Modern unhealthy lifestyles and dietary habits have led to a yearly increase in the incidence of metabolism-related liver cancer. A research team from the LKS Faculty of Medicine at the University of Hong Kong (HKUMed), in collaboration with Peking University (PKU), found that fats in liver cancer can reprogramme immune cells, causing them to malfunction and driving resistance to current first-line liver-cancer treatments. The findings were published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.

Dr. Hye Jin Nam’s team at the Korea Research Institute of Chemical Technology (KRICT), in collaboration with Professors Dong Hyun Jo and Sangsu Bae at Seoul National University College of Medicine, found that autophagy induction via nutrient deprivation or mTOR inhibition markedly enhances the efficiency of HR-based CRISPR–Cas9 gene editing up to threefold.

A daily dose of almonds improved key health markers for people with metabolic syndrome in a study led by scientists at Oregon State University’s Linus Pauling Institute and the OSU College of Health.

Harnessing the artificial intelligence (AI) driven platform, IDentif.AI, researchers from the Institute for Digital Medicine (WisDM), Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore (NUS Medicine), Cancer Science Institute of Singapore, NUS and the Shu Chien-Gene Lay Department of Bioengineering at the University of California San Diego, sought to uncover sex-specific drug combinations that may slow or halt AVS progression. IDentif.AI optimised drug combinations to inhibit aortic valve myofibroblast activation—a hallmark of AVS which refers to a process causing valve cells to stiffen and scar—in female and male valve cells isolated from laboratory models. The AI platform pinpointed a list of female-biased combinations (e.g. Y-27632/SB-203580/SD-208) that were more effective in addressing AVS in female cells, while AI-optimised male-biased combinations (e.g.  LY294002/Irosustat/TM5441) were notably more effective in male cells.