Immunology
As a result of a global health campaign, polioviruses have almost been eradicated in many areas of the world but enterovirus 71 is closely related to poliovirus and was first detected in California in the 1960s. Since then the virus has spread across Asia, affecting mostly children and some adults. Serious cases of the disease can include neurological disorders such as meningitis, paralysis and encephalitis.
Enterovirus 71 has caused major outbreaks of hand, foot, and mouth disease and it is still unclear why such a high number of cases occur in the Asia-Pacific region. In the first major…
Researchers say they have discovered a gene variant that may protect against alcoholism. The variant, in a gene called CYP2E1, is associated with a person's response to alcohol. For the 10 to 20 percent of people that possess this variant, those first few drinks leave them feeling more inebriated than the rest of the human population, who harbor a different version of the gene.
The CYP2E1 gene has long held the interest of researchers interested in alcoholism, because it encodes an enzyme that can metabolize alcohol. Most of the alcohol in the body actually gets metabolized…
Cells and tissues grow, develop and interact in a 3-D world, why not study them that way? The methods of culturing and studying human cells have traditionally been carried out on flat impermeable surfaces and those techniques have obviously produced a steady stream of critical insight into cell behavior and the mechanisms of infection and disease, but those cell cultures have limitations inreproducing the tissue environment in vivo.
Researcher Cheryl Nickerson and her team at the Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University highlight an innovative approach for studying cells in…
Recently scientists have discovered that a little molecule called Triclosan can help us eradicate a condition that affects 2 billion people around the world (we are only 6.7 billion total right?). A parasitic infection called toxoplasmosis affects those many people is caused by a protozoan Toxoplasma gondii. A total of 11% of the population in the US and up to 80% of the people in Brazil suffer by toxoplasmosis. Domestic cats are primary carriers, but many animals and humans also can carry the bug. It can pass on from even mother to the baby in the womb :( It causes morbidity and…
A group of researchers are contending obese kids may not be the result of lax parenting or a junk-food culture; obesity may have an infectious origin, according to a cross-sectional study by University of California, San Diego School of Medicine researchers who correlate children exposed to a particular strain of adenovirus, human adenovirus 36 (HAdV-36 or AD-36), being significantly more likely to be obese with some causation. Jeffrey B. Schwimmer, MD, associate professor of clinical pediatrics at UC San Diego, and colleagues examined 124 children, ages 8 to 18, for the presence of…
"We hear a lot about bioterrorism and pandemics," says Sheldon H. Jacobson, a professor of computer science and pediatrics at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,"but the fact of the matter is, the threat to routine immunization is one of the greatest threats we face. If we had problems with our vaccine supply chain, it would have the potential to cause more deaths than any of those other issues."
Key in 'herd immunity', the smallest percentage of a population that must be immunized against a disease so that unvaccinated individuals are also protected, for society is the…
Much of the predicted future of neurotechnology is grounded in the continuing success and development of nanotechnology. This field is broad, for sure, and is even a primary target of the US Federal Government (see the NNI).
A particularly critical aspect, however, considers the development of nanoparticles. A great deal of research is already underway on developing very tiny capsules that will one day float around in our bodies and drop off exact doses of drugs to a specific cell. Or, pint-sized nanobots with full on-board electronics will…
Being married has been associated with improving health but a new study suggests that having that long-term bond alters hormones in a way that reduces stress - but you don't need to buy a ring just yet; unmarried people in a committed relationship show the same reduced responses to stress, said Dario Maestripieri, Professor in Comparative Human Development at the University of Chicago and lead author of a new study in Stress.
A team of researchers studied 500 masters' degree students at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. About 40 percent of the men and 53…
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One of the biggest challenges of transplants is the need to suppress the immune response - so the new organ is not rejected - while keeping it strong enough to be able to fight all kinds of disease. As the high numbers of rejected organs show, this is a tricky balance. But a discovery by Maria Monteiro and Luis Graça, two Portuguese scientists, could help solving the problem, at least in the liver. They have found a new type of white blood cell – baptised NKTreg (reg from regulatory) – that, remarkably, once activated, migrate into this organ where it suppress any immune response in its…
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Portuguese scientists have just published a revolutionary new approach to treat rheumatoid arthritis (RA) which, if translated to humans, can change the way we treat autoimmunity (and so diseases like RA but also diabetes and MS) and, with it, the lives of millions of patients
The new treatment by Joana Duarte, Luis Graca and colleagues from the Instituto de Medicina Molecular (IMM) in Lisbon is remarkable because it specifically stops the abnormal immunological response behind RA without touching the rest of the immune system, and a short treatment has long lasting effects suggesting that it…