by Massachusetts General Hospital Credit: CC0 Public Domain High cholesterol and inflammation are key drivers of heart disease, and an inflamed buildup of lipids can cut off the blood supply through a coronary artery to cause a heart attack. Because white blood cells, which usually defend against infection, trigger inflammation in these situations, a team...
by National Institutes of Health Compared with healthy volunteers (left), gum tissue from people with severe periodontal disease (right) shows high levels of fibrin (magenta). Credit: Lakmali Silva, NIDCR Blocking function of a blood-clotting protein prevented bone loss from periodontal (gum) disease in mice, according to research led by scientists at the National Institute of...
by The Mount Sinai Hospital Credit: CC0 Public Domain Generalized pustular psoriasis (GPP) is a rare, life-threatening skin condition for which there are no approved treatments. It is characterized by episodes of widespread eruptions of painful, sterile pustules (blisters of non-infectious pus). There is a high unmet need for treatments that can rapidly and completely...
by Isabella Backman, Yale University Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Anyone who has ever twisted an ankle is familiar with swelling, redness, heat, and pain—some of the telltale signs of inflammation. While uncomfortable, it’s a biological necessity that protects the body from damage after a disturbance. But according Ruslan Medzhitov, Ph.D., Sterling Professor of Immunobiology, this...
by American Chemical Society Higher numbers of microplastics of various shapes, such as sheets (left) and fibers (right) were found in the feces of people with IBD than in healthy controls. Credit: Adapted from Environmental Science & Technology 2021, DOI: 10.1021/acs.est.1c03924 Microplastics—tiny pieces of plastic less than 5 mm in length –– are everywhere, from bottled...
by University of California – Riverside Dr. David Lo is a distinguished professor of biomedical sciences at UC Riverside. Credit: I. Pittalwala, UC Riverside. Biomedical scientists at the University of California, Riverside, propose a way for drugs to be more effective against inflammatory bowel disease, or IBD, in which the intestine undergoes inflammation. IBD, a...
by Uppsala University Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain Inflammatory processes are associated with a large range of human diseases, including rheumatic diseases and allergies. Protein biomarkers are measurable molecules that can have a prognostic value in patients, be used to diagnose disease, or indicate severity of disease. Today, a large number of plasma proteins have been...
UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA HEALTH SYSTEM IMAGE: JAYAKRISHNA AMBATI, MD, IS PART OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA SCHOOL OF MEDICINE’S DEPARTMENT OF OPHTHALMOLOGY AND THE FOUNDING DIRECTOR OF UVA’S CENTER FOR ADVANCED VISION SCIENCE. CREDIT: COURTESY AMBATI LAB Researchers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine have made a discovery linking lupus, a potentially debilitating...
Researchers have in the past proposed links between oral bacteria and chronic inflammation, particularly in the heart and brain, proposing that bacterial toxins and bacteria themselves enter the bloodstream via damaged gums. This undoubtedly happens, but supporting data is mixed when it comes to the question of whether or not this has a meaningful effect size in comparison to...
TLR4 is one of a number of cell surface receptors that mediate innate immune cell reactions to molecules indicative of damage in the body. Some fraction of the chronic inflammation of aging is caused by increases in damage-associated molecular patterns that trigger receptors of this nature, and consequent maladaptive reactions on the part of the innate immune system. Does it help to block this...
