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New drug targets may lead to effective Ebola treatments

2014-11-13
(Press-News.org) There are no approved treatments or preventatives against Ebola virus disease, but investigators have now designed peptides that mimic the virus' N-trimer, a highly conserved region of a protein that's used to gain entry inside cells.

The team showed that the peptides can be used as targets to help researchers develop drugs that might block Ebola virus from entering into cells.

"In contrast to the most promising current approaches for Ebola treatment or prevention, which are species-specific, our 'universal' target will enable the selection of broad-spectrum inhibitors that should block all known--and likely future--Ebola strains," said Dr. Michael Kay, senior author of the Protein Science study.

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Parental age at childbirth may affect metabolism of adult offspring

2014-11-13
In a study of middle-aged men who were overweight, researchers found that if a man's parents were older at the time of his birth, he was more likely to have lower blood pressure, more favorable cholesterol levels, and improved glucose metabolism. It's unknown whether the beneficial effect was due to having an older mother, an older father, or both. Additional studies are necessary to help shed light on the effects of parental age at childbirth on the metabolism of men and women. "In particular, more research is required to understand whether these effects are due to ...

Nonclinical factors may affect whether intensive procedures are used at the end of life

2014-11-13
In a study that looked at what factors might affect whether or not a patient receives intensive medical procedures in the last 6 months of life, investigators found that older age, Alzheimer's disease, cancer, living in a nursing home, and having an advance directive were associated with a lower likelihood of undergoing an intensive procedure. In contrast, living in a region with higher hospital care intensity and black race each doubled a patient's likelihood of undergoing an intensive procedure. "It's pretty striking the extent to which nonclinical factors--such as ...

New theory may help demystify pregnancy-related condition

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Preeclampsia, a late-pregnancy disorder that is characterized by high blood pressure and organ damage, may be caused by problems related to meeting the oxygen demands of the growing fetus, experts say in a new Anaesthesia paper. Left untreated, preeclampsia can lead to serious--even fatal--complications for a pregnant woman and her baby. The new theory challenges the current view that pre-eclampsia is caused by a problem with the placenta. "When the fetus is not getting enough oxygen and nutrients for its growth--due to conditions in the mother, conditions in the placenta ...

Is there such a thing as 'Facebook Murder'?

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Investigators recently set out to consider whether homicides involving social networking sites were unique and worthy of labels such as 'Facebook Murder', and to explore the ways in which perpetrators had used such sites in the homicides they had committed. The cases they identified were not collectively unique or unusual when compared with general trends and characteristics--certainly not to a degree that would necessitate the introduction of a new category of homicide or a broad label like 'Facebook Murder'. "Victims knew their killers in most cases, and the crimes ...

Bio-inspired bleeding control

Bio-inspired bleeding control
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Common cholesterol-fighting drug may prevent hysterectomies in women with uterine fibroids

2014-11-13
Researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, in collaboration with The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth), Baylor College of Medicine and the Georgia Regents University, report for the first time that the cholesterol-lowering drug simvastatin inhibits the growth of human uterine fibroid tumors. These new data are published online and scheduled to appear in the January print edition of the Journal of Biological Chemistry. Statins, such as simvastatin, are commonly prescribed to lower high cholesterol levels. Statins ...

How Campylobacter exploits chicken 'juice' highlights need for hygiene.

How Campylobacter exploits chicken juice highlights need for hygiene.
2014-11-13
A study from the Institute of Food Research has shown that Campylobacter's persistence in food processing sites and the kitchen is boosted by 'chicken juice.' Organic matter exuding from chicken carcasses, "chicken juice", provides these bacteria with the perfect environment to persist in the food chain. This emphasises the importance of cleaning surfaces in food preparation, and may lead to more effective ways of cleaning that can reduce the incidence of Campylobacter. The study was led by Helen Brown, a PhD student supervised by Dr Arnoud van Vliet at IFR, which is ...

Enterotoxigenic E. coli worldwide are closely related

2014-11-13
The strains of enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC) that infect adults and children in Asia, Africa, and the Americas, have notably similar toxins and virulence factors, according to research published ahead of print in the Journal of Bacteriology. That bodes well for vaccine development, says corresponding author Åsa Sjöling, now of the Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. ETEC infects 400 million people annually, or 5.3 percent of the world's population, killing 400,000. In the study, Sjöling et al. set out to determine whether the heat labile ...

Oxytocin helps to better overcome fear

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[Press-News.org] New drug targets may lead to effective Ebola treatments