Body

Investigators at Brigham and Women's Hospital have developed a hydrogel patch that can adhere to tumors in a preclinical model of colon cancer, delivering a local, combination treatment as the elastic gel breaks down over time. The new technique may allow clinicians to one day use diagnostic colonoscopy equipment to immediately deliver treatment without the need for open surgery at a later date. The team's findings are published in the July 25 issue of Nature Materials.

A new U of T Scarborough study has identified "superstar" varieties of rice that can reduce fertilizer loss and cut down on environmental pollution in the process.

The study, authored by U of T Scarborough Professor Herbert Kronzucker in collaboration with a team at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, looked at 19 varieties of rice to see which ones were more efficient at using nitrogen.

Ill-fitting joint sockets, contact dermatitis and sebaceous cysts are just a few of the problems plaguing prosthetic patients. They are all a result of the pressure that their prosthetic devices place on the soft tissue of their bodies.

Now researchers at Tel Aviv University, FOM Institute AMOLF and Leiden University in the Netherlands have developed a new approach to manufacturing mechanical "metamaterials" -- synthetic composite materials with structures and properties not usually found in natural materials -- that can be programmed to deform in a uniquely complex manner.

Results of preclinical studies by MUSC investigators reported in the July 2016 issue of PLOS One, demonstrate for the first time that the transcription factor KLF12 promotes CRC cell growth, in part, by activating EGR1. Furthermore, data demonstrate that KLF12 and EGR1 levels synergistically correlate with poor CRC prognoses.

Newly discovered fossil evidence from Namibia strengthens the proposition that the world's first mass extinction was caused by "ecosystem engineers" - newly evolved biological organisms that altered the environment so radically it drove older species to extinction.

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Vaccination against a single strain of Zika virus should be sufficient to protect against genetically diverse strains of the virus, according to a study conducted by investigators from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH); Washington University in St. Louis; and Emory University in Atlanta.

Friday, June 29, Baltimore, 2016 - Insilico Medicine, Inc in collaboration with scientists from Atlas Regeneration, Inc, Vision Genomics, Inc and Howard University published two research papers on fibrosis in the lung and liver and fibrotic signatures in glaucoma. Scientists utilized the new software tool referred to as "Regeneration Intelligence" to evaluate the perturbation status of many signaling pathways. This new system aimed to identify robust biomarkers of fibrotic disease and develop effective targeted therapy.

A new research replication project, involving 24 labs and over 2100 participants, failed to reproduce findings from a previous study that suggested that self-control is a depletable resource. The findings are published as part of a Registered Replication Report in Perspectives on Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - Researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham have found that the amount of proteins excreted in the urine of preterm infants with acute kidney injury, or AKI, is different from that excreted by infants with healthy kidneys.

The study, led by principal investigator David Askenazi, M.D., was published in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.

CORVALLIS, Ore. - As fewer teens overall take up smoking, those who do smoke daily are reporting more health complaints than in years past, a new study indicates.

"Teens who smoke report significantly higher levels of health complaints than nonsmoking teens, and we found that this gap has widened over the years, even as the overall prevalence of teen smoking has dropped," said Marc Braverman a professor, lead author and Extension specialist in the College of Public Health and Human Sciences at Oregon State University, who worked with collaborators in Norway.

Scientists have developed a new method of measuring the activity of disease-causing mutations in the LRRK2 gene, a major cause of inherited Parkinson's disease.

The team believes this breakthrough, which is published in the Biochemical Journal, could help pave the way for future development of a clinical test that could facilitate evaluation of drugs to target this form of the condition.

In a study published in Scientific Reports, scientists discovered impressive abundance and diversity among the creatures living on the seafloor in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ)--an area in the equatorial Pacific Ocean being targeted for deep-sea mining. The study, lead authored by Diva Amon, a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST), found that more than half of the species they collected were new to science, reiterating how little is known about life on the seafloor in this region.

For medics on the battlefield and doctors in remote or developing parts of the world, getting rapid access to the drugs needed to treat patients can be challenging.

Biopharmaceutical drugs, which are used in a wide range of therapies including vaccines and treatments for diabetes and cancer, are typically produced in large, centralized fermentation plants. This means they must be transported to the treatment site, which can be expensive, time-consuming, and challenging to execute in areas with poor supply chains.

ITHACA, NY--A new way of fixing inactive proteins has been discovered in an algae, which uses chloroplast extracts and light to release an interrupting sequence from a protein.

Research specialist Stephen Campbell and Professor David Stern at the Boyce Thompson Institute report the discovery in the July 29 issue of the Journal of Biological Chemistry. This repair system may have applications in agriculture and biotechnology because it could potentially be harnessed to enable proteins to become active only in the light.

They may be slimy, but they are a perfect environment for microorganisms: biofilms. Protected against external influences, here bacteria can grow undisturbed, and trigger diseases. Scientists at Kiel University, in cooperation with colleagues at the Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH) in Hamburg-Harburg, are researching how it can be possible to prevent the formation of biofilms from the beginning. On this basis, alternatives to antibiotics could be developed, as many pathogens are already resistant to most commercially used antibiotics.