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B
For development in Brazil, 2 crops are better than 1
Brazil is in the midst of an explosion of agricultural production, but who is profiting from that production -- wealthy land owners and investors or average Brazilians is the subject of debate. New research from Brown University suggests that at least one type of agricultural intensification -- double cropping -- is associated with increases in development measures for rural Brazilians.

NASA, National Institutes of Health

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Gone, but not forgotten
An international team of neuroscientists has described for the first time, in exhaustive detail, the underlying neurobiology of an amnesiac who suffered from profound memory loss after damage to key portions of his brain.

Medical Research Service, Department of Veterans Affairs, NIH/National Institute of Mental Health, Nuclear Energy Institute

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Journal of the American Chemical Society
Scientists map all possible drug-like chemical compounds
Drug developers may have a new tool to search for more effective medications and new materials. It's a computer algorithm that can model and catalog the entire set of lightweight, carbon-containing molecules that chemists could feasibly create in a lab.

National Institutes of Health

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Applied and Environmental Microbiology
Scientists cage dead zebras in Africa to understand the spread of anthrax
Scavengers might not play as key a role in spreading anthrax through wildlife populations as previously assumed, according to findings from a small study conducted in Etosha National Park in northern Namibia.

German Research Foundation, National Institutes of Health, NIH/National Institute of General Medical Sciences

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Obesity
Study: Physicians less likely to 'bond' with overweight patients
In a small study of 39 primary care doctors and 208 of their patients, Johns Hopkins researchers have found that physicians built much less of an emotional rapport with their overweight and obese patients than with their patients of normal weight.

NIH/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013
Hasbro Children's Hospital physician receives $3.2 million grant to study teen alcohol use
Hasbro Children's Hospital emergency medicine physician James Linakis, M.D., Ph.D, was recently awarded a five-year, $3.2 million grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism at the National Institutes of Health to validate a more efficient test to screen teenagers for future alcohol abuse and other risk behaviors.

NIH/National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013
Wayne State researchers seek calcium channels to target cancer tumors
Two Wayne State University researchers are working on a technique that could lead to easier, faster identification of cancer tumors that can be effectively treated by calcium channel-based therapies with the help of a grant from the National Cancer Institute.

NIH/National Cancer Institute

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

PLOS ONE
Study shows reproductive effects of pesticide exposure span generations
North Carolina State University researchers studying aquatic organisms called Daphnia have found that exposure to a chemical pesticide has impacts that span multiple generations -- causing the so-called "water fleas" to produce more male offspring, and causing reproductive problems in female offspring.

National Science Foundation, NIH/National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Hepatitis c-like viruses identified in bats and rodents
Investigators at the Center for Infection and Immunity at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health report the discovery of hepaciviruses and pegiviruses -- close relatives of HCV -- in rodents and bats. The viruses are similar to those that infect humans and may therefore provide insights into the origins of HCV, as well as the mechanisms behind animal-to-human transmission. It may also enable development of new animal models.

National Institutes of Health, US Agency for International Development, Centers for Disease Control, Department of Defense

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Pediatrics
After age 18, asthma care deteriorates
Asthma care for young adults deteriorates after age 18, due primarily to a loss of health insurance coverage, as well as to a series of socially-mediated changes.

NIH/National Institute on Aging, American Federation for Aging Research

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Radioactive bacteria targets metastatic pancreatic cancer
Researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have developed a therapy for pancreatic cancer that uses Listeria bacteria to selectively infect tumor cells and deliver radioisotopes into them. The experimental treatment dramatically decreased the number of metastases (cancers that have spread to other parts of the body) in a mouse model of highly aggressive pancreatic cancer without harming healthy tissue. The study was published today in the online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

NIH/National Cancer Institute, NIH/National Institute on Aging

Public Release: 22-Apr-2013

Journal of Experimental Medicine
New agent might control breast-cancer growth and spread
A new study suggests that an unusual experimental drug can reduce breast-cancer aggressiveness, reverse resistance to the drug fulvestrant and perhaps improve the effectiveness of other breast-cancer drugs. The findings suggest a new strategy for treating breast cancer.

NIH/National Cancer Institute, Kimmel Foundation, Spielman Fund for Breast Cancer Research

Public Release: 21-Apr-2013

Nature
A check on tension
Abnormal numbers of chromosomes are found in the cells of about 90 percent of cancers, so understanding how healthy dividing cells ensure that each of their daughters receive an equal number of chromosomes is important to cancer biology. Until recently, scientists thought they had this figured out. Now, a paper published in Nature by Ludwig scientists shows a different paradigm -- by targeting Aurora B kinase, their discovery has overturned the prevailing model of advanced cell division.

Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, National Institutes of Health, Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation Fellowship

Public Release: 21-Apr-2013

Nature Chemical Biology
Discovery brings hope of new tailor-made anti-cancer agents
Scientists at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute and their collaborators have tailor-made a new chemical compound that blocks a protein that has been linked to poor responses to treatment in cancer patients. The development of the compound, called WEHI-539, is an important step towards the design of a potential new anti-cancer agent.

Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, Australian Cancer Research Foundation, Australian Research Council, NIH/National Health and Medical Research Council, Victorian Government

Public Release: 21-Apr-2013

Nature
Structure of cell signaling molecule suggests general on-off switch
A three-dimensional image of one of the proteins that serves as an on-off switch as it binds to receptors on the surface of a cell suggests there may be a sort of main power switch that could be tripped. These surface receptors are responsible for helping cells discern light, set the heart racing, or detect pain.

National Institutes of Health

Public Release: 21-Apr-2013

Annals of Behavioral Medicine
Starting with 2 health behaviors may be better than 1
The increase in obesity levels suggests that methods of motivating people to eat healthier and get more exercise are not successful. A study by Abby King and colleagues from the Stanford School of Medicine, California looks at the timing of giving exercise and nutrition advice. The researchers found that a higher success rate might be possible when the advice is given at the same time. Their study is published in Springer's Annals of Behavioral Medicine.

NIH/National Institute on Aging, NIH/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute

Public Release: 21-Apr-2013

Nature Biotechnology
Hundreds of alterations and potential drug targets to starve tumors identified
A massive study analyzing gene expression data from 22 tumor types has identified multiple metabolic expression changes associated with cancer. The analysis, conducted by researchers at Columbia University Medical Center, also identified hundreds of potential drug targets that could cut off a tumor's fuel supply or interfere with its ability to synthesize essential building blocks. The study was published today in the online edition of Nature Biotechnology.

National Institutes of Health, National Centers for Biomedical Computing, Ellison Medical Foundation, NIH/National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences

Public Release: 19-Apr-2013

Nature Genetics
Genome study suggests new strategies for understanding and treating pulmonary fibrosis
A new genome-wide association study of more than 6,000 people has identified seven new genetic regions associated with pulmonary fibrosis. Researchers at National Jewish Health, the University of Colorado and several other institutions found a number of genes associated with host defense, cell-cell adhesion and DNA repair, which provide clues to possible mechanisms underlying this currently untreatable disease.

NIH/National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute

Public Release: 19-Apr-2013

Molecular Cancer Therapeutics
Novel monoclonal antibody inhibits tumor growth in breast cancer and angiosarcoma
A monoclonal antibody targeting a protein known as SFPR2 has been shown by researchers at the University of North Carolina to inhibit tumor growth in pre-clinical models of breast cancer and angiosarcoma.

National Institutes of Health, NCTraCS, UNC University Cancer Research Fund, Nancy DeMore Foundation

Public Release: 19-Apr-2013

Cell Reports
UTSW researchers identify new potential target for cancer therapy
Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have found that alternative splicing -- a process that allows a single gene to code for multiple proteins -- appears to be a new potential target for anti-telomerase cancer therapy.

NIH/National Cancer Institute

Public Release: 19-Apr-2013
Kessler Foundation participates in multi-site NIH study to develop caregiver TBI-CareQOL
Kessler Foundation is one four sites participating in "Quality of Life in Caregivers of Traumatic Brain Injury: The Development of the TBI-CareQOL", a multi-site 5-year study funded by the National Institutes of Health/National Institute of Nursing Research. Nancy Chiaravalloti , Ph.D., co-investigator of the Kessler site, is also project director of the Northern New Jersey Traumatic Brain Injury System and director of TBI Research at Kessler Foundation.

NIH/National Institute of Nursing Research

Public Release: 18-Apr-2013

PLOS ONE
Vanderbilt study finds lack of exercise not a factor in health disparities
Health disparities between white and black adults in the South are not connected to a lack of exercise but more likely related to other factors such as access to health care, socioeconomic status and perhaps genetics, according to a Vanderbilt study published in the journal PLOS ONE.

NIH/National Cancer Institute

Public Release: 18-Apr-2013

Diagnostic Microbiology and Infectious Disease
Outpatients, hospital patients face growing, but different problems with antibiotic resistance
A new study concludes that problems with antibiotic resistance faced by outpatients may be as bad as those in hospitalized patients, and that more studies of outpatients are needed -- both to protect their health and to avoid inappropriate or unnecessary drug use.

National Institutes of Health