Latest Genes Stories

- Partnership Based on Open Innovation That Leverages Eisai's Natural Product Chemistry-Based Drug Discovery Platform -Tokyo, July 17, 2012 - (JCN Newswire) - Eisai Co., Ltd. announced today that its U.S. subsidiary Eisai Inc. has entered into a research collaboration with U.S. biopharmaceutical company Verastem, Inc. for the generation of small molecule Wnt inhibitors that target cancer stem cells. Based on this agreement, Eisai will synthesize analogs of VS-507 (salinomycin) with the...

Pair helps remove and prevent misfolding of proteins that cause neurodegeneration In a paper published in the July 11 online issue of Science Translational Medicine, researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have identified two key regulatory proteins critical to clearing away misfolded proteins that accumulate and cause the progressive, deadly neurodegeneration of Huntington's disease (HD). The findings explain a fundamental aspect of how HD wreaks havoc...

Surprising finding about WNT signaling points to Sfrp5 as a potential target for anti-obesity drugs As the world fights obesity at the human level, scientists at the University of Michigan and their colleagues have made a surprising finding at the microscopic level that could help fuel that fight. Their work helps explain why fat-storing cells get fatter, and burn fat slower, as obesity sets in. If their findings from mice can be shown to apply to humans, they may provide a new target...

A new gene-silencing strategy can reverse core symptoms associated with Huntington's disease, according to a preclinical study published by Cell Press in the June 21st issue of the journal Neuron. The short-term therapy produced sustained benefits in both mouse and primate animal models of this neurodegenerative disorder, which currently lacks an effective treatment. "Our approach is feasible for development now into a therapy for Huntington's disease in man," says senior study author Don...

Breast-cancer researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have found that two related receptors in a robust signaling pathway must work together as a team to maintain normal activity in mammary stem cells. Mammary stem cells produce various kinds of breast cell types. They may also drive the development and growth of malignant breast tumors. Published recently in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, the research also suggests that a new signaling pathway may be involved, a...

ST. PAUL, Minn., May 29, 2012 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- MD Bioproducts launches a new subtype specific antibody as a marker for ankylosing spondylitis (AS): HLA-B*2705. The anti-HLA-B*2705 antibody, clone MARB4, has been validated for use in flow cytometry, tissue staining and immunoprecipitation. (Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20120529/CG15198) Ankylosing spondylitis (AS) is a chronc inflammatory arthritis. It is characterized by inflammation of the joints between the...

Researchers identify mechanism key in drug allergy Adverse drug reactions are a major issue that cause harm, are costly and restrict treatment options for patients and the development of new drugs. A groundbreaking finding by researchers from the La Jolla Institute for Allergy & Immunology could lead to a new way to dramatically improve drug safety by identifying drugs at risk to cause potentially fatal genetic-linked hypersensitivity reactions before their use in man....

The impact and influence of thirty years of research into the Wnt/beta-catenin signaling pathway are highlighted in a special issue of The EMBO Journal. “Three decades of Wnt signalling” summarizes many of the crucial scientific developments that have taken place since the discovery of the first mammalian Wnt gene in 1982. The reviews also describe many of the crucial research findings that have established the pathway as one of the fundamental signal transduction mechanisms in...

Researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have achieved, for the first time, the generation of neuronal cells from stem cells of Fragile X patients. The discovery paves the way for research that will examine restoration of normal gene expression in Fragile X patients. Fragile X syndrome is the most common cause of inherited mental retardation, affecting hundreds of thousands of patients worldwide. The syndrome is caused by lack of normal expression (functioning) of the FMR1 gene...

New research findings show that embryonic stem cells unable to fully compact the DNA inside them cannot complete their primary task: differentiation into specific cell types that give rise to the various types of tissues and structures in the body. Researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University found that chromatin compaction is required for proper embryonic stem cell differentiation to occur. Chromatin, which is composed of histone proteins and DNA, packages DNA...