Principal investigator, Dr. Leslie Kean, associate director of the Ben Towne Center for Childhood Cancer Research at Seattle Children’s, leads several research projects to develop novel approaches to predicting and preventing graft-versus-host disease. Results from a phase 2 clinical trial, presented by Seattle Children’s Research Institute at the 59th American Society of Hematology (ASH)...
Category: <span>Immunology</span>
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Immunotherapy strategy could be beneficial for relapsed acute myeloid leukemia
ATLANTA – University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers report that pairing an immunotherapy drug with chemotherapy proved beneficial for some patients with acute myeloid leukemia whose disease did not respond to standard treatment or had relapsed. Seven out of 18 patients with relapsed or persistent AML, or nearly 39 percent, had a...
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ASH: High-dose gene transfer beneficial in severe hemophilia A
(HealthDay)—For men with severe hemophilia A, high-dose factor VIII gene transfer is associated with sustained normalization of factor VIII activity levels, according to a study published online Dec. 9 in the New England Journal of Medicine to coincide with the annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology, held from Dec. 9 to 12 in Atlanta. Savita...
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Teaching antibiotics to be more effective killers
IMAGE: ALEXANDER MANKIN, DIRECTOR OF THE CENTER FOR BIOMOLECULAR SCIENCES IN THE UIC COLLEGE OF PHARMACY AND PROFESSOR OF MEDICINAL CHEMISTRY AND PHARMACOGNOSY. Research from the University of Illinois at Chicago suggests bond duration, not bond tightness, may be the most important differentiator between antibiotics that kill bacteria and antibiotics that only stop bacterial growth....
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Time of day affects severity of autoimmune disease
Insights into how the body clock and time of day influence immune responses are revealed today in a study published in leading international journal Nature Communications. Understanding the effect of the interplay between 24-hour day-night cycles and the immune system may help inform drug-targeting strategies to alleviate autoimmune disease. Circadian rhythms or 24-hour rhythms are generated...
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SALK SCIENTISTS MODIFY CRISPR TO EPIGENETICALLY TREAT DIABETES, KIDNEY DISEASE, MUSCULAR DYSTROPHY
Salk scientists modify CRISPR to epigenetically treat diabetes, kidney disease, muscular dystrophy Approach could also be applied to reversing aging and age-related diseases such as hearing loss and macular degeneration LA JOLLA—Salk scientists have created a new version of the CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing technology that allows them to activate genes without creating breaks in the...
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Bacteria activate their own killer
A new photothermal treatment could help to overcome antibiotic resistance. In this method, an agent transforms near-infrared light into local heating, which kills the pathogens. However, this “transformer” must first be activated, as explained by Chinese scientists in the journal Angewandte Chemie. In this case the target bacteria do this themselves. Other types of bacteria do...
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New gene therapy transplantation technique could improve treatment of neurodegenerative diseases
A reconstruction of a sagittal brain section of a mouse that received transplantation of HSPCs (green) through intra-cerebral ventricle injection. The image shows an abundance of progeny cells from the transplanted HSPCs. A therapeutic technique to transplant blood-forming (hematopoietic) stem cells directly into the brain could herald a revolution in our approach to treating...
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Second ‘don’t eat me’ signal found on cancer cells
Cancer cells. A second biological pathway that signals immune cells not to engulf and kill cancer cells has been identified by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine. An antibody that blocks the “don’t eat me” signal has shown promise as a cancer treatment in animal models and is currently in clinical trials. Combining...
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Researchers uncover link between immune function and osteoarthritic pain and progression
The immune system plays a pivotal role in the amount of pain and disease progression experienced by patients with osteoarthritis (OA), McMaster University researchers have found. This discovery could lead to new strategies for improving joint pain management and immune function in older adults with arthritis. The study, published in the medical journal Osteoarthritis and Cartilage,...