A new cancer vaccine platform works by enhancing the ability of the immune system to recognize cancer by leveraging anti-viral memories it already has - due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the worst outbreak of the last 70 years.
The AIDS virus (HIV) attacks immune system cells and once inside them it multiplies. In some of these immune cells, viral stocks are not very accessible to antiviral therapy. CNRS, Institut Curie and Institut Pasteur researchers investigating how HIV avoids being destroyed by immune cells have discovered that HIV alters the pH of the cellular compartments where it accumulates, thus stopping the activation of the very enzymes that would normally degrade it.
When viruses or infectious bacteria enter our body, the immune system is triggered to eliminate them, through a process involving various types of white blood cells. Some viruses target the immune system.
It’s already known that a person’s social environment can affect their health, with those who are socially isolated—that is, lonely suffering from higher mortality than people who are not. Now, in the first study of its kind, published in the current issue of the journal Genome Biology, UCLA researchers have identified a distinct pattern of gene expression in immune cells from people who experience chronically high levels of loneliness. The findings suggest that feelings of social isolation are linked to alterations in the activity of genes that drive inflammation, the first response of the immune system. The study provides a molecular framework for understanding why social factors are linked to an increased risk of heart disease, viral infections and cancer.
Why would prehistoric reptiles have needed to develop modern ears? No one can say for sure but it is certain that a new study by Johannes Müller and Linda Tsuji, paleobiologists at the Natural History Museum of the Humboldt University in Berlin, has pushed back the date of impedance-matching hearing by some 60 million years.
The fossil animals they studied, found in deposits of Permian age near the Mezen River in central Russia, possessed all the anatomical features typical of a vertebrate with a surprisingly modern ear.
When vertebrates had conquered land and the ancestors of modern day mammals, reptiles, and birds first began to diversify, hearing was not of high importance.
The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach but the way to a female chimpanzees may be through being a great thief. Researchers studying wild chimps in West Africa have learned that males steal desirable fruits from local orchards as a means of attracting female mates.
Lead researcher, Dr Kimberley Hockings from the University of Stirling’s Department of Psychology said: “We believe the males may be using crop-raids as a way to advertise their prowess to other group-members, especially the opposite sex.
Research presented at the British Pharmaceutical Conference (BPC) in Manchester, shows that a compound extracted from tangerine peel can kill certain human cancer cells.
Researchers based at the Leicester School of Pharmacy showed that human cancer cells (which contain an enzyme called P450 CYP1B1) were destroyed by a compound called Salvestrol Q40, contained in tangerine peel. Some types of human cancer cells contain abnormally high levels of P450 CYP1B1.(1), (2)
Salvestrol Q40 is found in the skin of fruits but is removed from the diet when fruit is eaten without its peel or is processed for fruit-based products such as fruit juice.
Last month, University of Alaska Fairbanks researcher Katey Walter brought a National Public Radio crew to Alaska’s North Slope (actually, the NPR story is a lot better and has video, so you can probablly just go there and read it, but please come back when you are done - Editors ), hoping to show them examples of what happens when methane is released when permafrost thaws beneath lakes.
When they reached their destination, Walter and the crew found even more than they bargained for: a lake violently boiling with escaping methane.
University of Minnesota researchers have discovered that N-acetyl cysteine, a common amino acid available as a health food supplement, may help curb pathological gamblers’ addiction.
In a recent eight-week trial, 27 people were given increasing doses of the amino acid, which has an impact on the chemical glutamate – often associated with reward in the brain. At the end of the trial, 60 percent of the participants reported fewer urges to gamble.
“It looks very promising,” said Jon Grant, J.D., M.D., a University of Minnesota associate professor of psychiatry and principal investigator of the study. “We were able to reduce people’s urges to gamble.”
The medical diagnosis of brain death is at odds with our traditional view of when death actually occurs, says Professor Allan Kellehear from the Centre for Death & Society at the University of Bath, speaking at an international conference on Death, dying & disposal.
A diagnosis of brain death uses factors like fixed and dilated pupils, lack of eye movement and absence of respiratory reflexes but the social understanding of death is that it occurs when the heart stops beating.
This makes decisions that often follow brain death, such as organ removal and the cessation of life support, potentially unsettling for the bereaved.
A way to convert natural gas into raw materials for the chemical industry and generate power as a by-product could lead to more environmental benign manufacturing processes.
Making synthesis gas - a blend of hydrogen and carbon monoxide - is a key step in turning natural gas or biomass into bulk chemicals, such as acetic acid, methanol, oxygenated alcohols, isocyanates, and ammonia, which are the feedstock of the global chemical industry. Synthesis gas can also be converted into synthetic diesel fuel. In the conventional process of synthesis gas production, a catalyst and heat are required, which itself requires energy.
These NASA Hubble Space Telescope images reveal how the glowing gas ejected by dying Sun-like stars evolves dramatically over time.
These gaseous clouds, called planetary nebulae, are created when stars in the last stages of life cast off their outer layers of material into space. Ultraviolet light from the remnant star makes the material glow. Planetary nebulae last for only 10,000 years, a fleeting episode in the 10-billion-year lifespan of Sun-like stars.
The name planetary nebula has nothing to do with planets.
A primary mystery puzzling neuroscientists -- where in the brain lies intelligence" -- just may have a unified answer.
In a review of 37 imaging studies related to intelligence, including their own, Richard Haier of the University of California, Irvine and Rex Jung of the University of New Mexico have uncovered evidence of a distinct neurobiology of human intelligence.
HIV infection is on the rise among young men who have sex with men (MSM) in New York City, according to preliminary data from the Health Department. New HIV diagnoses among MSM under age 30 have increased by 33% during the past six years, the agency reported today, from 374 in 2001 to almost 500 in 2006. New diagnoses have doubled among MSM ages 13 to19, while declining by 22% among older MSM. The under-30 group now accounts for 44% of all new diagnoses among MSM in New York City, up from 31% in 2001.
“We are very concerned about the increase in HIV among young men who have sex with men,” said Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, Health Commissioner for New York City. “We’re headed in the wrong direction.
