Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is becoming the most common chronic liver disorder in developed countries. Histological analysis of liver tissue is the only widely accepted test for diagnosing and distinguishing different stages of NAFLD. However, this technique provides only two-dimensional images of the liver tissue in low resolution and overlooks potentially important 3D structural…
Research led by scientists from McMaster University has yielded a potent antimicrobial that works against the toughest infectious disease strains. The find could be the beginning of developing new therapeutics to combat drug-resistant infections. The discovery is important as it is directly related to the development of Staphylococcus aureus diseases, known popularly as staph infections, which…
Medication prescribed for a certain type of epilepsy may offer a new method for treating malignant infantile brain tumours. A specific mTOR inhibitor has the ability to cross the blood–brain barrier to both reach and attack the tumour at source. This has been demonstrated by researchers from Uppsala University, in collaboration with US and UK colleagues, whose research has now been published in…
Researchers from the University of Helsinki developed a novel diagnostic method for the rapid on-site measurement of antibodies from patient samples. Now they have applied this new method for the diagnostics of celiac disease, with promising results. Point-of-care (POC) testing is a rapidly growing sector, bringing medical testing from central laboratories to where the patient is receiving care.…
Antibiotic-resistant pathogens pose one of the greatest threats to public health worldwide. In the near future, harmless bacterial infections may no longer be treatable and may again become the most common non-natural cause of death. At the same time, the available repertoire of antibacterial agents is becoming increasingly smaller as resistance rates rise.
A protein newly discovered by scientists in China is aiding in the dramatic reversal of stroke-like damage in laboratory animals and may one day rescue humans from neurological injury, the research team is predicting.
Inflammation drives the progression of neurodegenerative brain diseases and plays a major role in the accumulation of tau proteins within neurons. An international research team led by the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) and the University of Bonn comes to this conclusion in the journal “Nature”. The findings are based on the analyses of human brain tissue and further lab…
Stevens Institute of Technology has signed an exclusive licensing agreement with Bonbouton, giving the company the right to use and further develop a graphene sensing system that detects early signs of foot ulcers before they form, so diabetic patients can access preventative healthcare and manage their health.
Getting a good night’s sleep is important and insufficient sleep has been linked to poor health in many studies. Analysing data collected from wearable trackers, researchers from the SingHealth Duke-NUS Institute of Precision Medicine (PRISM) and the National Heart Centre Singapore (NHCS) recently demonstrated that chronic sleep deprivation is associated with increased cardiovascular disease…
For the first time, researchers from Helmholtz Zentrum München and the University Hospital of LMU Munich show that deep learning algorithms perform similar to human experts when classifying blood samples from patients suffering from acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Their proof of concept study paves the way for an automated, standardized and on-hand sample analysis in the near future. The paper was…
Swarms of nanoparticles which are 15,000 times smaller than a pinhead may be able to deliver vital drugs to the brain, offering new hope to patients in the early stages of a stroke. The research, carried out at The University of Manchester, shows that tiny vesicles called liposomes, just 100 nanometres in diameter can translocate through the damaged blood brain barrier following stroke. And that…
People with multiple sclerosis (MS) who also have depression are more likely to suffer debilitating symptoms early than people with MS who are not depressed, according to a study at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden that is published in the journal Neurology. The findings highlight the need for early recognition and treatment of depressive symptoms in patients with MS. More than 2 million people…
Early non-invasive detection of kidney rejection after transplantation was the central aim of a collaboration between Prof. Dr. Bernhard Banas, Chairman of Nephrology at the University Hospital Regensburg (UKR) and the medical diagnostics company, numares. The results of their joint clinical trial “UMBRELLA” were just published in EBioMedicine and presented at the American Society of…
Measles infections are not harmless – they can cause disease courses that may be of fatal outcome. Researchers of the Paul-Ehrlich-Institut (PEI) in co-operation with researchers from the UK and the Netherlands have now found out that measles viruses erase part of the immunological memory over several years. Affected persons are thus more susceptible to infections with other pathogens beyond…
Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have developed a way to 3D print living skin, complete with blood vessels. The advancement, published in Tissue Engineering Part A, is a significant step toward creating grafts that are more like the skin our bodies produce naturally. “Right now, whatever is available as a clinical product is more like a fancy Band-Aid,” said Pankaj Karande, an…
Research that might lead to new treatment options and longer survival for patients with glioblastoma – a malignant and particularly invasive type of brain tumour – is ongoing at ZHT, the Centre for Brain Tumours, and the Wilhelm Sander Neuro-oncology Treatment Unit at University Hospital Regensburg, which form one of the largest and most modern facilities for brain tumour treatment in…
Teams of researchers from Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin and the Medical University of Innsbruck have developed a new therapeutic concept for the treatment of temporal lobe epilepsy. It represents a gene therapy capable of suppressing seizures at their site of origin on demand. Having been shown to be effective in an animal model, the new method will now be optimized for clinical use.…
A key mechanism controlling tissue structure, which could help identify drugs that make it harder for cancer cells to spread, has been identified by researchers at the Francis Crick Institute. The two studies, published in Nature Materials and PLOS Computational Biology, explain the mechanism that causes changes in the structure of tissues. Using experimental and computational biology, the…
A photonics tech company from Vilnius are on their path to solve the 50-year-old task of making non-invasive blood analysis possible. With the help of a unique broadband laser-based sensor, the scientists and engineers at Brolis Sensor Technology are able to remotely sense concentration level of main critical blood constituents such as lactate, glucose, urea, ketones or ethanol without drawing…
Researchers at the University of Exeter first identified a gene in the 'hospital bug' Clostridioides difficile responsible for producing a protein that aids in binding the bacteria to the gut of its victims. In collaboration with researchers at Paris-SUD University, they then showed that mice vaccinated with this protein generated specific antibodies to the protein – and that C. diff that did…
Inhalation therapy is widely used for the treatment of lung diseases. Targeting of drugs to the site of disease is a major goal to improve drug efficacy and minimize side effects. Scientists at the Helmholtz Zentrum München and the Technical University of Munich have now shown that combined insight from various imaging methods allows for real-time monitoring of the dynamic process of drug…
Scientists from Scotland are developing a low cost, rapid diagnostic sensor test which aims to show the susceptibility of bacteria to antibiotics within 45 minutes. Laboratory testing of samples can take up to two days and the new test aims to allow doctors to be able to prescribe the correct antibiotic to a patient for an infection more quickly. In a research paper published in the journal…
For the first time, scientists at Newcastle University have identified changes in the DNA of the tumour cells in those with CYLD cutaneous syndrome (CCS) that may help them grow. A study published in Nature Communications suggest that the tumour cells gain a ‘survival advantage’ when the changes occur – an important step in understanding ways to develop treatments. CCS is a hereditary…
All living creatures – from the simplest animal and plant organisms right up to the human body – are colonised by numerous microorganisms. They are thus in a functional relationship with these microbes, and together form a so-called metaorganism. The investigation of this symbiotic cooperation between host organism and microorganisms is a key challenge for modern life sciences research. The…
Many life-threatening bacteria are becoming increasingly resistant to existing antibiotics. Swiss researchers co-headed by the University of Zurich have now discovered a new class of antibiotics with a unique spectrum of activity and mechanism of action. By disrupting outer membrane synthesis, the antibiotics effectively kill Gram-negative bacteria. According to the World Health Organization…
