https://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. A research team at the Korea University College of Medicine has uncovered a genetic mechanism responsible for delayed tooth development and impaired mineralization. The team, led by Professor Hae-chul Park (Department of Biomedical Sciences, Korea University College of Medicine) and Professor Ji-suk Shim (Department of Dentistry, Korea University College of Medicine), investigated the role of the Axin2 gene, which encodes a negative regulator of the Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway—a critical pathway that orchestrates cell proliferation, differentiation, and organogenesis. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-01-gene-delayed-softer-teeth-zebrafish.html Thu, 29 Jan 2026 12:40:05 EST news688912582 Electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes), widely marketed as a safer alternative to traditional cigarettes, are now hooking younger generations. World Health Organization data from 2025 show that at least 15 million adolescents aged 13–15 now vape. As colorful, fruit-flavored devices become a new social norm on playgrounds and campuses, we must rethink whether they are truly harmless as advertised. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-01-vaping-zebrafish-cigarette-exposure-disrupts.html Thu, 29 Jan 2026 12:28:39 EST news688912082 Stress, the body's natural response to different types of challenges and daily problems, is an inherently harmless state experienced by most people worldwide. While short-term stress is a common experience and can even be beneficial, acute or prolonged stress responses are known to be linked with various neuropsychiatric disorders, including depression and anxiety disorders. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-01-stress-hormone-receptors-brain-behavior.html Sun, 11 Jan 2026 12:00:02 EST news687092332 Stress affects many systems in our body and biologists Marcel Schaaf and Erin Faught at Radboud University are figuring out how that works. Their recent study showed how stress changes behavior by using two different receptors. Previously they unraveled how stress can have positive effects on the immune system. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-short-term-stress-primes-immune.html Thu, 11 Dec 2025 11:20:01 EST news684673968 Norovirus is the leading cause of gastroenteritis and is responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths every year. However, research progress into antiviral treatments and vaccines has been hindered by the absence of a robust reverse genetics system. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-12-reverse-genetics-path-norovirus-vaccine.html Wed, 10 Dec 2025 12:50:17 EST news684593401 University of Mississippi researchers have developed a new tool to help scientists study how environmental and genetic factors interact to influence autism spectrum disorder. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-11-tool-autism-factors.html Tue, 11 Nov 2025 11:34:04 EST news682083241 A Northwestern Medicine-led study has identified mutations in the gene CEP76 as a new cause of ciliopathies, shedding light on a complex group of disorders that affect multiple body systems, according to a study published in Science Advances. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-11-gene-cep76-rare-ciliopathy-disorders.html Mon, 03 Nov 2025 12:15:03 EST news681394501 New research published in Cell finds the existence of craters on the surface of melanoma cells that serve as immune hubs, becoming major sites for tumor killing. These craters could serve as good markers for immunotherapy success. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-craters-surface-melanoma-cells-tumor.html Fri, 17 Oct 2025 11:00:01 EDT news679824422 Our skin protects us from everyday mechanical stresses, like friction, cuts, and impacts. A key part of this function—standing as a bulwark against the outside world—is the skin's amazing ability to regenerate and heal. But where does this healing ability begin? https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-skin-natural-power-regenerative-medicine.html Mon, 13 Oct 2025 09:45:04 EDT news679567501 Dr. Brian Ciruna had no intention of studying scoliosis, a condition that causes unnatural curvature of the spine. However, the unexpected discovery about a decade ago that zebrafish also develop curved spines left him wondering what was causing the spine to bend and whether there was some connection to the human form of the disease. It turns out that this small, minnow-like fish has a lot to tell researchers about a condition that affects 3% to 4% of children and young teens in Canada. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-10-zebrafish-spine-reveal-clues-early.html Mon, 06 Oct 2025 14:26:03 EDT news678979561 Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease is the most common liver disease in the world, affecting about one-third of the adult population. This disorder is characterized by the accumulation of fat in liver cells, which has severe liver consequences and is also associated with a high mortality rate from cardiovascular disease. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-09-combination-drugs-cardiovascular-common-liver.html Tue, 30 Sep 2025 12:49:05 EDT news678455341 Molecular profiling has transformed cancer care, but 30% of high-risk pediatric cancers do not have actionable therapeutic targets, limiting personalized treatment options and negatively affecting survival outcomes. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-09-zebrafish-fast-effective-guidance-personalized.html Wed, 24 Sep 2025 15:11:54 EDT news677945509 According to the World Health Organization, tuberculosis accounts for one in three deaths among people living with HIV. In fact, even when receiving effective antiretroviral treatment, HIV-positive individuals are 15 to 30 times more likely to contract tuberculosis than HIV-uninfected people. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-09-tuberculosis-vulnerability-people-hiv-viral.html Thu, 18 Sep 2025 14:00:04 EDT news677410270 Despite swimming in different worlds, fish and humans are biologically much closer than one might think. Capitalizing on this kinship, researchers have now used zebrafish embryos to come up with a promising new therapy for kaposiform lymphangiomatosis (KLA)—a rare, life-threatening genetic disorder of the lymphatic system. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-09-fishing-drug-rare-disease.html Tue, 02 Sep 2025 09:36:45 EDT news676024598 For over three decades, the zebrafish has advanced preclinical biomedical research: hundreds of individuals can be studied simultaneously, and even whole-brain activity can be recorded in living animals. Its limitation, however, lies in its social nature: as a schooling species, its behavior is always influenced by the presence—or absence—of conspecifics. This means that when studied in isolation, results may be skewed by its innate social tendencies. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-08-fish-species-strategies-memory.html Thu, 28 Aug 2025 14:19:03 EDT news675609541 Researchers at Oregon Health & Science University have identified a gene that plays a crucial role in the brain's ability to form the protective layer around nerves known as myelin, potentially opening new doors to treatments for a rare childhood disorder and more common diseases such as multiple sclerosis. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-07-tmem63a-gene-linked-brain-myelin.html Tue, 22 Jul 2025 13:30:12 EDT news672409364 Before 1846, surgery was a crude and brutal undertaking, typically performed on conscious patients lashed to their beds. Then a Boston dentist publicly demonstrated that the highly flammable chemical diethyl ether—commonly called ether—could render a patient unconscious and insensitive to pain. Overnight, surgery became a major player in modern medicine. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-06-quest-reinvent-anesthesia.html Thu, 19 Jun 2025 14:33:05 EDT news669562381 Synthetic chemicals and plastics are useful and indispensable in our lives. On the other hand, the world is grappling with plastic pollution—clogging oceans, threatening wildlife, and leaching into ecosystems. While eco-friendly alternatives are on the way, researchers have been trying to identify the various effects of the synthetic plastics present within the ecosystem. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-06-bpa-retinoic-acid-disrupt-brain.html Thu, 19 Jun 2025 11:03:04 EDT news669549782 Zika virus (ZIKV) infection is a major public health concern, particularly due to the severe brain development defects it can cause in fetuses when pregnant women are infected. One of the most serious outcomes is microcephaly—a condition in which newborns exhibit abnormally small heads. Currently, there are no approved treatments or vaccines for ZIKV, largely because the mechanisms behind the disease remain poorly understood. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-05-zebrafish-zika-virus-disrupts-early.html Wed, 28 May 2025 15:30:05 EDT news667664892 In vertebrate retinas, specialized photoreceptors responsible for color vision (cone cells) arrange themselves in patterns known as the "cone mosaic." Researchers at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) have discovered that a protein called Dscamb acts as a "self-avoidance enforcer" for color-detecting cells in the retinas of zebrafish, ensuring they maintain perfect spacing for optimal vision. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-03-mystery-vision-science-zebrafish-retinal.html Tue, 25 Mar 2025 06:00:06 EDT news662055382 Researchers at University College Dublin (UCD) have discovered that a mutation in a gene called emc1 causes major vision problems in zebrafish. Zebrafish with this mutation had poorly developed eye cells, weaker responses to light, and changes in the normal structure of their retinas. These tiny, tropical fish are used as a tool to find novel genes that cause inherited blindness and help find better treatments for inherited retinal blindness. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-01-newly-gene-mutation-eye-disease.html Wed, 08 Jan 2025 10:22:04 EST news655554121 An ancient brain circuit, which enables the eyes to reflexively rotate up as the body tilts down, tunes itself early in life as an animal develops, a new study finds. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-01-newborn-brain-circuit-stabilizes-discovery.html Thu, 02 Jan 2025 15:53:04 EST news655055581 Researchers from the Bakkers group at the Hubrecht Institute have successfully repaired damaged mouse hearts using a protein from zebrafish. They discovered that the protein Hmga1 plays a key role in heart regeneration in zebrafish. In mice, this protein was able to restore the heart by activating dormant repair genes without causing side effects, such as heart enlargement. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2025-01-zebrafish-protein-dormant-genes-heart.html Thu, 02 Jan 2025 10:07:03 EST news655034816 Working with week-old zebrafish larva, researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine and colleagues decoded how the connections formed by a network of neurons in the brainstem guide the fishes' gaze. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-11-neuronal-circuit-insight-eye-movement.html Fri, 22 Nov 2024 11:54:04 EST news651498841 A drug commonly used to treat glaucoma has been shown in zebrafish and mice to protect against the build-up in the brain of the protein tau, which causes various forms of dementia and is implicated in Alzheimer's disease. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-10-glaucoma-drug-neurodegenerative-diseases-animal.html Thu, 31 Oct 2024 06:00:01 EDT news649502521 Nager syndrome, or NS, is a rare genetic disease that affects the development of the face and limbs, usually causing anomalies in the bone structures of the jaws, cheeks, and hands. With a prevalence of less than 100 cases ever reported, not much is known about the disease except the fact that mutations in the SF3B4 gene are its primary cause. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-10-zebrafish-underlying-mechanism-nager-syndrome.html Wed, 16 Oct 2024 17:01:04 EDT news648316861 Because of their special properties—heat resistance, water and grease repellence, and high durability—PFAS are used in many everyday products (e.g. cosmetics, outdoor clothing, and coated cookware). But it is precisely these properties that make them so problematic. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-09-zebrafish-pfas-exposure-affects-brain.html Wed, 04 Sep 2024 13:00:01 EDT news644673066 Columbia University researchers have discovered how variants of the ABCA7 gene, which are common among Black Americans, increase the risk for Alzheimer's disease. The paper is published in the journal Cell Genomics. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-08-common-genetic-variants-black-americans.html Fri, 30 Aug 2024 12:49:03 EDT news644240941 Blinding diseases lead to permanent vision loss by damaging photoreceptor cells, which humans cannot naturally regenerate. While researchers are working on new methods to replace or regenerate these cells, the crucial question is whether these regenerated photoreceptors can fully restore vision. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-08-zebrafish-regenerated-photoreceptor-cells-fully.html Tue, 27 Aug 2024 10:24:05 EDT news643973041 Millions of adults have atrial fibrillation—an irregular beating of the upper chambers of the heart that yields increased risk of heart failure, stroke and death. Many genetic mutations in the developing fetus can lead to adult atrial fibrillation, including mutations that shorten the massive protein titin in cardiac muscle cells. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-07-tiny-deletion-heart-muscle-protein.html Thu, 25 Jul 2024 09:43:04 EDT news641119382