http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. A newly found understanding of receptor signaling may have revealed a better way to design drugs. A study from Nationwide Children's Hospital suggests that a newly identified group of proteins, alpha arrestins, may play a role in cell signaling that is crucial to new drug development. The study appears in PLOS ONE. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-potential-pathway-drug.html Medical research Mon, 10 Dec 2012 12:49:51 EST news274366169 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 Three international teams of scientists, led by researchers at the University of California San Diego, University of Michigan and Stanford University, have published a trio of papers describing in unprecedented detail the structure and workings of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs), a large family of human proteins that are the target of one-third to one-half of modern drugs. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-vital-protein-complex-protein-coupled-receptors.html Medical research Wed, 28 Sep 2011 13:00:01 EST news236431745 G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) are popular drug targets, accounting for about one-third of approved drugs and many hundreds of drugs currently in development. They act as molecular switches that transduce extracellular signals by activating heterotrimeric G proteins (G proteins) located at the inside of the cell. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-common-drugs-molecular-pas-de.html Medical research Tue, 26 Jul 2011 10:40:02 EST news230894507