Tuesday, December 4, 2012
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently approved a new oral medication for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis that represents a new class of drugs for the disease... Tofacitinib is from a new class of drugs developed to target Janus kinases. One member of this family, JAK3, was discovered in the early 1990s by a National Institutes of Health laboratory in the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS).
Friday, November 30, 2012
Mice with a condition that serves as a laboratory model for Down syndrome perform better on memory and learning tasks as adults if they were treated before birth with neuroprotective peptides, according to researchers at the National Institutes of Health.
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Changes in how genes in the immune system function may result in age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the leading cause of visual impairment in older adults, based on preliminary research conducted by National Institutes of Health (NIH) investigators.
Thursday, November 15, 2012
...The findings, published online in the Nov. 15 issue of the journal Scientific Reports, reveal that this form of vocal improvisation is associated with a unique functional reallocation of brain activity in the prefrontal cortex and proposes a novel neural network that appears to be intimately involved in improvisatory and creative endeavors.
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Couples with high levels of PCBs and similar environmental pollutants take longer to achieve pregnancy in comparison to other couples with lower levels of the pollutants, according to a preliminary study by researchers at the National Institutes of Health and other institutions.
Sunday, November 11, 2012
An international group of scientists has identified three genetic regions that predispose Asian women who have never smoked to lung cancer. The finding provides further evidence that risk of lung cancer among never-smokers, especially Asian women, may be associated with certain unique inherited genetic characteristics that distinguishes it from lung cancer in smokers.
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Leisure-time physical activity is associated with longer life expectancy, even at relatively low levels of activity and regardless of body weight, according to a study by a team of researchers led by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health.
Monday, November 5, 2012
Gene therapy can be performed safely in the human salivary gland, according to scientists at the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR), part of the National Institutes of Health. This finding comes from the first-ever safety, or Phase I, clinical study of gene therapy in a human salivary gland. Its results, published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, also show that the transferred gene, Aquaporin-1, has great potential to help head and neck cancer survivors who battle with chronic dry mouth.
Thursday, November 1, 2012
National Institutes of Health (NIH) researchers have discovered a significant new mechanism of action for a class of chemotherapy drugs known as poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase inhibitors, or PARP inhibitors. They have also identified differences in the toxic capabilities of three drugs in this class which are currently being tested in clinical trials.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
The world's largest, most detailed catalog of human genetic variation — used by disease researchers around the world — has more than doubled in size with the 1000 Genomes Project's latest publication in the Oct. 31 issue of Nature. The National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health, helps fund and direct this international public-private consortium of researchers in the United States, Britain, China, Germany and Canada.
