Forming model embryos from stem cells in the lab

Maastricht: Scientists from the MERLN Institute, associated with Brightlands, and the Hubrecht Institute (KNAW) have successfully created in the laboratory embryo-like structures from mouse stem cells. These model embryos resemble natural ones to the extent that, for the first time, they implant into the uterus and initiate pregnancy. This radically new method opens the door to understanding the first and hidden processes of life, problems of infertility, or the embryonic origin of diseases. This scientific breakthrough has been published in Nature.

Natural killer cells have a memory

Bonn: Researchers at the Universities of Bonn and Munich decode an autoimmune mechanism. Researchers at the University of Bonn and the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität of Munich have decoded a new mechanism of how the immune system can specifically attack pigmented cells of the skin. It was previously believed that so-called natural killer cells did not have an immunological memory for the body's own tissues. However, the scientists have now been able to show that these special immune cells can indeed “remember” pigmented cells when they come into more frequent contact with a specific contact allergen. These results may provide new insights into the development of the skin-depigmenting disease vitiligo but may also offer new options for the treatment of malignant melanoma. These results have now been published in the renowned scientific journal “Immunity”.

Targeting cancer cells with sugars

Munich: Globally, cancer is the second leading cause of death, also because the efficiency of chemotherapeutics is inadequate due to poor delivery to the tumor. Prof. Olivia Merkel and her team develop targeted nanocarrier systems to increase the delivery rates of therapeutic formulations and their specific uptake into the target cells. In the treatment of cancer, there are still several limitations. Especially the delivery of sufficient amounts of active chemotherapeutic drug is difficult.

Clever bacteria put human ingenuity to the test

INSERM: How do bacteria manage to infect our body? What tactics do they use to slip through the cracks in our immune system? This is what the team of Thomas Henry, Inserm researcher, and his coworkers from the CNRS of Claude Bernard Lyon 1 University and the École Normale Supérieure de Lyon grouped within the International Center for Infectiology Research (CIRI) are trying to elucidate.  In a paper published in Nature Communication, the researchers studied a key component in the escape mechanism of bacteria and found, in humans, the major player involved in its detection.

A cartoon to explain a cell's life, and the science behind

A Cell’s Life is the title of the cartoon about a skin cell called Jojo whose highest ambition has always been to become a neuron. On his first day at work, he gets discouraging news – he is told a skin cell can never be anything other than a skin cell. But a dedicated researcher, working to find a cure for Parkinson’s disease, might be able to alter Jojo’s fate...

How liver regenerate itself

Stanford: A subset of liver cells with high levels of telomerase renews the organ during normal cell turnover and after injury, according to Stanford researchers. The cells may also give rise to liver cancer. Liver stem cells that express high levels of telomerase, a protein often associated with resistance to aging, act in mice to regenerate the organ during normal cellular turnover or tissue damage, according to a study by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine.

Are tumor cells glutamine addicts?

EMBO: Most cancers require large amounts of glutamine for rapid growth and there are numerous studies indicating that they cannot survive without it, a phenomenon termed “glutamine addiction”. This has fueled the idea that preventing tumors from glutamine uptake could be a potential therapeutic strategy. A study by researchers from Berlin and Würzburg, Germany, now concludes that while glutamine deprivation will halt the proliferation of certain tumor cells, most of them will not be killed, raising questions of whether such a therapeutic intervention will lead to remission in cancers. The study is published today in The EMBO Journal.

Immune cells shown to be essential to a healthy heart rhythm

Harvard: Harvard Medical School researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital have identified a surprising new role for macrophages, the white blood cells primarily known for removing pathogens, cellular debris and other unwanted materials from the body. In a paper published in Cell on April 20, they describe their discovery of how macrophages are also essential for the healthy functioning of the heart by helping conduct the electric signals that coordinate the heartbeat.

Rogue breast tumor proteins point to potential drug therapies

Washington: For patients with difficult-to-treat cancers, doctors increasingly rely on genomic testing of tumors to identify errors in the DNA that indicate a tumor can be targeted by existing therapies. But this approach overlooks another potential marker — rogue proteins — that may be driving cancer cells and also could be targeted with existing treatments. If DNA can be described as the body’s genetic blueprint, proteins can be thought of as the construction workers who carry out the plan. Studying the blueprint can be vital to understanding genetic diseases, including cancer, but that focus also means that some problems arising with the workers may be missed.

Personalized Cell Therapies Show More Promise in Solid Tumors

Pennsylvania: Investigational “hunter” immune cells engineered to seek out and attack a deadly brain cancer known as glioblastoma (GBM) infiltrated patients’ tumors and triggered thousands of more T cells once inside, researchers from Penn Medicine reported in a late breaking abstract at the AACR Annual Meeting 2017 (Abstract LB-053).  The findings are among the results from three studies being presented on chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) therapy with T cells and a newer approach known as CARMA, which successfully pitted engineered macrophages against breast and ovarian tumors.

New study charts single-cell composition of two major types of brain tumor

Harvard: Detailed analysis of two brain tumor subtypes has revealed that they may originate from the same type of neural progenitor cells and may be distinguished by gene mutation patterns and by the composition of their microenvironments. The results of the study, led by Harvard Medical School investigators at Massachusetts General Hospital and collaborators at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, were published in the March 31 issue of Science.

Cool Tools: Pushing the Limits of High-Resolution Microscopy

NIH: Cell biologists would love to shrink themselves down and actually see, touch and hear the inner workings of cells. Because that’s impossible, they have developed an ever-growing collection of microscopes to study cellular innards from the outside. Using these powerful tools, researchers can exhaustively inventory the molecular bits and pieces that make up cells, eavesdrop on cellular communication and spy on cells as they adapt to changing environments. In recent years, scientists have developed new cellular imaging techniques that allow them to visualize samples in ways and at levels of detail never before possible. Many of these techniques build upon the power of electron microscopy (EM) to see ever smaller details.

Scalpel free with the "liquid biopsies"

Berkeley: Losing a breast or a lung to cancer leaves a scar, both physical and emotional. But even a biopsy to determine if a tumor is cancerous, or to track a tumor’s response to drugs, brings short-term pain and can miss signs of metastasis. So, the possibility of a scalpel-free biopsy has been something of a holy grail — a way to relieve trauma, speed diagnosis and shrink medical bills.
The ideal non-surgical approach might start with a simple blood draw. Snippets of DNA or RNA detected in the blood could be analyzed for the presence of a tumor; whether it has metastasized and whether it carries mutations for resistance to specific drugs. Such  “liquid biopsies” may now be within reach. 

Signals from fat cells may help regulate other tissues

Harvard: Fat cells are not simply big blobs of lipid quietly standing by in the body—instead, they send out hormones and other signaling proteins that affect many types of tissues. Harvard Medical School scientists at Joslin Diabetes Center now have identified a route by which fat also can deliver a form of small RNAs called microRNAs that helps to regulate other organs. “This mechanism may offer the potential to develop an entirely new therapeutic approach,” said C. Ronald Kahn, the Mary K. Iacocca Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Joslin's chief academic officer, and senior author of a paper on the research published in the journal Nature.

Researchers identify new process to raise natural armies of cancer-targeting T lymphocytes outside the body

Mayo Clinic: Mayo Clinic and University of Washington researchers have discovered a new culture method that unlocks the natural fighter function of immune T-cells when they are passing through the bloodstream. This allows T-cell armies to be raised directly from blood that naturally recognize and target proteins that are present on most human cancers. The results are published in the Feb. 14 issue of Oncotarget.

Scientists identify mechanisms behind harmful changes in the gut’s bacterial balance during inflammation

Dallas: A study led by UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers has uncovered key molecular pathways behind the disruption of the gut’s delicate balance of bacteria during episodes of inflammatory disease. “A deeper understanding of these pathways may help in developing new prevention and treatment strategies for conditions such as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and certain gastrointestinal infections and colorectal cancers,” said Dr. Sebastian Winter, Assistant Professor of Microbiology and a W.W. Caruth, Jr. Scholar in Biomedical Research at UT Southwestern, who led the study.

Researchers identify ion channel necessary for hormone and anti-obesity drug to suppress eating

Dallas: UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers have identified an ion channel required for brain cells to suppress eating behavior in response to the hormone leptin or to the anti-obesity drug lorcaserin. Ion channels are tunnel-shaped passageways on the surface of neurons through which charged particles, or ions, can travel in and out of the cell. A deeper understanding of this brain-metabolism relationship could someday lead to new, better targeted treatments for obesity or diabetes, said lead author Dr. Kevin Williams, Assistant Professor of Internal Medicine at UT Southwestern and senior author of the study, published recently in Cell Reports.

Study unveils new way to starve tumors to death

Saint-Louis: For decades, scientists have tried to halt cancer by blocking nutrients from reaching tumor cells, in essence starving tumor cells of the fuel needed to grow and proliferate. Such attempts often have disappointed because cancer cells are nimble, relying on numerous backup routes to continue growing. Now, scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have exploited a common weak point in cancer cell metabolism, forcing tumor cells to reveal the backup fuel supply routes they rely on when this weak point is compromised. Mapping these secondary routes, the researchers also identified drugs that block them. They now are planning a small clinical trial in cancer patients to evaluate this treatment strategy.

Nanohyperthermia softens tumors to improve treatment

CNRS: The mechanical resistance of tumors and collateral damage of standard treatments often hinder efforts to defeat cancers. However, a team of researchers from the CNRS, the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM), Paris Descartes University, and Paris Diderot University has successfully softened malignant tumors by heating them. This method, called nanohyperthermia, makes the tumors more vulnerable to therapeutic agents. First, carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are directly injected into the tumors. Then, laser irradiation activates the nanotubes, while the surrounding healthy tissue remains intact. The team's work was published on January 1 in Theranostics.

Viruses in the genome important for our brain

Lund: Over millions of years retroviruses have been incorporated into our human DNA, where they today make up almost 10 per cent of the total genome. A research group at Lund University in Sweden has now discovered a mechanism through which these retroviruses may have an impact on gene expression. This means that they may have played a significant role in the development of the human brain as well as in various neurological diseases.