Curing Death by Curing Aging Archives Page 40

Genes identified which predict response to breast cancer treatment (9/25/2007)

Scientists have identified two genes that identify which breast cancer cells are resistant and which respond to a common chemotherapy treatment. ...> Full Article

Microscopic Pollution May Trigger Heart Attacks/Strokes by Spurring Blood Clots (9/24/2007)

Tiny particles that spew from the exhaust of diesel trucks, buses and coal-burning factories killing thousands of people. ...> Full Article

Ancient Mechanism For Coping With Stresses Also Gives Cancer A Boost (9/24/2007)

An ancient mechanism for coping with environmental stresses, including heat and toxic exposures, also helps cancerous tumors survive, reveals a new report in the Sept. 21, 2007, issue of Cell, a publication of Cell Press. ...> Full Article

Age adjustment may be delaying detection of prostate cancers in senior men (9/24/2007)

Age adjustment, a method used by physicians to evaluate prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels and cancer risk in men according to age, may be hindering the early detection of prostate cancer in older men. ...> Full Article

Blood Protein Detects Lung Cancer, Even at Earliest Stage (9/24/2007)

Biopharmaceutical researchers have found a protein in blood they say is linked to all stages of lung cancer but which rarely shows up in the blood of people without the disease. Testing for this protein might help physicians decide whether smokers or others at high risk for lung cancer should be referred for lung imaging. ...> Full Article

Immunizations Are Discontinued in Two HIV Vaccine Trials (9/24/2007)

HIV Vaccine trials canceled after participants taking the vaccines became infected with HIV at a higher rate than those participants taking a placebo. ...> Full Article

Researchers Studying Model to Learn Why Certain Cancers Become Resistant to Drugs (9/24/2007)

Resistance to chemotherapy treatments can be the worst news a cancer patient ever receives. A pair of researchers are working steadfastly to learn why some tumors eventually build a tolerance to the common chemotherapy drug cisplatin, in hopes of identifying the particular genes that can be manipulated to make treatment as effective as possible. ...> Full Article

Gene Chip Data Improved Therapy in Some Patients with Incurable Cancer (9/21/2007)

"Crude" personalized medicine holds promise even when it is still in its infancy as a technology ...> Full Article

Using Antiretrovirals as a Prevention Strategy Could Dramatically Slow The Spread of HIV Infection in Africa (9/21/2007)

Model predicts potential prevention of more than 3 million new HIV infections over 10 years ...> Full Article

Genetic Cause Discovered for Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (9/21/2007)

Genetic cause of lupus, and other auto-immune diseases found, may lead to better treatments and eventually a cure. ...> Full Article

Flu virus trots globe during off season (9/21/2007)

The influenza A virus does not lie dormant during summer but migrates globally and mixes with other viral strains before returning to the Northern Hemisphere as a genetically different virus, according to biologists who say the finding settles a key debate on what the virus does during the summer off season when it is not infecting people. ...> Full Article

Heat shock proteins are co-opted for cancer (9/21/2007)

A Jekyll-Hyde mechanism that both protects healthy cells and enables cancer cells could be the basis for new cancer-fighting drugs. ...> Full Article

Scientists decipher mechanism behind antimicrobial 'hole punchers' (9/21/2007)

In the battle against bacteria, researchers have scored a direct hit. They have made a discovery that could shorten the road to new and more potent antibiotics. ...> Full Article

Radiation Oncologists to Use Real-Time System to Help Plant 'Seeds' Against Prostate Cancer (9/21/2007)

Radiation oncologists and urologists have begun using a real-time system to implant radiation-emitting seeds in prostate cancer patients. While the system is only being used for imaging and planning purposes so far, it ultimately will help with the actual placement of the seeds. ...> Full Article

New cell death pathway involved in sperm development (9/20/2007)

New research has uncovered a new pathway that regulates cell death proteins, yielding new knowledge about caspase function as well as insights into the causes of human infertility. ...> Full Article

Liver Cancer Marker Could Yield Blood Test for Early Detection (9/20/2007)

In the face of an emerging liver cancer crisis in Asia, researchers at the Chinese University of Hong Kong have developed a test that could help millions. Due to widespread hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection, nearly 10 percent of China's population is at high risk for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), a liver cancer with low survival rates if not detected and treated early. Researchers report on a new blood screening technique that could make it possible to detect early-stage liver cancer and predict how well a patient will do following treatment. ...> Full Article

Test for Lung Cancer Looks for Discomforting Quiet among Protective Genes (9/20/2007)

When it is quiet - "almost too quiet" - in movies, it is a sign that something is about to go wrong for the good guys. This holds true for the genes that protect against lung cancer, as researchers at the University of Toledo in Toledo, Ohio, have learned. They identified a panel of 15 genes that could serve to predict cancer; if enough of their collective activity becomes quiet - almost too quiet -- it could mean they are being suppressed by other factors in the cell, a step that may lead to cancer. ...> Full Article

To Evade Chemotherapy, Some Cancer Cells Mimic Stem Cells (9/20/2007)

Anti-cancer treatments often effectively shrink the size of tumors, but some might have an opposite effect, actually expanding the small population of cancer stem cells believed to drive the disease, according to findings presented today in Atlanta, Georgia at the American Association for Cancer Research's second International Conference on Molecular Diagnostics in Cancer Therapeutic Development. ...> Full Article

Researcher's Drug Strategy for Huntington's Disease (9/20/2007)

Drug prototype appears to relieve symptoms in animal models of Huntington's disease. ...> Full Article

Disease Mechanism Found for Hantavirus Infections (9/20/2007)

Researchers have discovered a mechanism by which deer mice might escape disease despite being infected with the virus. ...> Full Article

Impact of New Cancer Vaccine to be Evaluated in Rochester (9/20/2007)

Rochester has been chosen as one of four national sites to monitor the effectiveness of the new cervical cancer vaccine. The project, which is funded by the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), will be jointly conducted by the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC) and the New York State Department of Health. ...> Full Article

Communication in Cancer World is Key to Survival (9/19/2007)

New Report Says Need is Greater as Information Grows ...> Full Article

A New Technology for Cancer Screening Listens for the Signs of Cancer (9/19/2007)

Cancer-sensing devices built as cheaply and efficiently as wristwatches - using many of the same operating principles - could change the way clinicians detect, treat and monitor cancer in patients. Researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology have created an acoustic sensor that can report the presence of small amounts of mesothelin, a molecule associated with a number of cancers including mesothelioma, as they attach to the sensor's surface. ...> Full Article

Cell death in sparrow brains may provide clues in age-related human diseases (9/19/2007)

A remarkable change takes place in the brains of tiny songbirds every year, and some day the mechanism controlling that change may help researchers develop treatments for age-related degenerative diseases of the brain such as Parkinson's and dementia. ...> Full Article

Researchers discover gene mutation thought to control energy levels (9/19/2007)

Medical researchers have discovered a mutation in a gene that is widely considered to be the major controller of energy levels in our bodies. The discovery has significant implications for people suffering from diabetes and for endurance athletes. ...> Full Article

Geneticist to seek obesity link in Alaska Natives (9/19/2007)

Geneticist to study how polyunsaturated fatty acids and physical activity may modify genetic risk factors thought to play a role in the development of obesity. ...> Full Article

Biopsy, not Screening, Detects Prostate Cancer (9/19/2007)

While PSA (prostate-specific antigen) tests have become widely used to screen for prostate cancer, a biopsy is what actually determines the presence of prostate cancer. Nonetheless, it remains unclear whether or not PSA screening reduces prostate cancer deaths. ...> Full Article

Preliminary research suggests frequent hemodialysis at night may improve some outcomes for patients with end-stage kidney disease (9/19/2007)

Patients who received hemodialysis at night six times a week for treatment of end-stage kidney disease had improvements on certain outcomes, including reduced need for blood pressure medications and improvement in selected quality of life measures, compared to patients who received conventional hemodialysis three times weekly ...> Full Article

T vs. B: Re-engineered Human T Cells Effectively Target and Kill Cancerous B Cells (9/19/2007)

Human white blood cells, engineered to recognize other malignant immune cells, could provide a novel therapy for patients with highly lethal B cell cancers such as acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), according to researchers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC). By administering repeated doses of T cells designed to express an artificial receptor which recognizes human B cells, the researchers were able to eradicate cancer in 44 percent of mice bearing human ALL tumors. ...> Full Article

New antibiotic drug combo to speed up treatment of tuberculosis (9/19/2007)

A team of tuberculosis experts at Johns Hopkins and in Brazil have evidence that substituting the antibiotic moxifloxacin in the regimen of drugs used to treat the highly contagious form of lung disease could dramatically shorten the time needed to cure the illness from six months to four. ...> Full Article