Category Biology/Biotechnology

St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital scientists reversed an aggressive cancer, reverting malignant cells towards a more normal state. Rhabdoid tumors are an aggressive cancer which is missing a key tumor suppressor protein. Findings showed that with the missing tumor suppressor, deleting or degrading the quality control protein DCAF5 reversed the cancer cell state...

Consistently exercising 2–3 times a week over the long term is linked to a lower current risk of insomnia as well as the ability to clock up the recommended 6–9 hours of shut-eye every night, suggests an international 10-year study published in the open access journal BMJ Open.

Regular exercise is associated with better overall health, and several studies have suggested that physical activity promotes better quality sleep and may improve symptoms of chronic insomnia, note the researchers.

But it’s not entirely clear how much gender, age, weight (BMI), overall fitness, general health, and exercise type contribute to this association, they add.

To explore this further, the researchers assessed the frequency, duration, and intensity of weekl...

New research from scientists at the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University has identified a key driver of myelination, the formation of protective fatty sheaths around nerve fibers.

Myelination is essential for the rapid transmission of electrical signals in the brain, facilitating everything from movement to thought. The breakdown or loss of this myelin sheath, as seen in conditions like multiple sclerosis and other neurodegenerative diseases, leads to significant cognitive and physical impairments.

The new findings have researchers excited about the potential for new avenues of treatment to regrow these insulating sheaths i...

Human artificial chromosomes (HACs) capable of working within human cells could power advanced gene therapies, including those addressing some cancers, along with many laboratory applications, though serious technical obstacles have hindered their development. Now a team led by researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania has made a significant breakthrough in this field that effectively bypasses a common stumbling block.

In a study published in Science, the researchers explained how they devised an efficient technique for making HACs from single, long constructs of designer DNA...