PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Breakthrough in understanding life-threatening childhood liver disease

CU School of Medicine researchers find link to infection

2010-10-27
(Press-News.org) Researchers at the University of Colorado School of Medicine and The Children's Hospital have taken a big step toward understanding what causes one of the most serious liver diseases in infants.

The disease is called biliary atresia, It blocks the bile ducts in young infants, through which bile, crucial for digestion, flows to the small intestine. The disease is rare – it strikes in about one in 10,000 births. But it's life-threatening.

"It is fatal if not treated quickly," says Cara Mack, MD, who led the CU research.

Surgical removal of the blocked main bile duct can buy time but ultimately the treatment in the majority of cases is a liver transplant during infancy or childhood, a procedure that is both complicated and expensive.

Until now, doctors weren't sure what caused biliary atresia, which is important to know in order to develop better treatments. The CU researchers propose that an infection late in the third trimester of pregnancy or soon after birth initiates the bile duct injury.

The body fights off the infection and infants initially show no signs of a problem. But then, Mack says, the body continues to battle as if the infection still was active. The body, however, is attacking itself -- the bile ducts specifically -- not the infection. This is called an autoimmune process.

Why? Mack's research in a mouse model of the disease suggests that it may be that the bile ducts have been changed and the body's protective system senses that. Or it may be that the bile ducts give off a protein that is similar to proteins produced by the infection, launching the body's defenses into action. In these investigations, Mack and colleagues identified an immune system compound, anti-enolase antibody, that reacts to both virus and bile duct proteins. This antibody may contribute to the bile duct injury in biliary atresia.

"After a viral infection has resolved," Mack says, "the body's immune defenses turn on the bile ducts and cause continued damage."

That leads to scarring of the bile ducts, eventually blocking them so that "bile is not able to flow from the bile ducts into the intestines," says Mack, an associate professor in pediatrics with CU, who practices at The Children's Hospital in Aurora.

The discovery, published recently in the journal Gastroenterology, isn't a cure. But it is a big step, "pointing the way to new diagnostic tests and, eventually, to improved treatment options for this devastating disease," Mack says.

INFORMATION:

END



ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Breaching the breech protocol

2010-10-27
Most babies are delivered head-first, but in about 4% of all deliveries babies are "born breech" ― with their buttocks or feet first. Doctors usually exercise caution and use caesarean sections (C-sections) as the delivery method of choice for such births, believing it safer for the baby. After a large-scale international study in 2000, C-sections became the near-universal choice for such births. But now researchers at Tel Aviv University are saying that, under certain circumstances, traditional vaginal delivery for breech babies is not only safe for baby, but even ...

6 new isotopes of the superheavy elements discovered

2010-10-27
Berkeley, CA—A team of scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has detected six isotopes, never seen before, of the superheavy elements 104 through 114. Starting with the creation of a new isotope of the yet-to-be-named element 114, the researchers observed successive emissions of alpha particles that yielded new isotopes of copernicium (element 112), darmstadtium (element 110), hassium (element 108), seaborgium (element 106), and rutherfordium (element 104). Rutherfordium ended the chain when it decayed by spontaneous fission. ...

Haptoglobin as an early serum biomarker of virus-induced type 1 diabetes in rats

2010-10-27
Type 1 diabetes (T1D), formerly known as juvenile diabetes, is a multifactorial disease of complex etiology characterized by the autoimmune destruction of pancreatic beta cells. In addition to genetic susceptibility, it is generally accepted that environmental factors play important roles in triggering disease, with virus infection having perhaps the strongest association. Multiple viral infections including cytomegalovirus, mumps, rubella, enteroviruses, and parvovirus have all been associated with human T1D. Indeed, the effects of diverse viruses in triggering T1D may ...

USDA scientists helping keep in-demand smoked salmon safe to eat

2010-10-27
Scientists with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) are helping ensure that the smoked salmon that's always a hit at festive gatherings also is always safe to eat, including among their achievements the development of a first-of-its-kind mathematical model that food processors and others can use to select the optimal combination of temperature and concentrations of salt and smoke compounds to reduce or eliminate microbial contamination of the product. The studies are led by food technologist Andy (Cheng-An) Hwang with the USDA Agricultural Research Service's (ARS) ...

Halloween horror story -- tale of the headless dragonfly

2010-10-27
CORVALLIS, Ore. – In a short, violent battle that could have happened somewhere this afternoon, the lizard made a fast lunge at the dragonfly, bit its head off and turned to run away. Lunch was served. But the battle didn't happen today, it happened about 100 million years ago, probably with dinosaurs strolling nearby. And the lizard didn't get away, it was trapped in the same oozing, sticky tree sap that also entombed the now-headless dragonfly for perpetuity. This ancient struggle, preserved in the miracle of amber, was just described by researchers from Oregon State ...

Getting the big picture quickly

Getting the big picture quickly
2010-10-27
SALT LAKE CITY, Oct. 27, 2010 – University of Utah computer scientists developed software that quickly edits "extreme resolution imagery" – huge photographs containing billions to hundreds of billions of pixels or dot-like picture elements. Until now, it took hours to process these "gigapixel" images. The new software needs only seconds to produce preview images useful to doctors, intelligence analysts, photographers, artists, engineers and others. By sampling only a fraction of the pixels in a massive image – for example, a satellite photo or a panorama made of hundreds ...

Portable breast scanner allows cancer detection in the blink of an eye

2010-10-27
Professor Zhipeng Wu has invented a portable scanner based on radio frequency technology, which is able to show in a second the presence of tumours – malignant and benign – in the breast on a computer. Using radio frequency or microwave technology for breast cancer detection has been proven by researchers in the US, Canada and UK. However, up to now, it can take a few minutes for an image to be produced, and this had to be done in a hospital or specialist care centre. Now Professor Wu, from the University's School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, says concerned ...

Rosendin Electric Receives Design-Build Merit Award from DBIA for Work on Nogales International Waste Water Treatment Plant

2010-10-27
Rosendin Electric (www.rosendin.com), the nation's largest private electrical contractor and a 100-percent employee-owned company, has been recognized by the Design-Build Institute of America (DBIA) for its contribution to completion of the Nogales International Waste Water Treatment Plant in Rio Rico, Arizona. At the 2010 Design-Build Conference & Expo held in Las Vegas last week, the DBIA awarded the 2010 Water/Wastewater Over $25 Million Design-Build Merit Award to PCL Construction as the contracting firm, Stantec Engineering as the engineering firm, and Rosendin ...

Pro Energy Consultants' Customer Satisfaction Consistently High

2010-10-27
Pro Energy Consultants, a national energy auditing company, has consistently received high customer satisfaction ratings, the company reported today. Pro Energy, established September 2008, began carefully tracking its customers' satisfaction levels the following year. "This is attributed to the professionalism of our franchise owners nationwide and the fact that an energy audit really does benefit homeowners in many ways," said Pro Energy Consultants Chief Operations Officer Suave Brachowski, who says the satisfaction rating is currently at 99.8 percent. "After all, ...

Experience Mapping Launches New Website

2010-10-27
Experience Mapping author, Karen Newman, announced today that her industry acclaimed book now has a new comprehensive website containing detailed information, testimonials, real-life case studies and reviews. Experience Mapping is a process for taking an inventory of your skills, abilities, training, education, experience, and anything else that enables you to earn an income, and then realigning all of those assets and resources in a new career. "It's a simple and totally effective process that can absolutely change your life," said Newman, "just like it changed mine." As ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Are probiotics worth the cost to prevent infection after a colon removal surgery?

Mizzou at the forefront of using hydrogen energy safely

New design framework makes it easier to create custom shock-absorbing materials

Ochsner Health honored by AMA for Joy in Medicine

New meta-analysis demonstrates that access to the GeneSight test can significantly improve response and remission rates for patients with depression

UCLA receives $7.1M federal grant to expand psychotherapy treatment for chronic pain

One dose of antibiotic treats early syphilis as well as three doses

Researchers identify single antibody behind life-threatening reaction to common blood thinner

Don’t sweat it: New device detects sweat biomarker at minimal perspiration rate

Not so sweet: Some sugar substitutes linked to faster cognitive decline

Antibody-making cells reveal new function in response to flu infection

CCNY physicists make quantum emitter discovery in diamonds

SwRI and Copeland win R&D 100 Award for innovative oil-free compressor

Loneliness is bad for health and wealth in the U.K.

Oral health treatment in patients due for surgery is associated with significantly lower rates of postoperative pneumonia and shorter hospital stays, per observational study in one Japanese hospital,

Oxygen came late to ocean depths during Paleozoic

Among women suffering hyperemesis (extreme nausea and vomiting) in pregnancy, half report considering terminating their pregnancy, and 9 in 10 have considered having no more children

Loneliness is bad for health and wealth in the UK

Climate change is making rollercoaster harvests the new normal

Misdirected: Increased dementia risk associated with errors of the 'brain’s compass'

Sip smarter: Apple juice effects on oral health are short-lived, study suggests

Vegan dog food provides similar nutrients to meat-based diets, new study finds

The cling of doom: How staph bacteria latch onto human skin

Emotional and medical toll of extreme pregnancy nausea, with many women considering ending pregnancies

DNA analysis shows colorectal cancer has unique microbial fingerprint

Sugar-coated nanoparticles could target deadly breast cancer

Understanding catalyst activity for green hydrogen production

Zhu harnessing interpretable neuro-symbolic learning for reliable ranking

George Mason researchers receive funding for Quantum System Stability & Reproducibility Workshop (StableQ)

Li studying quantum algorithms

[Press-News.org] Breakthrough in understanding life-threatening childhood liver disease
CU School of Medicine researchers find link to infection