HOUSTON ― The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center’s Research Highlights showcases the latest breakthroughs in cancer care, research and prevention. These advances are made possible through seamless collaboration between MD Anderson’s world-leading clinicians and scientists, bringing discoveries from the lab to the clinic and back. Understanding the role of exceptional research as a driving force behind progress in its mission to end cancer, MD Anderson is proud to support World Cancer Research Day, Sept. 24, which calls for global efforts to promote cancer ...

About The Study: In this study that included data from Kaiser Permanente Southern California of individuals age 19 and younger, the incidence of type 1 diabetes slightly increased overall and type 2 diabetes significantly increased after the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, in particular among non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic youth. These findings suggest the need for further evaluation of physiologic and behavioral risk factors preceding new-onset diabetes during the pandemic.  Authors: Matthew T. Mefford, Ph.D., of Kaiser Permanente Southern ...

About The Study: This analysis of assessments of 2,708 emergency medicine residents found evidence of sex-specific ethnoracial disparities in ratings on the Milestones assessments. These disparities increased over time across multiple Milestones assessments and were most severe for female residents of ethnoracial groups that are underrepresented in medicine.  Authors: Elle Lett, Ph.D., M.A., M.Biostat., of the University of Washington School of Public Health in Seattle, is the corresponding author.  To ...

Polycomb repressive complex 2 (PRC2) was discovered decades ago in Drosophila, where it was found to be a key controller of developmental genes. Further analyses showed that PRC2 modifies chromatin and silences target gene expression. However, the ancestral function of PRC2 - as functioning primarily to control genes during development - was called into question when researchers discovered that PRC2 also plays a role in unicellular species, in which no development takes place. A first hint at PRC2’s original role came from studies in red algae, which found PRC2 left its methylation mark on transposons – jumping genes that ...

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are a class of materials that contain nano-sized pores. These pores give MOFs record-breaking internal surface areas, which make them extremely versatile for a number of applications: separating petrochemicals and gases, mimicking DNA, producing hydrogen, and removing heavy metals, fluoride anions, and even gold from water are just a few examples. In the gas-separation domain, MOFs are particularly interesting for separating hydrogen from nitrogen, which is crucial for clean energy production, fuel cell efficiency, ammonia synthesis, and various ...

The team, led by Imperial College London researchers, uncovered the wiring in mouse brains that leads them to begin nesting in preparation for sleep. Published today in Nature Neuroscience, the study reveals that preparing properly for sleep is likely a hard-wired survival feature – one often neglected or overridden by humans. We all need to sleep, but since we are unconscious when we do so, it makes sense to fall asleep in a safe and warm place. For some animals this is especially important, as a burrow or nest provides a haven from ...

Tumor vaccines can help the body fight cancer. These vaccines alert the patient's immune system to proteins that are carrying cancer-typical alterations. Physicians and cancer researchers from Heidelberg and Mannheim have now treated adult patients with advanced midline gliomas, difficult-to-treat brain tumors, with a peptide vaccine for the first time. The vaccine mimicked a mutational change in a histone protein typical of this type of cancer. The vaccine proved to be safe and induced the desired immune responses directed ...

If you happen to come across plants of the Balanophoraceae family in a corner of a forest, you might easily mistake them for fungi growing around tree roots. Their mushroom-like structures are actually inflorescences, composed of minute flowers. But unlike some other parasitic plants that extend an haustorium into host tissue to steal nutrients, Balanophora induces the vascular system of their host plant to grow into a tuber, forming a unique underground organ with mixed host-parasite tissue. This ...

An international research team led by scientists in the Center for Genetic Epidemiology at the Keck School of Medicine of USC and USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center has singled out mutations in 11 genes that are associated with aggressive forms of prostate cancer. These findings come from the largest-scale prostate cancer study ever exploring the exome — that is, the key sections of the genetic code that contain the instructions to make proteins. The scientists analyzed samples from about 17,500 prostate cancer ...

Palaeontologists at University College Cork (UCC) in Ireland have discovered X-ray evidence of proteins in fossil feathers that sheds new light on feather evolution.     Previous studies suggested that ancient feathers had a different composition to the feathers of birds today. The new research, however, reveals that the protein composition of modern-day feathers was also present in the feathers of dinosaurs and early birds, confirming that the chemistry of feathers originated much earlier than previously thought.  The research, published today in Nature Ecology and Evolution, was led by palaeontologists ...

MicroRNAs are small molecules that regulate gene activity by binding to and destroying RNAs produced by the genes. More than 60% of all human genes are estimated to be regulated by microRNAs, therefore it is not surprising that these small molecules are involved in many biological processes including diseases such as cancer. To discover the function of a microRNA, it is necessary to find out exactly which RNAs are targeted by it. While such methods exist, they require a lot of material typically in order of millions of cells, to ...

A new form of agricultural pest control could one day take root—one that treats crop infestations deep under the ground in a targeted manner with less pesticide. Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed nanoparticles, fashioned from plant viruses, that can deliver pesticide molecules to soil depths that were previously unreachable. This advance could potentially help farmers effectively combat parasitic nematodes that plague the root zones of crops, all while minimizing costs, pesticide use and environmental toxicity. Controlling infestations caused by root-damaging nematodes has long been a challenge in agriculture. One reason is that the types of pesticides ...

A research team led by Prof. LIN Nan from the Institute of Psychology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences found that during sentence processing, the neural activity of two canonical language areas, i.e., the left ventral temporoparietal junction (vTPJ) and the lateral anterior temporal lobe (lATL), is associated with social-semantic working memory rather than language processing per se. The study was published in Nature Human Behaviour on Sept. 21. Language and social cognition are two deeply interrelated abilities of the human species, but have traditionally been studied ...

On September 17th, 2023, Carbon Future, an international interdisciplinary journal sponsored by Tsinghua University, has been officially inaugurated.   Carbon Future is an open access, peer-reviewed and international interdisciplinary journal that reports carbon-related materials and processes, including carbon materials, catalysis, energy conversion and storage, as well as low carbon emission process and engineering. The journal is published quarterly by Tsinghua University Press, and publicly released on SciOpen, an internationally digital ...

In a groundbreaking study published in Engineering, researchers have developed a revolutionary method for data storage using DNA. The paper titled “Engineering DNA Materials for Sustainable Data Storage Using a DNA Movable-Type System” introduces a novel approach that utilizes DNA fragments, referred to as “DNA movable types,” for data writing, thereby eliminating the need for costly and environmentally hazardous DNA synthesis. DNA molecules have long been recognized as green materials ...

Weill Cornell Medicine has received a three-year, nearly $6 million grant to lead one of three national contraceptive research centers. The grant from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, part of the National Institutes of Health, will fund the Weill Cornell Medicine Contraception Development Research Center. Led by Drs. Jochen Buck and Lonny Levin, both professors of pharmacology at Weill Cornell Medicine, the center will focus on developing an on-demand male contraceptive. “It’s an honor to be selected for a second time for this award,” Dr. Levin ...

INDIANAPOLIS -- Frailty is a serious concern in later-life adults due to its association with additional health risks including disability, falls, hospitalization and mortality. The prevalence of frailty has risen over time; about 15 percent of those aged 65 years and older are considered frail. In one of the first studies to analyze the mediating effects of social relationships in the relationship between childhood experiences and frailty, Regenstrief Research Scientist Monica M. Williams-Farrelly, PhD, has found ...

The onset of embryo-specific gene transcription, also known as embryonic genome activation (EGA), is a crucial step in the developmental journey of an organism. Although EGA has been studied to some extent in mice, human EGA remains largely unexplored, mainly due to the lack of novel in vitro cell models and ethical restrictions on the usage of human embryos. Thus, cell models resembling the human blastomere stage—when the embryo undergoes a cell duplication process—are necessary to study the earliest stages of human EGA and understand the events that occur during early embryonic development.   To ...

Water is one of the most abundant substances on Earth and partakes in countless biological, chemical, and ecological processes. Thus, understanding its behavior and properties is essential in a wide variety of scientific and applied fields. To do so, researchers have developed various water models to reproduce the behavior of bulk water in molecular simulations. While these simulations can provide valuable insights into the specific properties of water, selecting an appropriate model for the system under study is crucial. ...

Community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) is a major infectious disease worldwide and contributes to high mortality and massive economic burden. Hospital mortality among the severe CAP (SCAP) remains high, ranging from 25% to more than 50%. Early identification of patients at high risk of death is essential for improving patient outcomes. However, predicting outcomes in patients with SCAP is challenging, as the disease is complex and influenced by various factors, including the types of pathogen causing the infection, the host immune response, and underlying medical conditions. In this study published in eBioMedicine (a Lancet publication), a team led by Dr. Jinmin Ma, BGI Genomics Infection ...

People from diverse religious backgrounds in the United States view curiosity about religion as morally virtuous, according to new research published in Social Psychological and Personality Science. Atheists also view this curiosity as moral, although less moral than a lack of religious curiosity. Previous research has examined what makes people curious and how curiosity helps people learn new information, but psychologists know less about how displaying curiosity is viewed by other people. The current research finds that people ...

DALLAS, September 21, 2023 — Supporting the next generation of health advocates, the American Heart Association awards five high school seniors with $1,000 college scholarships to energize their commitment to community health through service-learning opportunities. The grants are a part of the American Heart Challenge™, a school-based program that helps middle and high school students feel good about their health, while doing good for the community. The American Heart Association, devoted ...

A groundbreaking anticancer treatment technology that selectively targets cancer cell lysosomes and overcomes drug resistance has been developed by Professor Ja-Hyoung Ryu and his research team in the Department of Chemistry at UNIST. This pioneering research promises a new paradigm for chemical anticancer drugs in the future. Lysosomes are crucial organelles responsible for breaking down and recycling cellular components. Targeting lysosomes with anticancer drugs has emerged as a promising approach to combat drug resistance in cancer cells. However, ...

(Toronto, September 21, 2023) The United Nations General Assembly held a high-level meeting on Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness, and Response on September 20, 2023, to continue discussions on finalizing a globally enforceable Pandemic Accord or Treaty that will be presented to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) World Health Assembly in May 2024. This treaty, if agreed to and eventually ratified, will be the second international treaty instrument under WHO auspices, and represents a critical juncture in global health needed to strengthen pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response in the ...

According to a study recently published by the Journal of the American Medical Association, maternal morbidity and mortality rates in Texas during the last two decades have more than doubled from 1999 (10.3 deaths per 100,000 births) to 2019 (21.9 deaths per 100,000 births). This rate not only exceeds the national average (17.4 in 2018), but it also places Texas at or near the bottom of most metrics used to determine the safest states in which to have a baby. One of the primary factors related to the lack of maternity care in the Lone Star state is the existence of maternity care deserts, which are counties where no maternity care exists. And in the Texas Panhandle, ...