News by Subject Biology

University of Maine researchers have reanalyzed global annual precipitation using quantile regression to reveal overlooked trends. Linear trends in US and global climate assessments reflect changes in mean annual precipitation, but these may not reflect changes across other quantiles in the precipitation probability distribution, including tails (very high and low precipitation levels), leading to systematic mischaracterization of climate risk. Applications in future climate studies could allow for risk assessment at more appropriate adaptation targets.

The researchers explored the efficacy of a multi-therapy approach based on the disease risk factor status specific to individuals with Alzheimer's disease (AD) diagnosis or concern. The findings indicate previously unidentified connectivity between AD risk factors, suggesting that treatment regimens should be tailored to the individual and multi-modal to simultaneously return several risk factors to a normative state.

A team of researchers in France and at MIT has taken the first three-dimensional images of kerogen's internal structure, with a level of detail more than 50 times greater than has been previously achieved. The images should allow more accurate predictions of how much oil or gas can be recovered from any given formation.

In castration-resistant prostate cancer, the tumors continue to progress even though testosterone production has been blocked; more than 90% of these patients develop metastasis and the survival rate is one to two years. * Using liquid biopsy, a simple blood test has been successful in determining what type of treatment can help to prolong the life expectancy of more than 150 patients

A combinatorial gene therapy approach -- one designed to inhibit inflammation and one targeting protection against cartilage degeneration -- was shown to preserve articular carti-lage better than each approach alone in animal models of both moderate and severe post-traumatic osteoarthritis.

According to Wistar researchers, the S100A14 protein is expressed at higher levels in people who inject drugs and remain uninfected despite many years of high-risk, needle sharing behavior in areas with high HIV prevalence. The protein mediates activation of a type of immune cell called natural killer cells (NK), which play a key role in the host immune defense during the earliest phases of viral infection.

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) cells expressing the NPM1 mutant gene are highly dependent on continued export of protein NPM1c to proliferate. This finding provides a rationale for testing nuclear export inhibitor therapeutics in NPM1-mutated AML.

Old age is the greatest risk factor for many diseases, including Alzheimer's disease (AD) and cancer. Geroprotectors are a recently identified class of anti-aging compounds. New Salk research has now identified a unique subclass of these compounds, dubbed geroneuroprotectors (GNPs), which are AD drug candidates and slow the aging process in mice.