http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. In current health lore, antioxidants are all the rage, as "everybody knows" that reducing the amount of "reactive oxygen species"—cell-damaging molecules that are byproducts of cellular metabolism—is critical to staying healthy. What everyone doesn't know is that our bodies already have a complex set of processes built into our cells that handle these harmful byproducts of living and repair the damage they cause. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-06-dna-checkpoint-mechanism-oxidative-stress.html Medical research Fri, 14 Jun 2013 11:47:59 EST news290429272 (Medical Xpress)—Membrane fusion is a highly regulated event, both inside cells, and between them. From the moment a sperm first fuses with an egg, subsequent developmental events depend upon its proper control. Inside cells, fusion events regulate phagocytosis and vesicle exocytosis, as well as control proliferative and apoptotic events associated with mitochondria. Fusion between cells, as in the formation of placental trophoblasts, osteoclasts, and myoblasts, share many of the genetic and biochemical pathways used for fusion processes occurring inside cells. Developing communities of cells have also improvised, and come up with a few additional tricks of their own. In a paper just published in Nature, researchers from the University of Virginia, have taken a closer look at how myoblasts fuse in the development of skeletal muscle to become multinucleated syncytia. In particular, the researchers reveal how apoptosis in a chosen few of the myotube progenitors is critical to the process. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-fusion-cell-death-skeletal-muscle.html Medical research Fri, 26 Apr 2013 14:33:32 EST news286205591 Melatonin injections delayed symptom onset and reduced mortality in a mouse model of the neurodegenerative condition amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig's disease, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. In a report published online ahead of print in the journal Neurobiology of Disease, the team revealed that receptors for melatonin are found in the nerve cells, a finding that could launch novel therapeutic approaches. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-team-melatonin-als-symptom-onset.html Neuroscience Thu, 25 Apr 2013 04:54:11 EST news286084445 A massive study analyzing gene expression data from 22 tumor types has identified multiple metabolic expression changes associated with cancer. The analysis, conducted by researchers at Columbia University Medical Center, also identified hundreds of potential drug targets that could cut off a tumor's fuel supply or interfere with its ability to synthesize essential building blocks. The study was published today in the online edition of Nature Biotechnology. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-hundreds-potential-drug-starve-cancer.html Cancer Sun, 21 Apr 2013 13:00:01 EST news285764870 The spread of breast cancer to distant organs within the body, an event that often leads to death, appears in many cases to involve the loss of a key protein, according to UC San Francisco researchers, whose new discoveries point to possible targets for therapy. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-drug-breast-cancer-metastasis.html Cancer Sun, 27 Jan 2013 13:00:16 EST news278503753 (Medical Xpress)—University of Florida taste scientist Linda Bartoshuk and her colleagues want to play a trick on you—but it's for your own good. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-scientists-natural-compounds-humans-perception.html Medical research Wed, 16 Jan 2013 09:45:05 EST news277551828 Researchers in Singapore have succeeded in tracking, for the first time, the molecular changes caused by type 2 diabetes that affect how the body handles glucose production in the liver. In a series of experiments in mice, the researchers introduced a form of the compound pyruvate that incorporated specially treated carbon nuclei. This allowed the researchers to follow the processing of the compound using magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS). In this way, the team, led by Phillip Lee of the Singapore Bioimaging Consortium, showed that the enzyme pyruvate carboxylase plays a key role in the development of diabetes. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-ability-molecular-diabetes-personalized-medicine.html Diabetes Wed, 19 Dec 2012 09:31:51 EST news275131897 A national research collaboration of senior researchers, including a researcher from Moffitt Cancer Center, has found that 20 to 25 percent of "heavily pre-treated" patients with a variety of cancers who enrolled in a clinical trial had "objective and durable" responses to a treatment with BMS-936558, an antibody that specifically blocks programmed cell death 1 (PD-1). PD-1 is a key immune "checkpoint" receptor expressed by activated immune cells (T-cells) and is involved in the suppression of immunity. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-success-immune-approach-cancers.html Cancer Wed, 13 Jun 2012 13:42:35 EST news258813748 Using blood, urine and tissue analysis of a unique mouse model, a team led by UC Davis researchers has identified several proteins as diagnostic biomarkers and potential therapeutic targets for kidney cancer. Subject to follow-up validation testing, inhibition of these proteins and several related pathways holds promise as a form of therapy to slow the growth of kidney tumors. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-biomarkers-therapeutic-kidney-cancer.html Cancer Thu, 31 May 2012 14:43:18 EST news257694189 Four years after they discovered the viral roots of a rare skin cancer, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute (UPCI) and the School of Medicine have now identified a molecule activated by this virus that, in animal studies, could be targeted to selectively kill the tumor cells. The treatment will soon be tested in patients. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-genomics-molecular-based-treatment-viral-skin.html Cancer Wed, 09 May 2012 14:00:05 EST news255782721 New research conducted at UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, offers hope for people with a rare disorder called Chuvash polycythemia. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-genetic-orphan-disease.html Genetics Wed, 22 Jun 2011 11:26:56 EST news227960376 Scientists at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences have uncovered how the body's immune system launches its survival response to the notorious and deadly bacterium anthrax. The findings, reported online today and published in the June 22 issue of the journal Immunity, describe key emergency signals the body sends out when challenged by a life-threatening infection. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-immune-anthrax-infections.html Medical research Thu, 16 Jun 2011 12:45:37 EST news227447097 Research led by David Litchfield of The University of Western Ontario has identified how biochemical pathways can be "rewired" in cancer cells to allow these cells to ignore signals that should normally trigger their death. It's one way that cancer cells may become resistant to therapy. The findings are now published in Science Signaling. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-cancer-cells-death.html Cancer Wed, 08 Jun 2011 13:12:12 EST news226757521