and while many of these are beneficial, some can cause disease. For example some reports have linked Crohn's disease to the presence of certain strains of E coli."
"We'd like to be able to remove specific members of the bacterial population and see what their function is in the microbiome,
but more information about the microbiome is needed to effectively design such therapies.""The paper's lead author is Hiroki Ando, an MIT research scientist.
but efforts to harness them for medical use have been hampered because isolating useful phages from soil
and gastrointestinal infections, including pneumonia, sepsis, gastritis, and Legionnaires'disease. One advantage of the engineered phages is that unlike many antibiotics,
they are very specific in their targets.""Antibiotics can kill off a lot of the good flora in your gut,
"We aim to create effective and narrow-spectrum methods for targeting pathogens.""Lu and his colleagues are now designing phages that can target other strains of harmful bacteria,
as well as treating human disease. Another advantage of this approach is that all of the phages are based on an identical genetic scaffold,
The newly described Cpf1 system differs in several important ways from the previously described Cas9, with significant implications for research and therapeutics,
including in cancer research, "said Levi Garraway, an institute member of the Broad Institute, and the inaugural director of the Joint Center for Cancer Precision Medicine at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Brigham and Women's Hospital,
and the Broad Institute. Garraway was involved not in the research. Zhang, Broad Institute, and MIT plan to share the Cpf1 system widely.
These groups plan to offer licenses that best support rapid and safe development for appropriate and important therapeutic uses."
"Our goal is to develop tools that can accelerate research and eventually lead to new therapeutic applications.
#Cabozantinib improves survival in patients with advanced kidney cancer: Results from the METEOR trial Patients with advanced kidney cancer live for nearly twice as long without their disease progressing
if they are treated with cabozantinib, a drug that inhibits the action of tyrosine kinases--enzymes that function as an"on
"or"off"switch in many cellular processes, including cancer. In the second of two late-breaking presentations of research that is predicted to change the way kidney cancer patients are treated,
Professor Toni Choueiri will tell the presidential session of the 2015 European Cancer Congress 1,
about results from the first 375 patients out of a total of 658 patients recruited to the phase III clinical METEOR trial comparing cabozantinib with everolimus,
the current standard treatment for the disease. Analysis of results in July 2015 showed that the estimated median (average) progression-free survival time for patients with advanced clear cell kidney cancer,
randomised to receive cabozantinib, was 7. 4 months, while it was 3. 8 months for those receiving everolimus.
The findings are published simultaneously with the ECC2015 presentation in the New england Journal of Medicine. 2 Prof Choueiri
who is Associate professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical school and Clinical Director and Kidney Cancer Center Director at The Lank Center for Genitourinary Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute,
since the results may change the standard of care in patients with advanced kidney cancer who have received prior standard therapy that targets the vascular endothelial growth factor receptor (VEGFR)."
"Although treatment with VEGFR-targeted drugs has been very effective in the first line of therapy for patients with advanced kidney cancer,
This has resulted in a significant reduction in the rate of disease progression or death in the cabozantinib arm as compared with the everolimus arm.
Regaining tumour control after prior targeted therapy may reduce symptoms related to kidney cancer and eventually help patients live longer."
"An early evaluation of overall survival from the ongoing METEOR trial has shown a strong trend indicating that survival may be improved in patients receiving cabozantinib compared to standard therapy.
Overall, these results should give new hope to patients diagnosed with advanced kidney cancer as cabozantinib may become a new treatment option."
"Clear cell kidney cancer (or renal cell carcinoma) is one of the commonest kidney cancers--70-80%of kidney cancer patients have this type.
81%of patients with stage I disease, in which the tumour is confined to the kidney,
with only around eight percent of patients with stage IV disease surviving for five years.
Their disease had to have progressed within six months of receiving prior treatment with VEGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) therapy.
%shortness of breath (3. 7%)and pneumonia (3. 7%).Prof Choueiri said:""The METEOR results are important from a clinical and scientific point of view.
or resistance to standard therapies is critical for improving long-term outcome for our patients with advanced kidney cancer.
Further studies include a randomised phase II study of cabozantinib versus standard of care with sunitinib as a first treatment for advanced renal cell cancer.
Combinations with other emerging therapies, such as agents boosting the immune system, are of interest and an early stage clinical trial combining cabozantinib with immune checkpoint inhibitors has been initiated in urological cancers,
including patients with kidney cancer.""The trial has stopped recruiting patients and researchers are hoping that cabozantinib may become available to patients with advanced kidney cancer some time in 2016.
In the USA, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has designated it as a breakthrough therapy,
which may allow expedited development of the drug. Professor Peter Naredi, the ECCO scientific co-chair of the Congress,
who was involved not in the research, commented:""I am excited over the advances in treatment of renal cell carcinoma that we are at present.
The results of the METEOR study are remarkable and most likely will be practice changing. This, together with the report of the Checkmate 025 study, are definitely among the highlights of this congress."
who will be reporting results from the Checkmate 025 randomised phase III trial of nivolumab versus everolimus in advanced kidney cancer r
The device is particularly beneficial to patients who are of high surgical risk or are unsuitable for existing clinical interventions.
and this may lead to congestive heart failure or it may worsen an existing heart failure. Pioneered by Associate professor Leo Hwa Liang from the Department of Biomedical engineering at NUS'Faculty of engineering
and Dr Jimmy Hon from the Department of Surgery at the NUS Yong Loo Lin School of medicine, this novel invention addresses a clinical gap in the current treatment of mitral valve regurgitation.
This research project is supported by the Medical Engineering Research & Commercialization Initiative (MERCI) under the Department of Surgery of the NUS Yong Loo Lin School of medicine.
or are suffering from multiple chronic diseases are not suitable for the treatment. Although current mitral valve interventions delivered via a small incision through the skin could be a viable alternative treatment
therefore be a viable option for patients who are not suitable for surgeries or the standard treatment.
This transcatheter valve offers palliative treatment for the patients who were denied surgery, especially those with multiple co-morbidities."
"Dr Hon is also a Senior Consultant at the Department of Cardiac, Thoracic and Vascular Surgery, National University Heart Centre, Singapore.
They hope to work with medical technology companies to commercialise their invention to benefit patients soon n
and development of new medicines by greatly accelerating the computer-aided design of pharmaceutical compounds (and minimizing lengthy trial and error testing);
Medical researchers have developed now a highly effective in vitro technique for producing light sensitive retina cells from human embryonic stem cells.
"Cone transplant represents a therapeutic solution for retinal pathologies caused by the degeneration of photoreceptor cells,
offering hope that treatments may be developed for currently non-curable degenerative diseases, like Stargardt disease and ARMD."
ARMD is in fact the greatest cause of blindness amongst people over the age of 50
But in order to undertake a complete therapy, we need neuronal tissue that links all RPE cells to the cones.
In 2001, he launched his laboratory at Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital and immediately isolated the molecule.
Beyond the clinical applications, Professor Bernier's findings could enable the modelling of human retinal degenerative diseases through the use of induced pluripotent stem cells,
offering the possibility of directly testing potential avenues for therapy on the patient's own tissues s
The authors see numerous applications for terahertz accelerators, in materials science, medicine and particle physics, as well as in building X-ray lasers.
as well as medical applications using X-rays and electron radiation.""The rapid advances we are seeing in terahertz generation with optical methods will enable the future development of terahertz accelerators for these applications,
#Possible new treatment for bladder cancer using a mycobacterium Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona researchers have found a mycobacterium that is more effective in treating superficial bladder cancer
and does not cause infections, unlike those used up to now. Mycobacteria are the only bacteria used in cancer treatment.
The administration of the bacterium Mycobacterium bovis (BCG), is the current treatment for superficial bladder cancer.
It is inserted directly into the bladder through a catheter. BCG prevents new tumours from appearing,
the most serious being BCG infections that need to be treated with antituberculous drugs. A study on the characteristics of a wide group of mycobacteria begun seven years ago by the Mycobacteria Research Group
Preclinical studies using mouse models of bladder cancer have demonstrated the efficacy of the mycobacterium M. brumae in the treatment of this disease.
presenting no risk of causing infections, which means it would have fewer adverse side effects on patients than BCG.
which is given significant that in the last few years BCG production problems have led to supply issues for certain bladder cancer patients."
"Our results suggest that Micobacterium brumae is an ideal candidate to replace the current BCG treatment for superficial bladder cancer,
The study, published in the journal European Urology Focus, was conducted in collaboration with Dr Rosa M. Rabanal of the Murine and Comparative Pathology Unit, Department of Animal Medicine and Surgery, UAB,
and with the group Bacterial Infections and Antimicrobial Therapies led by Dr Eduard Torrents, of the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) I
#New test predicts teens'future risk of heart disease Risk for cardiovascular disease, currently running rampant in the United states,
The test accounts for many risk factors for the deadly disease and has the potential to be adapted by physicians nationwide to assess teenagers'future risk
Risk Factors for Cardiovascular disease Approximately 610,000 people die from heart disease every year in the United states--that's one of every four deaths.
Cardiovascular disease has predominantly modifiable risk factors meaning that the disease is entirely preventable. These modifiable risk factors include high blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity, physical inactivity, diabetes, unhealthy diets and smoking.
The only risk factor unable to be changed is genetic predisposition. The Role of Metabolic syndrome The new diagnostic test has been developed by a team that included Mark Deboer, MD, of the University of Virginia Children's Hospital's Department of Pediatrics,
and Matthew Gurka, Phd, of West virginia University's School of Public health. The test relies on an evaluation of metabolic syndrome,
a conglomeration of conditions including increased blood pressure, high levels of blood sugar, excessive body fat around the abdomen and waist,
and abnormal cholesterol levels that together increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. It takes into account variables specific both to race and gender."
"The way that we normally diagnose metabolic syndrome appears to have some racial discrepancies where African-american individuals are diagnosed not with metabolic syndrome at a very high rate
and yet they are at very high risk for developing type 2 diabetes and CVD cardiovascular disease,
so Dr. Gurka and I formulated a metabolic syndrome severity score that is specific to sex and ethnicity,
"Deboer said. In creating the test, Deboer and Gurka examined metabolic severity scores from children in the 1970s that assessed body mass index (BMI), systolic blood pressure, fasting triglycerides, HDL cholesterol and fasting glucose.
The children were followed up as recently as 2014 at an average age of 49.6 years."
"The current study was targeted at using that metabolic syndrome severity score on data from individuals who were children in the'70s to see
if it correlated with their risk on developing CVD and type 2 diabetes later in life,
and we found that there was a high correlation between the metabolic severity score for those children and for their later development of cardiovascular disease and diabetes,
The Use of the Test The test is innovative in that it is able to assess changes in metabolic syndrome severity in a person over time
or does not have metabolic syndrome, but the new test is able to create a scale,
"We are hopeful that this score can be used to assess the baseline risk for adolescents regarding metabolic syndrome
and their risk for future disease and use it as a motivator for individuals to try to change their risk
or get medication to reduce their metabolic syndrome severity and their future risk for disease, "Deboer said d
#Groundbreaking computer program diagnoses cancer in two days In by far the majority of cancer cases, the doctor can quickly identify the source of the disease, for example cancer of the liver, lungs, etc.
However, in about one in 20 cases, the doctor can confirm that the patient has cancer
and attempts to locate the origin of the cancer before starting any treatment. Now, researchers at DTU Systems Biology have combined genetics with computer science
which--on the basis of a biopsy from a metastasis--can with 85 per cent certainty identify the source of the disease
Each year, about 35,000 people are diagnosed with cancer in Denmark, and many of them face the prospect of a long wait until the cancer has been diagnosed and its source located.
However, even after very extensive tests, there will still be 2-3 per cent of patients where it has not been possible to find the origin of the cancer.
In such cases, the patient will be treated with a cocktail of chemotherapy instead of a more appropriately targeted treatment
are based on analyses of DNA mutations in cancer tissue samples from patients with metastasized cancer,
i e. cancer which has spread. The pattern of mutations is analysed in a computer program which has been trained to find possible primary tumour localizations.
whether an individual cancer patient will benefit from a specific type of medicine. This is a very effective method,
and it is becoming increasingly common to conduct such sequencing for cancer patients. Associate professor Aron Eklund from DTU Systems Biology explains:"
"We are pleased very that we can now use the same sequencing data together with our new algorithms to provide a much faster diagnosis for cancer cases that are difficult to diagnose,
and to provide a useful diagnosis in cases which are currently impossible to diagnose. At the moment, it takes researchers two days to obtain a biopsy result,
but we expect this time to be reduced as it becomes possible to do the sequencing increasingly faster.
And it will be straightforward to integrate the method with the methods already being used by doctors."
and thus also as an effective and easy way of monitoring people who are at risk of developing cancer.
Tumor tracer A diagnostic method for determining the primary site of the cancer. The method combines genetics and computer science,
and can analyse a biopsy from a metastasis, and on this basis provide a number of possible scenarios for where the cancer may have developed
and indicate the probability of it being correct. At the moment analysing a biopsy takes two days s
#Medical diagnosis: Will brain palpation soon be possible? If there is one technique used by the physician to explore the human body during every medical examination
in order to make a diagnosis or prescribe further tests, it is palpation. By its nature, however, the brain cannot be palpated without using a highly invasive procedure (craniotomy,
"Therapeutic Applications of Ultrasound")have developed just a noninvasive brain imaging method using MRI that provides the same information as physical palpation.
Ultimately, it could be used in the early diagnosis of brain tumours or Alzheimer's disease. This work is published in PNAS.
Many diseases involve structural changes in tissues which are reflected in a change in their mechanical properties, such as elasticity.
something that greatly complicates the work of neurosurgeons. On the other hand, the brain is the seat of natural vibrations created by the blood pulsating in the arteries and the circulating cerebrospinal fluid.
"Alzheimer's disease, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis and hydrocephalus involve changes in the stiffness of the brain tissues. This new technique allows their detection,
and could be used to avoid brain biopsies.""This method for palpating the brain could have other areas of application,
such as for analysing the development of neurodegenerative processes, the impact of a lesion from a trauma or tumour, response to treatment, etc e
'Complex array of mutations found in rare, aggressive leukemia Sezary syndrome (SS), an aggressive leukemia of mature T cells, is complicated more at a molecular level than ever suspected, according to investigators from the Perelman School of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
With a poor prognosis and limited options for targeted therapies, fighting SS needs new treatment approaches.
The team's results uncover a previously unknown, complex genomic landscape of this cancer, which can be used to design new personalized drug regimens for SS patients based on their unique genetic makeup.
Sezary syndrome is a rare condition: Its incidence is estimated to be about 0. 3-2 cases per 100,000 in the United states each year,
and those patients have a five-year survival rate of less than 30 percent. Penn Medicine has the one of the largest referral clinics for treatment of SS patients in the country.
The team integrated three, complementary gene sequencing approaches to look for mutations in tumor cells from SS patients:
whole-genome sequencing in six subjects, sequencing of all protein-coding regions (exomes) in 66 subjects,
drugs that are approved currently for treatment of other hematologic cancers such as polycythemia vera and myelofibrosis."
These results highlight the genetic vulnerabilities that we can use in designing precision medicine therapies."
"The Penn team, in collaboration with Alain Rook, MD, director of the Cutaneous T-cell Lymphoma Program and a professor of Dermatology, aims to develop a molecular taxonomy for mutations in SS patients.
From this, they will also be able to identify distinct subsets of the disease to stratify patients for precision therapy based on their unique mutations and the inhibitors available for those mutations s
#Scientists pave way for diamonds to trace early cancers Physicists from the University of Sydney have devised a way to use diamonds to identify cancerous tumours before they become life threatening.
synthetic version of the precious gem can light up early-stage cancers in nontoxic, noninvasive Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans.
Targeting cancers with tailored chemicals is not new but scientists struggle to detect where these chemicals go since,
short of a biopsy, there are few ways to see if a treatment has been taken up by a cancer.
Led by Professor David Reilly from the School of Physics researchers from the University investigated how nanoscale diamonds could help identify cancers in their earliest stages."
"We knew nano diamonds were of interest for delivering drugs during chemotherapy because they are largely nontoxic and non-reactive,
"By attaching hyperpolarised diamonds to molecules targeting cancers the technique can allow tracking of the molecules'movement in the body,
and target cancers long before they become life-threatening, "says Professor Reilly. The next stage of the team's work involves working with medical researchers to test the new technology on animals.
Also on the horizon is research using scorpion venom to target brain tumours with MRI scanning g
#3d image of cancer protein aids quest for new treatments Scientists at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute have created the first three-dimensional image of a key protein known to be involved in the development of blood and other cancers.
The discovery showed the protein, called Trib1, plays a vital role in controlling how and when other proteins are degraded,
The finding could be used to develop new drugs to treat cancers such as leukaemia, caused by malfunctioning of the Trib1 protein.
causing a type of blood cancer called acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Institute researchers Dr James Murphy and Dr Isabelle Lucet, in collaboration with Dr Peter Mace from the University of Otago, New zealand, characterised the human Tribbles protein Trib1.
and can lead to diseases such as cancer.""Using the Australian Synchrotron, Dr Mace, Dr Murphy and colleagues were able to obtain detailed three-dimensional images of Trib1."
which will provide critical clues for developing drugs that target Trib1 to treat cancers.""Lead investigator Dr Mace said Trib1 acted as a scaffold to bring many proteins together,
our research could help us design novel therapeutic agents for the treatment of AML, "Dr Mace said."
which causes a loss of proteins that would normally inhibit cancer. Understanding the structure of Trib1 provides critical clues about how we could block Tribbles for the treatment of AML."
which has the capacity to transform toxic organochlorine compounds into others that are harmless. These experts have succeeded in characterising
posing a threat due to their high toxicity. According to data from the Waste Agency of Catalonia, 8%of contaminated soils recorded in 2014 contained organochlorine compounds,
Scientists at the University of Nebraska Medical center designed a new delivery system for these drugs that,
Nanotechnology, Biology and Medicine. While current HIV treatments involve pills that are taken daily, the new regimens'long-lasting effects suggest that HIV treatment could be administered perhaps once or twice per year.
thereby prolonging its therapeutic effect.""The chemical marriage between URMC-099 and antiretroviral drug nanoformulations could increase drug longevity,
and reduce general toxicities, "said Gendelman, lead study author and professor and chair of the Department of Pharmacology and Experimental Neuroscience at Nebraska,
"We are excited about pursing this research for the treatment and eradication of HIV infections.""The two therapies were tested together in laboratory experiments using human immune cells
and in mice that were engineered to have a human immune system. Gendelman and Gelbard believe that the nanoformulation technology helps keep the protease inhibitor in white blood cells longer
Gelbard, director of UR's Center for Neural development and Disease, developed URMC-099 to treat HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders or HAND,
as any patient prescribed URMC-099 would also be taking antiretroviral therapy. The goal was to determine
"Our ultimate hope is that we're able to create a therapy that could be given much less frequently than the daily therapy that is required today,
reduce side effects and help people manage the disease, because they won't have to think about taking medication every day
the result is a potentially fatal arrhythmia. Now, a team of researchers from Oxford and Stony Brook universities has found a way to precisely control these waves--using light.
'When there is scar tissue in the heart or fibrosis, this can cause part of the wave to slow down.
This ideal therapy has remained in the realm of science fiction until now.''The team stresses that there are significant hurdles before this could offer new treatments--a key issue is being able to alter the heart to be light-sensitised
However, as gene therapy moves into the clinic and with miniaturization of optical devices, use of this all-optical technology may become possible.
The findings, published in JAMA Neurology, identify structural damage between the thalamus and primary motor cortex as the obstacle between covert awareness and intentional movement.
will pave the way for the development of restorative therapies for thousands of patients. Dr Davinia Fernández-Espejo
""However, before we take the crucial step of developing targeted therapies to help these patients,
Dr Fernández-Espejo added,"The ultimate aim is to use this information in targeted therapies that can drastically improve the quality of life of patients.
"Though it may be a number of years before an effective therapy is developed, the team believe that a significant milestone has been reached with the discovery e
especially mutations, has become critically important for the detection of diseases and design of therapies to treat them.
But finding a specific biomarker in a massive amount of genetic code is hard. Zhang and his team at Rice's Bioscience Research Collaborative have become specialists in finding such needles in haystacks.
"In one of many successful tests, the lab designed molecules to detect mutation sequences in historic biopsy samples preserved in wax from cancer patients.
One of the researchers'goals is to design noninvasive cancer diagnostics that detect DNA biomarkers in blood samples for early screening and early recurrence detection.
and apply it to cancer detection n
#New approach toward a broad spectrum malaria vaccine Malaria affects millions of people worldwide. Plasmodium falciparum enolase participates in parasite invasion of host red blood cells and mosquito midgut epithelium.
Anti-enolase antibodies interfere with the invasion, inhibiting parasite growth and transmission. A pentapeptide insert of parasite enolase, conserved in all Plasmodia species,
but absent from host enolases, shows considerable protection against malaria when displayed on Archaeal gas vesicle nanoparticles.
A vaccine based on this motif could confer protection against all malaria parasites. In a recent breakthrough to combat malaria, a collaboration of Indian and American scientists have identified a malarial parasite protein that can be used to develop antibodies
when displayed on novel nanoparticles. This approach has the potential to prevent the parasite from multiplying in the human host
and also inhibits transmission through mosquitoes. The finding points towards developing a powerful malaria vaccine in the hope of eradicating this debilitating and often fatal disease.
Malaria takes a heavy toll on human lives. About half a million people die every year and several hundred million suffer from this disease across the globe.
To add to the disease burden, the malaria parasite is increasingly becoming resistant to commonly used antimalarial drugs.
Development of an antimalarial vaccine is an integral part of an effort to counter the socioeconomic burden of malaria.
Researchers in the malaria labs at Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR Mumbai, India, have identified now a five amino acid segment of a Plasmodium parasite protein that is normally involved in producing energy from glucose.
Work from Prof. Gotam Jarori's lab has shown earlier that this protein, enolase, is a protective antigen
and has several other functions that are essential for parasite growth and multiplication. Taking this a step further, in a recently published paper in the Malaria Journal,
they have shown that a small part of this protein, that is unique to parasite enolase and is absent in human enolases,
has protective antigenic properties.""As enolase was implicated in invasion of red blood cells of the host as well as the midgut of mosquitoes,
antibodies against this small fragment can potentially have a dual benefit by blocking the multiplication cycle of the parasite in humans,
and this conjugated system was used to vaccinate mice. Interestingly, a subsequent challenge with a lethal strain of mouse malaria parasite in these vaccinated animals showed considerable protection against malaria.
Says Prof. Dassarma, Phd, a professor of microbiology and immunology at the school,"GVNPS offer a designer platform for vaccines
and this work is a significant step forward towards a new malaria vaccine.""This study is a significant advance in the field,
since most other vaccine candidate molecules tested so far confer protection against only a single species of parasite, due to the species and strain specific nature of these molecules."
"The small segment of five amino acids that forms a protective epitope is present in all human malaria causing species of Plasmodium and hence,
antibodies directed against it are likely to protect against all species of the parasite, "says Sneha Dutta,
a graduate student at TIFR who conducted these experiments. Efforts are focused now at developing this into an effective vaccine against malaria a
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