Central nervous system can sometimes send out signals that invite hostile immune system attacks
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It may sound like a case of blame the victim, but researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have shown that cells in the central nervous system can sometimes send out signals that invite hostile immune system attacks.
In mice the researchers studied, this invitation resulted in damage to the protective covering of nerves, causing a disease resembling multiple sclerosis.
“It’s been clear for quite a while that our own lymphocytes (white blood cells) have the ability to enter the central nervous system and react with the cells there,” says John Russell, Ph.D., professor of molecular biology and pharmacology. “Under normal circumstances, the brain and the immune system cooperate to keep out those cells that might harm the brain. But in people with multiple sclerosis, they get in.”
Scientists find sleep hormone melatonin in red wine grapes
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Scientists in Italy say they have discovered that the grapes used to make some of the most popular red wines contain high levels of the sleep hormone melatonin.
Melatonin is naturally secreted by the pineal gland in the brain, especially at night. It tells the body when it is time to sleep.
The discovery of melatonin in grape skin could explain why so many of us hit the bottle in the evening to wind down after a day’s hard slog. ‘The melatonin content in wine could help regulate the circadian rhythm [sleep-wake patterns], just like the melatonin produced by the pineal gland in mammals,’ says researcher Iriti Marcello at the University of Milan.
Louisiana gov. signs law that would ban abortions
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Louisiana Democratic Gov. Kathleen Blanco signed into law a ban on most abortions, which would be triggered if the U.S. Supreme Court overturns its 1973 ruling legalizing the procedure, a spokesman said on Saturday.
The ban would apply to all abortions, even in cases of rape or incest, except when the mother’s life is threatened. It is similar to a South Dakota law that has become the latest focus of the abortion battle.
The South Dakota law was enacted partly to invite a court challenge in the hope a more conservative Supreme Court would overturn its Roe v. Wade decision that established a woman’s right to abortion.
Medicare Could Save Money, Provide More Defibrillators
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Medicare beneficiaries with heart failure could benefit from new strategies to decide who qualifies for lifesaving implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs), according to a University of Iowa study.
The U.S. Medicare Program spends about $4.6 billion dollars each year providing ICDs to older Americans. The investigation, published in the June 16 online early issue of the journal Value in Health, explored what would happen if Medicare spent the same amount of money to provide more patients with less expensive, yet also less effective, automated external defibrillators (AEDs).
An ICD is a small, pager-sized device implanted beneath the skin that uses electric shock to restore normal heart rhythm and costs about $40,000. An AED is a briefcase-sized device that requires a bystander to use pads that deliver an electric shock to restore the victim’s heart rhythm and costs about $2,000.
Bahamas malaria outbreak causes concern
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A case of malaria which has cropped up in the Bahamas has caused concern and raised many questions for health officials and has worried local residents.
Health officials are currently screening illegal immigrants for malaria after the outbreak of the potentially fatal disease was confirmed on the Exuma islands, a sandy chain of islands southeast of Nassau.
Malaria has not been endemic in the Bahamas and apart from what are termed “sporadic” cases by the health ministry, almost all cases have been imported into the country.
New technique will screen embryos for almost 6,000 inherited diseases
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A powerful new method of testing embryos for inherited diseases, has been developed by fertility specialists in Britain.
The test will allow doctors to test for the first time a vast range of inherited diseases for which the specific genetic mutation is not known, such as Duchenne’s muscular dystrophy (DMD) and some forms of cystic fibrosis.
The technique which is more accurate and efficient than current methods, will offer help to hundreds of couples who have a realistic chance of having healthy children and will enhance the number of diseases clinics can test for from about 200 to almost 6,000.
New hope for Huntington disease cure
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Researchers at the University of British Columbia’s Centre for Molecular Medicine and Therapeutics (CMMT) have provided ground-breaking evidence for a cure for Huntington disease in a mouse offering hope that this disease can be relieved in humans.
Published in Cell journal, Dr. Michael Hayden and colleagues discovered that by preventing the cleavage of the mutant huntingtin protein responsible for Huntington disease (HD) in a mouse model, the degenerative symptoms underlying the illness do not appear and the mouse displays normal brain function. This is the first time that a cure for HD in mice has been successfully achieved.
“Ten years ago, we discovered that huntingtin is cleaved by ‘molecular scissors’ which led to the hypothesis that cleavage of huntingtin may play a key role in causing Huntington disease”, said Dr. Michael Hayden, Director and Senior Scientist at the Child and Family Research Institute’s Centre for Molecular Medicine and Therapeutics. Dr. Hayden is also a Canada Research Chair in Human Genetics and Molecular Medicine.
Altered Activity in Brain Receptors Points to Schizophrenia Complexity
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Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, in collaboration with scientists at the City University of New York, have identified a striking dysregulation in neuronal receptor activity in the postmortem brain tissue from patients with schizophrenia. By stimulating receptors in the prefrontal cortex, the research team tracked heightened levels of erbB4 receptor activity, as well as decreased NMDA receptor activity in the tissue from patients with schizophrenia. Additionally, they were able to identify a relationship between these two receptor groups, suggesting a mechanism for decreased NMDA receptor function that has long been suspected in schizophrenia. The researchers report their findings in this week’s advanced online issue of Nature Medicine.
Schizophrenia, a mental disorder afflicting approximately one percent of the world population, is characterized by a variety of symptoms such as: hallucinations, paranoia, disorganized behavior, and the inability to experience pleasure. Previous studies of the brains of patients with schizophrenia suggest altered function in the prefrontal cortex, the brain’s organizational center for cognitive function, personality expression, and behavioral control. International, large-scale genetic studies of patients with schizophrenia have pointed researchers to a gene called neuregulin 1 (NRG1), which appears to play a role in determining one’s susceptibility to the disease.
Chang-Gyu Hahn, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Steven Arnold, MD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Neurology, and Raquel Gur, MD, PhD, Professor of Psychiatry, and colleagues at Penn, in collaboration with Hoau-Yan Wang, PhD, at The City University of New York, took an approach to use NRG1 protein to activate its neuronal receptor, erbB4, to measure the molecular response in postmortem brain tissue.
Vegetables may help arteries stay clear
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A healthy dose of vegetables every day may help keep the heart arteries clear, a study in mice suggests. Researchers found that lab mice given a diet full of broccoli, carrots, green beans, corn and peas developed far less artery narrowing than those reared on a veggie-free diet.
For humans, the findings offer more support for the advice health experts and mothers have long given: eat your vegetables.
Discounting French fries, most Americans aren’t adequately heeding that advice, noted the study’s lead author, Dr. Michael R. Adams of Wake Forest University School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
Fertility treatments could aid Europe demographic crisis
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Providing fertility treatment to more women could help offset Europe’s demographic crisis, a leading think tank said on Monday.
Increasing longevity, improvements in health care and falling birth rates mean that by 2050 the number of Europeans over the age of 65 will double from around 15 percent to about 30 percent.
Governments are concerned about the financial consequences because the graying population will increase healthcare and pension costs and there will be fewer younger people in the work force.
Acupuncture shows promise for fibromyalgia
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Acupuncture may help relieve the symptoms of fibromyalgia, especially the fatigue and anxiety that often comes with the condition, a new study suggests.
Fibromyalgia is a syndrome marked by chronic widespread aches and pains, fatigue and sleep problems, among other symptoms; the cause is unknown, and there are no medications specifically approved for the condition. Instead, treatment usually involves a combination of approaches, such as painkillers, antidepressants and exercise therapy.
Only two well-designed clinical trials have tested acupuncture’s effects on fibromyalgia, and these studies yielded conflicting results.
Children may need two doses of chickenpox vaccine
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One dose of chickenpox vaccine may be insufficient to prevent school outbreaks of chickenpox, according to a report in the medical journal Pediatrics.
Outbreaks of chickenpox continue to be reported, even in highly vaccinated populations, the authors explain.
In Arkansas, a chickenpox vaccination requirement for entry into kindergarten was introduced in 2000, so by September 2003 children in kindergarten through third grade were protected. Nonetheless, a large number of cases of chickenpox still occurred in an elementary school in 2003.
Average American has very high risk of diabetes
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Body mass index (BMI), the ratio of body weight to height, is tightly linked to lifetime risk of diabetes mellitus, researchers reported at the Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association. “On average, every American has a very high risk of diabetes,” CDC investigators told conference participants.
Using the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data, Dr. K. M. Venkat Narayan and associates at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, calculated the lifetime risk of diabetes according to BMI for subjects between 18 and 84 years old.
A BMI between 20 and 25 is considered normal, whereas values above or below this range represent being under- and overweight, respectively. Obesity is typically defined as a BMI of 30 or greater.
Restricting carbohydrates may prevent Alzheimer’s disease
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A recent study directed by Mount Sinai School of Medicine suggests that experimental dietary regimens might calm or even reverse symptoms of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD).
The study, which appears in the July 2006 issue of the Journal of Biological Chemistry, is the first to show that restricting caloric intake, specifically carbohydrates, may prevent AD by triggering activity in the brain associated with longevity.
“Both clinical and epidemiological evidence suggests that modification of lifestyle factors such as nutrition may prove crucial to Alzheimer’s Disease management,” says Giulio Maria Pasinetti, M.D., Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry and Neuroscience, Director of the Neuroinflammation Research Center at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and lead author of the study. “This research, however, is the first to show a connection between nutrition and Alzheimer’s Disease neuropathy by defining mechanistic pathways in the brain and scrutinizing biochemical functions. We hope these findings further unlock the mystery of Alzheimer’s and bring hope to the millions of Americans suffering from this disease.”
Migraine associated with high-normal sex drive
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For some individuals prone to migraine, this susceptibility may not necessarily interfere with their sex life and may in fact improve their libido, according to research published in the journal Headache.
“The goal of this research was to understand migraine better,” lead author Dr. Timothy T. Houle told Reuters Health. “By better understanding how the brain is altered with this syndrome, we can develop better drugs in the future.”
“Migraineurs have other commonly associated symptoms, such as sleep abnormalities and a higher risk of depression. Altered sex drive may be another quirk of being a migraineur,” he added.
