Category Health/Medical

Scientists have identified it’s best-known adhesion protein that it uses to attach to stomach sugars and evade the body’s attempts to ‘flush’ it away. It is estimated that 1 in 2 people have got it, though most won’t ever experience any problems. Even so, it is considered one of the most common bacterial infections worldwide and a leading cause of dyspepsia, peptic ulceration and gastric cancer.

Through unique evolutionary adaptations, H. pylori is able to evade the antiseptic effect of our stomach acid by hiding within the thick acid-resistant layer of mucus that coats the stomach wall. Once within the mucus layer, the bacterium latches onto sugars naturally found on the stomach wall using its adhesion proteins...

Sleeping mouse (stock image). “What is amazing is finding the same mechanism for sleep-wake cycle control in an insect and a mammal,” said Matthieu Flourakis, the lead author of the study. “Mice are nocturnal, and flies are diurnal, or active during the day, but their sleep-wake cycles are controlled in the same way.” Credit: © Iosif Szasz-Fabian / Fotolia

In studies of fruit flies and mice and the brain circadian neurons governing the daily sleep-wake cycle’s timing, the researchers found that high sodium channel activity in these neurons during the day turn the cells on and ultimately awaken an animal, and high potassium channel activity at night turn them off, allowing the animal to sleep.

“This suggests the underlying mechanism controlling our sleep-wake cycle is ancient,” said Prof...

Intraoperative ovarian cancer treatment based on the combinatorial effect of a targeted photodynamic therapy (PDT) associated with suppression of the DJ-1 protein, one of the key players in the ROS defense of cancer cells. Ovarian cancer tumors exposed to a single dose of combinatorial therapy were completely eradicated from the mice and the treated animals showed no evidence of cancer recurrence.

A combination of techniques by Oregon State University researchers achieved complete cancer cell elimination with no regrowth of tumors. It may offer a novel mechanism to address this aggressive and often fatal cancer that kills 14,000 women in the US each year. Ovarian cancer has a high mortality rate because it often has metastasized into the abdominal cavity before it’s discovered...

A population of liver cells has been found that are better at regenerating liver tissue than hepatocytes. The study is the first to identify these so-called ‘hybrid hepatocytes,’ and show that they are able to regenerate liver tissue without giving rise to cancer.

Of all major organs, the liver has the highest capacity to regenerate – that’s why many liver diseases, including cirrhosis and hepatitis, can often be cured by transplanting a piece of liver from a healthy donor. The liver’s regenerative properties were previously credited to a population of adult stem cells known as oval cells. But recent studies concluded that oval cells don’t give rise to hepatocytes; instead, they develop into bile duct cells...