Photo by Erin Ashford Yale University Principal Investigator: David Spiegel Research Team: Prof. Jason Crawford, Nam Kim, Venkata Sabbasani, Matthew Streeter The long-lived collagen proteins that give structure to our arteries and other tissues are continuously exposed to blood sugar and other highly reactive molecules necessary for life. Occasionally, …Glucosepane Crosslinks and Undoing Age-Related Tissue Damage.
Unregulated cell division is a hallmark of cancer, and one of the key proteins involved in controlling cell division is called FoxM1. Abnormal activation of FoxM1 is a common feature of cancer cells and is correlated with poor prognosis, metastasis, and resistance to chemotherapy.
Now researchers at UC Santa Cruz have determined the structure of this protein—a kind of “master switch” for cell division—in its inactive or “off” conformation. This new understanding of the structure of FoxM1 could ultimately be used to design new drugs that stabilize the protein in its inactive state and thereby stop the uncontrolled proliferation of cancer cells.
Seth Rubin, professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UC Santa Cruz, explained that FoxM1 is a “transcription factor,” a protein that controls the activity of specific genes.
If you’re planning a trip to Hawaii, be mindful of what you eat, the state’s Department of Health states in an advisory published last week. Officials are ramping up efforts to warn tourists about rat lungworm disease, an illness caused by a parasite that can infest human brains. The advisory follows an alert from the CDC that confirmed three new rat lungworm cases all linked to Hawaii.
Two studies are shedding light on the links between the gut, the brain, and autism. The research reveals how gut problems can be triggered by the same gene mutations associated with autism, and a study shows how a fecal transplant from humans with autism can promote autism-like behaviors in mice.
The newest results from the Human Microbiome Project have revealed just how connected the microbes in our gut are to our overall health.
You have about as many bacteria and other microbes living in your body as your own cells—and yet, we still don’t understand much about how this microbiome relates to bodily function. Back in 2007, the National Institutes of Health kicked off the Human Microbiome Project, a $200 million effort to understand these microbes. Scientists have now published the results from the second phase of this project, designed to study how the microbiome interacts with the human body. These three studies, which examine preterm birth, inflammatory bowel disease, and pre-diabetes, demonstrate that microbiomes are unique to individuals and intimately tied to our health.
Scientists at the University of Helsinki working in collaboration with the University of Oxford have deciphered for the first time how a virus genome is condensed inside the capsid of a virus.
“The motivation of the study was to increase our basic understanding of viral replication, but in the long term this may contribute to tackling viral disease,” says the director of the of the project, Associate Professor Juha Huiskonen from the Helsinki Institute of Life Science, HiLIFE.
The breakthrough results were achieved using cryogenic electron microscopy, a method that has in recent years revolutionised structural biology—a field of biology that aims to understand how molecules of life work at the atomic level.
We found that eating one cup of blueberries per day resulted in sustained improvements in vascular function and arterial stiffness—making enough of a difference to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease by between 12 and 15 percent.
Eating a cup of blueberries a day reduces risk factors for cardiovascular disease—according to new research led by the University of East Anglia, in collaboration with colleagues from Harvard and across the UK.
New findings published today in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition show that eating 150g of blueberries daily reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease by up to 15 percent.
The research team from UEA’s Department of Nutrition and Preventive Medicine, Norwich Medical School, say that blueberries and other berries should be included in dietary strategies to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease—particularly among at risk groups.
Energy drinks are causing potentially fatal heart disorders that are not explained by their high caffeine content, a study has found.
Experts have warned people with congenital heart conditions and high blood pressure to limit their use of the drinks after the largest study yet found they caused substantial interference in the electric signals that govern the organ.
A trial of participants between the ages of 18 and 40 revealed the speed at which the heart reset itself after beating was altered at least four hours after consuming an energy drink.
In my view, most of the research so far has placed too much emphasis on cataloguing species names. We’ve been characterizing the human microbiome as if it were a relatively fixed property to be mapped and manipulated — one that is separate from the rest of the body. In fact, I think that interventions that could help to treat conditions such as diabetes, cancer and autoimmune diseases will be discovered only if we move beyond species catalogues and begin to understand the complex and mutable ecological and evolutionary relationships that microbes have with each other and with their hosts.
The dream of microbiome-based medicine requires a fresh approach — an ecological and evolutionary understanding of host-microbe interactions — argues Lita Proctor.