by University of Utah Health Sciences In her Genomic Signal Processing Lab, Alter develops new mathematical methods that are uniquely suited for personalized medicine. Credit: Nathan L. Galli, University of Utah For the past 70 years, the best indicator of life expectancy for a patient with glioblastoma (GBM)—the most common and the most aggressive brain...
Category: <span>Genetics</span>
How the Lyme disease epidemic is spreading and why ticks are so hard to stop
by Jeff Hansen, University of Alabama at Birmingham Is personalized medicine cost-effective? University of Alabama at Birmingham researcher Nita Limdi, Pharm.D., Ph.D., and colleagues across the United States have answered that question for one medical treatment. Patients experiencing a heart attack—known as a myocardial infarction or an acute coronary syndrome—have sharply diminished blood flow in...
Scientists create first roadmap of human skeletal muscle development
by University of California, Los Angeles An interdisciplinary team of researchers at the Eli and Edythe Broad Center for Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA has developed a first-of-its-kind roadmap of how human skeletal muscle develops, including the formation of muscle stem cells. The study, published in the peer-reviewed journal Cell Stem Cell,...
Study identifies group of genes with altered expression in autism
by FAPESP Autism has long been associated only with behavioral and environmental factors, but the role of genetics in its development is now increasingly evident. Some 100 genes have been found to play a role in autism spectrum disorder, and another thousand are being studied to the same end. The diagnosis and treatment of the...
Danish researchers find new breast cancer gene in young people
by University of Copenhagen Over the past 20 years, our knowledge of hereditary diseases has taken a quantum leap, and several hereditary gene variants have been found that may predispose to the development of cancer. We have known for a long time that mutations in human BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes may lead to the development...
Reusable Textiles to Repel Viruses
Prostate cancer therapies have shown significant advances during the past decade, with multiple new therapies being introduced for patients with advanced disease. Now, the early results of a clinical trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) reveals for the first time that therapies based on tumor genetics – specifically DNA repair defects...
Researchers identify most powerful gene variant for height known to date
by Jake Miller, Harvard Medical School A team of researchers from Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Socios En Salud, and the Broad Institute at Harvard and MIT report they have identified the single largest genetic contributor to height known to date. The findings, published May 13 in Nature, are based on an analysis...
Single-cell RNA seq developed to accurately quantify cell-specific drug effects in pancreatic islets
by CeMM Research Center for Molecular Medicine of the Austrian Academy of Sciences The pancreas is an abdominal organ that produces digestive enzymes as well as hormones that regulate blood sugar levels. This hormone-producing function is localized to the islets of Langerhans, which constitute clusters of different endocrine cell types. Among those are beta cells,...
Scientists Found A Way to Disable a Gene Responsible For Obesity: Worry About Getting Too Fat No More?
Scientists were able to prevent obesity in mice by blocking macrohages, key inflammatory cells, within the body. Researchers from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have successfully disabled a gene in specific mouse cells, preventing mice from becoming obese even after being fed a high-fat diet. Macrophages, vital inflammatory cells which are...
Unexpectedly potent protein droplets help explain hereditary diseases
by Max Planck Society Microscopic image of cell nuclei of cultured cells. HOXD13 condensates are labelled in red. The DNA is stained in blue. Credit: MPI f. Molecular Genetics/ Shaon Basu Repeats of individual building blocks within proteins are the cause of many hereditary diseases, but how such repeats actually cause disease is still largely...