Science and Health News

Researchers have found a previously unknown population of cells in mice that function as liver stem cells. The finding could aid drug testing and increase understanding of liver biology and disease.

When scientists in the Campisi lab at the Buck Institute bred mice that produced excess free radicals that damaged the mitochondria in their skin, they expected to see accelerated aging across the mouse lifespan – additional proof of the free radical theory of aging.  Instead, they saw a surprising benefit in young animals: accelerated wound healing due to increased epidermal differentiation and re-epithelialization.  The study published online on August 3rd in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

DNAnexus, the leader in cloud-based genome informatics and data management, today announced that the company was awarded a research and development contract by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Office of Health Informatics to build precisionFDA, an open source platform for community sharing of genomic information.

Researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Northwestern University have engineered a tethered ribosome that works nearly as well as the authentic cellular component, or organelle, that produces all the proteins and enzymes within the cell. The engineered ribosome may enable the production of new drugs and next-generation biomaterials and lead to a better understanding of how ribosomes function.

Study finds that arteries adapt to oxidative stress caused by aging Although the causes of many age-related diseases remain unknown, oxidative stress is thought to be the main culprit. Oxidative stress has been linked to cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases including diabetes, hypertension and age-related cancers. However, researchers at the University of Missouri recently found that aging actually offered significant protection against oxidative stress. These findings suggest that aging may trigger an adaptive response to counteract the effects of oxidative stress on blood vessels.

Gene-based cures for human diseases are now on the horizon A study led by Shoukhrat Mitalipov, Ph.D., and Hong Ma, M.D., Ph.D., at the Center for Embryonic Cell and Gene Therapy at Oregon Health & Science University and the Oregon National Primate Research Center has revealed the first critical step in developing novel gene and stem cell therapy treatments for patients with mitochondrial disease.

A team of bioengineers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), led by Ali Khademhosseini, PhD, and Nasim Annabi, PhD, of the Biomedical Engineering Division, has developed a new protein-based gel that, when exposed to light, mimics many of the properties of elastic tissue, such as skin and blood vessels. In a paper published in Advanced Functional Materials, the research team reports on the new material’s key properties, many of which can be finely tuned, and on the results of using the material in preclinical models of wound healing.

Chronic pain caused by the nerve damage of type 2 diabetes, surgical amputation, chemotherapy and other conditions is especially intractable because it resists painkilling medications.