http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. A mechanism that permits essential substances to enter our cells while at the same time removing from them harmful components also has a "down side." This negative aspect prevents vital drugs, such as anti-cancer drugs, from achieving their designed functions, while also enabling bacterial cells to develop resistance to penetration of antibiotics. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-05-traffic-cells.html Medical research Wed, 01 May 2013 10:21:02 EST news286622453 A seemingly obscure gene in the female fruit fly that is only active in cells that will become eggs has led researchers at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research to the discovery of a atypical protein that lures, traps, and inactivates the powerful Polo kinase, widely considered the master regulator of cell division. Its human homolog, Polo-like kinase-1 (Plk1), is misregulated in many types of cancer. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-03-mousetrap-fruit-flies-human-cancer-driving.html Cancer Wed, 13 Mar 2013 13:42:58 EST news282400964 (Medical Xpress)—Living organ­isms depend on pro­teins for their sur­vival. These large, com­plex mol­e­cules mediate nearly every life func­tion, but when the genes that code for them start to mutate, those func­tions begin to break down. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-protein-cancer-drug.html Cancer Tue, 08 Jan 2013 06:35:08 EST news276849299 (Medical Xpress)—A University of Colorado Cancer Center study in this month's edition of the Journal of Investigative Dermatology describes a new target and potential treatment for melanoma, the most dangerous form of skin cancer. MicroRNA can decide which genes in a cell's DNA are expressed and which stay silent. Melanoma tends to lack microRNA-26a, which makes the gene SODD go silent. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-serendipity-potential-therapy-melanoma.html Cancer Thu, 20 Dec 2012 12:24:26 EST news275228659 Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have shown that the cells that produce glucagon are stimulated by the hormone itself. A previous study by the same group demonstrated that this principle also applies to insulin. This means that a feedback system is at work in the body, whereby hormone secreting cells receive an immediate signal to produce more of the hormone. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-glucagon-synthesis.html Medical research Mon, 03 Dec 2012 15:00:10 EST news273755404 The association between the inflammatory bowel disease ulcerative colitis and a gene that makes certain cell surface proteins has been pinpointed to a variant amino acid in a crucial binding site that profoundly influences immune response to antigens, including gut bacteria, reports a team of researchers at the University of Pittsburgh, Cleveland Clinic, Carnegie Mellon University and Harvard Medical School. They published the findings today in the online version of Genes & Immunity. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-team-amino-acid-variation-immune.html Immunology Thu, 15 Dec 2011 11:36:32 EST news243171384 HIV is coated in sugars that usually hide the virus from the immune system. Newly published research reveals how one broadly neutralizing HIV antibody actually uses part of the sugary cloak to help bind to the virus. The antibody binding site, called the V1/V2 region, represents a suitable HIV vaccine target, according to the scientists who conducted the study. In addition, their research reveals the detailed structure of the V1/V2 region, the last part of the virus surface to be visualized at the atomic level. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-antibody-key-sugars-hiv-surface.html HIV & AIDS Wed, 23 Nov 2011 13:00:06 EST news241274510 Using highly potent antibodies isolated from HIV-positive people, researchers have recently begun to identify ways to broadly neutralize the many possible subtypes of HIV. Now, a team led by biologists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) has built upon one of these naturally occurring antibodies to create a stronger version they believe is a better candidate for clinical applications. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-biologists-anti-hiv-antibody-potency.html HIV & AIDS Thu, 27 Oct 2011 14:00:19 EST news238940814 It is widely known that mutations in the breast cancer susceptibility 1 (BRCA1) gene significantly increase the chance of developing breast and ovarian cancers, but the mechanisms at play are not fully understood. Now, researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University Massey Cancer Center have shown that certain BRCA1 mutations result in excessive, uncontrolled DNA repair, which challenges the prior assumption that mutations in BRCA1 only contribute to breast cancer through a reduction in function. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-key-function-mutation-hereditary-breast.html Genetics Thu, 01 Sep 2011 12:39:37 EST news234099553 Researchers have traced in detail how certain powerful HIV neutralizing antibodies evolve, a finding that generates vital clues to guide the design of a preventive HIV vaccine, according to a study appearing in Science Express this week. The discoveries were made by a team led by the Vaccine Research Center (VRC) at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-08-scientists-route-eliciting-hiv-neutralizing-antibodies.html HIV & AIDS Thu, 11 Aug 2011 14:00:53 EST news232287161 In a finding that may be good news for scientists developing HIV vaccines and therapies, a team of researchers at The Rockefeller University and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute have found a way to investigate the broadly neutralizing antibody response against the CD4 binding site of HIV on a monoclonal level. This led to the identification and characterization of several “highly active anti-CD4 binding site antibodies” (HAADs) and their expanded B cell families. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-scientists-broad-potent-hiv-antibodies.html HIV & AIDS Wed, 20 Jul 2011 16:46:30 EST news230399161 Researchers at the University of California, San Diego and Hunter College of the City University of New York (CUNY) have identified potential human molecular targets of the anti-HIV drug Nelfinavir, which may explain why the drug is also effective as a cancer therapy. Their study will be published in the online edition of PLoS Computational Biology on April 28. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-04-molecular-hiv-drug-cancer-therapy.html Medications Thu, 28 Apr 2011 18:00:01 EST news223230398