http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. The heart responds to the increased stress caused by chronically raised blood pressure, for example, by thickening its wall muscle. In the late stage of this condition, a risk of heart failure arises. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Heart and Lung Research have now succeeded in identifying a key molecule in the molecular signalling cascade responsible for this growth. Based on this discovery, they managed to achieve a significant reduction in cardiac wall thickening in animal experiments. In addition, they managed to partly reduce existing thickening of the cardiac wall. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-03-pathological-thickening-cardiac-wall-halted.html Cardiology Tue, 26 Mar 2013 10:26:00 EST news283512344 University of California, San Diego bioengineers have demonstrated in a study in pigs that a new injectable hydrogel can repair damage from heart attacks, help the heart grow new tissue and blood vessels, and get the heart moving closer to how a healthy heart should. The results of the study were published Feb. 20 in Science Translational Medicine and clear the way for clinical trials to begin this year in Europe. The gel is injected through a catheter without requiring surgery or general anesthesia—a less invasive procedure for patients. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-hydrogel-regeneration-functionality-heart.html Medical research Wed, 20 Feb 2013 14:04:52 EST news280591485 When the human genome was sequenced, biologists were surprised to find that very little of the genome—less than 3 percent—corresponds to protein-coding genes. What, they wondered, was all the rest of that DNA doing? http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-non-coding-rna-molecules-differentiation-embryonic.html Medical research Fri, 25 Jan 2013 07:44:49 EST news278322283 A certain enzyme, the CaM kinase II, keeps the cardiac muscle flexible. By transferring phosphate groups to the giant protein titin, it relaxes the muscle cells. This is reported by researchers led by Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Linke of the Institute of Physiology at the Ruhr Universität in the journal Circulation Research. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-enzyme-cam-kinase-ii-muscle.html Cardiology Thu, 17 Jan 2013 10:31:39 EST news277640781 Unfortunately, newspaper articles about young athletes dying suddenly on the field are not unheard of. Such reports fuel discussions about compulsory screening, for example of young footballers, for heart failure. Research by scientists from Ghent (VIB/UGent) and Italy will benefit these screening methods. They have discovered a link between mutations in a certain gene and the heart condition Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Cardiomyopathy. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-discovery-screening-sudden-cardiac-death.html Cardiology Wed, 12 Dec 2012 10:39:58 EST news274531181 A University of Cincinnati (UC) Cancer Institute lung cancer research team reports that lung cancer stem cells can be isolated—and then grown—in a preclinical model, offering a new avenue for investigating immunotherapy treatment options that specifically target stem cells. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-stem-cell-advance-immunotherapy-lung.html Cancer Tue, 13 Nov 2012 17:00:02 EST news272044430 Blood vessels are extremely dynamic: depending on the external conditions, they can adapt their permeability for nutrients, their contractility, and even their shape. Unlike cardiac muscle cells, for example, the smooth muscle cells in blood vessels demonstrate a high degree of plasticity, so they can specialise or multiply as required, even repairing damage to the vessel wall. This vascular remodelling is evidently precisely regulated. Disruptions are extremely significant in conditions such as atherosclerosis or high blood pressure. At the Max Planck Institute for Heart and Lung Research in Bad Nauheim, scientists conducting research on genetically modified mice have discovered how external signals regulate vascular remodelling at cell level. This has created an entirely new understanding of regulation, which could pave the way for new approaches in the prevention and treatment of atherosclerosis and other vascular diseases. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-proteins-remodelling-blood-vessels.html Medical research Tue, 13 Nov 2012 13:24:58 EST news272035465 (Medical Xpress)—A new study from Karolinska Institutet demonstrates that a change in the ECG wave called the QRS prolongation is associated with a higher rate of heart-failure mortality. According to the team that carried out the study, which is published in the scientific periodical The European Heart Journal, the discovery suggests that more heart-failure cases than the most serious could be helped by pacemakers. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-pacemaker-heart-failure-patients.html Cardiology Fri, 05 Oct 2012 10:07:01 EST news268650412 (Medical Xpress)—Cardiac stress, for example a heart attack or high blood pressure, frequently leads to pathological heart growth and subsequently to heart failure. Two tiny RNA molecules play a key role in this detrimental development in mice, as researchers at the Hannover Medical School and the Göttingen Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry have now discovered. When they inhibited one of those two specific molecules, they were able to protect the rodent against pathological heart growth and failure. With these findings, the scientists hope to be able to develop therapeutic approaches that can protect humans against heart failure. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-heart-failure-mice.html Cardiology Tue, 25 Sep 2012 16:54:12 EST news267810840 A new Johns Hopkins study has unraveled the changes in a key cardiac protein that can lead to heart muscle malfunction and precipitate heart failure. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-scientists-out-of-tune-protein-muscle-demise.html Cardiology Wed, 12 Sep 2012 15:51:47 EST news266683895 The analysis of four French registries from 1995 to 2010 was presented by Professor Nicolas Danchin from the Hopital Européen Georges Pompidou. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-day-mortality-ami-treatment.html Cardiology Tue, 28 Aug 2012 11:40:01 EST news265370936 The protein concentrate APOSEC, obtained from white blood cells, when given intravenously 40 minutes after an acute myocardial infarction, largely prevents scarring of the cardiac muscle. These were the findings of Hendrik Jan Ankersmit, Head of the Christian Doppler Laboratory for Diagnosis and Regeneration in Cardiac and Thoracic Diseases at the MedUni Vienna, which were unveiled back in the autumn of 2011. A study by a team of researchers led by Ankersmit has now unravelled further mechanisms responsible for how APOSEC works. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-treatment-heart-aposec-mechanism-unravelled.html Cardiology Tue, 28 Aug 2012 08:39:05 EST news265361880 Copeptin predicts prognosis in patients with heart failure, according to research presented at the ESC Congress today, August 25, by Professor Stefan Störk from Germany. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-copeptin-prognosis-hf-patients.html Cardiology Mon, 27 Aug 2012 11:10:01 EST news265282877 Researchers have made a major advance in efforts to regenerate damaged hearts. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-heart-muscle-cell-grafts-suppress.html Medical research Sun, 05 Aug 2012 13:00:16 EST news263384994 A cutting-edge method developed at the University of Michigan Center for Arrhythmia Research successfully uses stem cells to create heart cells capable of mimicking the heart's crucial squeezing action. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-method-cardiac-muscle-patches-stem.html Cardiology Tue, 19 Jun 2012 09:40:10 EST news259317555 Malformed desmin proteins aggregate with intact proteins of the same kind, thereby triggering skeletal and cardiac muscle diseases, the desminopathies. This was discovered by researchers from the RUB Heart and Diabetes Center NRW in Bad Oeynhausen led by PD Dr. Hendrik Milting in an interdisciplinary research project with colleagues from the universities in Karlsruhe, Würzburg and Bielefeld. They report in the Journal of Biological Chemistry. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-aggregating-stabilizing-insights-mechanisms-heart.html Medical research Wed, 23 May 2012 09:58:35 EST news256985910 Testosterone supplements helped heart failure patients breathe better and exercise more, according to research in Circulation Heart Failure, an American Heart Association journal. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-testosterone-supplements-heart-failure-patients.html Cardiology Tue, 17 Apr 2012 16:00:01 EST news253888870 UNC researchers have discovered how the genetic defect underlying one of the most common congenital heart diseases keeps the critical organ from developing properly. According to the new research, mutations in a gene called SHP-2 distort the shape of cardiac muscle cells so they are unable to form a fully functioning heart. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-molecular-link-genetic-defect-heart.html Genetics Mon, 06 Feb 2012 11:25:17 EST news247749883 How sildenafil, the active ingredient in Viagra, can alleviate heart problems is reported by Bochum's researchers in cooperation with colleagues from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester (Minnesota) in the journal Circulation. They studied dogs with diastolic heart failure, a condition in which the heart chamber does not sufficiently fill with blood. The scientists showed that sildenafil makes stiffened cardiac walls more elastic again. The drug activates an enzyme that causes the giant protein titin in the myocardial cells to relax. "We have developed a therapy in an animal model that, for the first time, also raises hopes for the successful treatment of patients" says Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Linke of the RUB Institute of Physiology. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-viagra-heart-failure-mechanism.html Cardiology Fri, 23 Dec 2011 10:03:30 EST news243857003 Stem cell therapies hold enormous potential to address some of the most tragic illnesses, diseases, and tissue defects world-wide. However, the inability to target cells to tissues of interest poses a significant barrier to effective cell therapy. To address this hurdle, researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) have developed a platform approach to chemically incorporate homing receptors onto the surface of cells. This simple approach has the potential to improve the efficacy of many types of cell therapies by increasing the concentrations of cells at target locations in the body. These findings are published online in the journal Blood on Oct. 27, 2011. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-cells-home-specific-tissues-enable.html Medical research Thu, 27 Oct 2011 12:29:01 EST news238937326 Since the start of 2011, the active ingredient ticagrelor can be prescribed in Germany in addition to acetylsalicylic acid (ASA) to avoid blood clots in patients with acute ischaemia of the cardiac muscle. The German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) has now examined whether ticagrelor offers advantages to patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS) in comparison with conventional drugs. This is the first co-called "early benefit assessment" that IQWiG has performed on the basis of a dossier provided by the manufacturer, in accordance with the new legal regulations. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-ticagrelor-considerable-added-benefit-specific.html Medical research Tue, 11 Oct 2011 11:41:32 EST news237552078 Rob Evans, a 61-year-old social worker from Apache Junction, Ariz., got the good news on Father's Day: After 3.5 years, doctors had found him a heart and were preparing to bring it to the University of California-Los Angeles, where he was being treated for a slow, steady decay of his cardiac muscle. Evans had been hospitalized at UCLA for six weeks. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-warm-heart-transplants.html Cardiology Fri, 09 Sep 2011 11:40:33 EST news234787208 By employing optogenetics, a new field that uses genetically altered cells to respond to light, and a tandem unit cell (TCU) strategy, researchers at Stony Brook University have demonstrated a way to control cell excitation and contraction in cardiac muscle cells, the details of which are published in the early online edition of Circulation: Arrhythmia & Electrophysiology: “Stimulating Cardiac Muscle by Light: Cardiac Optogenetics by Cell Delivery.” The team of scientists, led by Emilia Entcheva, Ph.D., Associate Professor in the Departments of Biomedical Engineering, Physiology & Biophysics, and the Division of Cardiology in Medicine, Stony Brook University, includes members of the inter-departmental Institute of Molecular Cardiology at Stony Brook. The authors claim that their technique may help form the basis for a new generation of light-driven cardiac pacemakers and other medical devices. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-08-technique-heart-muscle-light-controlled-pacemakers.html Cardiology Mon, 22 Aug 2011 08:16:58 EST news233219760 Research introduced at SNM's 58th Annual Meeting may lead to much-needed cardiovascular disease screening for diabetic patients at risk of ischemic heart disease, a disorder marked by significantly reduced blood flow in the heart. Ischemia of the myocardium, or cardiac muscle, can signal diminished oxygenation of the heart tissue and trigger a heart attack if left untreated. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-molecular-imaging-ischemic-heart-disease.html Medical research Mon, 06 Jun 2011 14:30:03 EST news226584734 Scientists at Johns Hopkins have shown in laboratory experiments in mice that blocking the action of a signaling protein deep inside the heart's muscle cells blunts the most serious ill effects of high blood pressure on the heart. These include heart muscle enlargement, scar tissue formation and loss of blood vessel growth. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-05-animal-reveal-route-heart-disease.html Cardiology Mon, 02 May 2011 12:11:49 EST news223557091 New insight into the physiology of cardiac muscle may lead to the development of therapeutic strategies that exploit an inherent protective state of the heart. The research, published by Cell Press online on April 19th in the Biophysical Journal, discovers a state of cardiac muscle that exhibits a low metabolic rate and may help to regulate energy use and promote efficiency in this hard-working and vital organ. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-04-cardiac-muscle-potential-cardio-protective-mechanism.html Cardiology Tue, 19 Apr 2011 13:12:33 EST news222437536