Nearly 12,000 people will die of head and neck cancer in the United States this year and worldwide cases will exceed half a million.
Jan 27, 2012
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UNSW researchers have made a discovery that could lead to a revolutionary drug that actually reverses ageing, improves DNA repair and could even help NASA get its astronauts to Mars.
Mar 23, 2017
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A team of UK scientists have identified the mechanism behind hardening of the arteries, and shown in animal studies that a generic medication normally used to treat acne could be an effective treatment for the condition.
Jun 11, 2019
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Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRI's, are popular drugs that treat depression by increasing the amount of a neurotransmitter called serotonin in the brain. But when a common SSRI known as sertraline is taken ...
May 15, 2020
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A new precision medicine targeting cancer's ability to repair its DNA has shown promising results in the first clinical trial of the drug class.
Jun 22, 2020
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Researchers at Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center have identified a gene marker that may lead to a more effective, precision treatment for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC). The researcher's findings are published ...
Sep 22, 2022
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Proteins commonly known as BRCA—short for BReast CAncer susceptibility gene- serve a critical role in cellular DNA repair, but when mutated they allow genetic errors to replicate, facilitating cancer development. If the ...
Jun 12, 2018
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Scientists at the German Cancer Research Center (Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum, DKFZ) have now found a cause for frequent catastrophic events in the genetic material of cancer cells that have only been known for a few ...
Nov 12, 2018
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Precision cancer drugs called PARP inhibitors have a previously unknown ability to boost the immune system, and could help many more patients benefit from immunotherapy, a new study reveals.
Mar 9, 2019
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Ben-Gurion University of the Negev researchers have determined that the protein SIRT6 is almost completely absent in Alzheimer's disease patients and likely contributes to its onset.
May 8, 2017
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DNA repair refers to a collection of processes by which a cell identifies and corrects damage to the DNA molecules that encode its genome. In human cells, both normal metabolic activities and environmental factors such as UV light and Radiation can cause DNA damage, resulting in as many as 1 million individual molecular lesions per cell per day. Many of these lesions cause structural damage to the DNA molecule and can alter or eliminate the cell's ability to transcribe the gene that the affected DNA encodes. Other lesions induce potentially harmful mutations in the cell's genome, which affect the survival of its daughter cells after it undergoes mitosis. Consequently, the DNA repair process is constantly active as it responds to damage in the DNA structure.
The rate of DNA repair is dependent on many factors, including the cell type, the age of the cell, and the extracellular environment. A cell that has accumulated a large amount of DNA damage, or one that no longer effectively repairs damage incurred to its DNA, can enter one of three possible states:
The DNA repair ability of a cell is vital to the integrity of its genome and thus to its normal functioning and that of the organism. Many genes that were initially shown to influence lifespan have turned out to be involved in DNA damage repair and protection. Failure to correct molecular lesions in cells that form gametes can introduce mutations into the genomes of the offspring and thus influence the rate of evolution.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
