IRP Discoveries

Boosting Brain Activity to Suppress Snacking

Non-Invasive Stimulation Method May Improve Self-Regulation Around Food

a box of donuts

Marketers make a living from the fact that merely seeing an advertisement for junk food can spur a sudden craving for potato chips or sugary cereal. Some people have an easier time than others resisting such urges, and over-consuming that sort of food can have problematic consequences for health. Findings from a recent IRP study suggest that stimulating a particular part of the brain might help people who struggle with obesity by enhancing their ability to control their desire to snack.

Predicting Risks and Benefits for Lung Cancer Screening

IRP Researchers Refine Tools to Maximize the Benefit from Life-Saving Tests

patient getting a CT scan

Eleven years ago, IRP senior investigator Hormuzd Katki, Ph.D., had a bit of an eureka moment during a press event announcing the results of the National Lung Cancer Screening Trial, which demonstrated that annual screenings cut the risks of dying from lung cancer in heavy smokers by 20 percent.

“It struck me as I read the trial results that not only was this a very important trial, but that it was possible that different people will have different benefits from lung cancer screening,” Dr. Katki remembers. “Even within this group of very high-risk smokers who were part of the trial, you can identify some people who get much more benefit than other people, and that has implications for who should be offered this kind of screening.”

Modified Soybeans May Provide Cardiovascular Benefits

Mouse Study Suggests Simple Ingredient Swap Could Improve Public Health

soybeans

When it comes to consuming a healthy diet, “everything in moderation” is a common piece of advice. In fact, evidence is accumulating that eating lots of a particular dietary fat thought to promote cardiovascular health may actually be problematic. A recent IRP study performed in mice suggests that vegetable oil made from a modified soybean may decrease the risk for cardiovascular disease by helping people strike the right balance in their consumption of two different types of fat.

Simple Blood Test May Thwart a Complicated Cancer

Signs of Past Viral Exposure Predict Liver Cancer Risk

vials containing blood samples

The liver has a difficult but important job. It serves as the central processing plant for all the food, drinks, and drugs we take in, separating and breaking them down into usable nutrients and toxic wastes that need to be removed from the body. It’s no surprise, then, that diseases affecting the liver can have life-threatening consequences. In particular, infections like hepatitis B and C and liver damage caused by alcohol, drugs, or fatty liver disease can all lead to liver cancer. Unfortunately, even though the presence of these conditions are harbingers of possible liver cancer, the disease often passes unnoticed until it is at an advanced, less treatable stage.

IRP senior investigator Xin Wei Wang, Ph.D., and his NIH research team are developing ways to detect liver cancers much earlier, when existing treatments are much more likely to stop their growth. In honor of Liver Cancer Awareness Month this October, I talked to Dr. Wang about his research and the novel blood test his lab has developed to predict liver cancer risk.

Taming Unruly Stem Cells to Enhance Eye Research

Widely Available Molecule Could Aid Development of Therapies for Blinding Diseases

eye

As scientists inch closer to growing fully functioning organs outside the body, it’s easy to forget that it’s already possible to grow miniature, simplified versions of some organs in the lab. These ‘organoids’ are an extremely useful research tool, but producing them can be tricky. New IRP research could make it much easier to grow organoids that mimic the eye’s retina, thereby accelerating discoveries about a variety of vision-impairing diseases.

Bringing Out the Big Guns Against Blood Cancer

IRP Research Shows Benefits of More Intensive Treatments for Certain Patients

woman receiving chemotherapy treatment

Fate can be cruel, especially when it comes to a rare, highly fatal blood cancer called acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Even when months of intensive chemotherapy appear to cause a complete remission of the disease — meaning doctors cannot detect any remaining cancer cells in a patient’s body — roughly half of those patients see the cancer return within two years, or even as soon as six months. Sadly, most of them don’t survive their second bout with the disease.

As a medical student, IRP senior investigator Christopher Hourigan, M.D., D.Phil., thought this outcome was unfair. More than that, he thought it indicated that the standard ways doctors determined if an AML patient was in remission were inadequate, and that remission might not even be the right goal. That’s why he has focused his career on finding ways to detect, prevent, and treat AML recurrence, known in his field as ‘relapse’.

“I was a scientist before I became a doctor, and it was really eye-opening to me, when I started to practice medicine, how difficult some of the treatment decisions were and how limited the information available was to inform those decisions,” Dr. Hourigan says.

Teaming Up to Tackle Engineering Challenges

Innovation Awards Accelerate Development of New Research Techniques

scientist working with a robotic arm

Scientists spend years, even decades, intensely studying a specific disease or biological system, an approach that yields unrivaled knowledge. However, many important scientific questions require a deep understanding of several subjects. As a result, the IRP has numerous programs dedicated to encouraging scientists with different areas of expertise to work together.

One such program is the NIH Director’s Challenge Innovation Awards, which funds innovative, high-impact projects that require the cooperation of researchers in more than one of NIH’s Institutes and Centers. This year, the program selected six promising proposals with one foot in the disciplines of biology and medicine and another in engineering or the physical sciences.

Overzealous Immune Cells Hamper Healing

Study Points to Treatment Targets for Impaired Healing Due to Diabetes

patient having his foot examined

Whether we’ve nicked a finger while chopping vegetables or wiped out riding a skateboard, we tend to take for granted that our injuries will eventually mend themselves. However, for a type of wound that often plagues patients with diabetes, healing is no sure thing. IRP researchers recently identified why certain immune cells shift from helpful healers into saboteurs in those injuries.

Neuroimaging Study Supports Two-Stage Theory of Recall

Results Suggest Dual Functions for Memory-Related Brain Area

photos spread out on bedspread

Scientists studying memory have been closely scrutinizing a brain structure called the hippocampus ever since a man named Henry Molaison — better known as ‘patient H.M.’ — lost his ability to create new memories after surgeons removed that portion of his brain as a last-ditch treatment for his unrelenting epileptic seizures. For the most part, that research has treated the hippocampus as one homogenous structure. However, a recent IRP study lends support to the growing recognition that recall is a multi-stage process in which different parts of the hippocampus play different roles.

Mosquitos With Human Gene Hinder Malaria Transmission

Genetically Modified Insects Could Help Curb Infections

transgenic mosquitos with blue, red, and green eyes

“Scientists create genetically modified mosquitos” sounds like the plot of a bad sci-fi movie, but it’s actually the reality in labs all around the world. Researchers are producing these ‘transgenic’ mosquitos in the hopes that the bugs could help combat the scourge of malaria, and in a recent study, IRP scientists demonstrated that their unique strategy in this realm has strong potential to accomplish that goal.