Supreme Court declines to hear new contraception cases
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The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to take up preliminary appeals brought by Roman Catholic groups that want an exemption from part of President Barack Obama’s healthcare law requiring employers to provide insurance that covers contraception.
The cases were brought by a series of Roman Catholic-affiliated nonprofit groups based in Washington, D.C., including Catholic University.
The legal issue is different from one involving for-profit companies that also object on religious grounds to the so-called contraception mandate, which was argued before the high court last week.
The Supreme Court’s decision not to hear the two cases at this stage means that the federal appeals court in Washington will proceed to decide the issue. If the groups lose, they would have another chance to seek Supreme Court review.
Tamiflu-resistant influenza: Parsing the genome for the culprits
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Tamiflu is one of the few available treatments for those who come down with the flu. But the virus quickly develops resistance; multiplying at a rate of several generations a day, these tiny pathogens rapidly accumulate genetic mutations. Because of this, they have a good chance of developing counterattacks to the antiviral. How can these infinitesimal variations be identified within the immensity of the virus’ genetic code? EPFL researchers have created a computer tool that can shed light on the flu virus’ formidable adaptability. They were able to find mutations that conferred resistance that had up to this point not yet been identified. Their software has been made freely available to researchers everywhere, and is the subject of an article published in the journal PLOS Genetics.
Widespread use of Tamiflu leads to resistance
In theory, Tamiflu should only be used by patients in fragile health. But during the 2008-2009 flu season, the drug was used for the first time on a very wide scale. Resistant strains of the virus appeared within just a few weeks. Fortunately, even though the mutation induced a resistance to Tamiflu, it also caused a reduction in the replication rate of the virus. Once the use of the antiviral was dialed back to a more reasonable level, the resistant strains lost their competitive advantage, and they disappeared, submerged by competitors that were sensitive to the drug but had a higher rate of replication.
Resistance always results from random mutations, says Jeffrey Jensen, co-author of the EPFL study. But when a mutation leads to a competitive advantage, for example the ability to resist against a source of aggression, it tends to be passed on to its descendants. “A priori, nothing distinguishes one mutation from another; they’re all the result of chance. Our goal is precisely to be able to tell the difference between mutations that make the virus resistant to Tamiflu, thus leading to a selection phenomenon, and other mutations.”
Optimism linked to healthier eating among women
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Women with a sunny disposition may also have an easier time adopting healthy habits, according to a new study.
Researchers found that women who were more optimistic were better able to follow healthy eating guidelines, both when they were instructed to do so and when they chose to make changes on their own.
The authors noted that the biggest help for making diet improvements is not necessarily optimism itself, but the skills that tend to go with it.
“It’s not just having a sunny outlook - rather, this is a marker of other things people do,” said Melanie Hingle, a dietician at the University of Arizona in Tucson. She led the new study, which was published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.
U.S. advisers back DNA-based colon cancer test
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A colon cancer screening method that analyzes DNA from stool samples won the unanimous backing of a U.S. advisory panel on Thursday, paving the way for potential regulatory approval of the non-invasive test.
A panel of outside experts advising the Food and Drug Administration voted 10-0 to recommend approval of the Cologuard screening test made by Exact Sciences Corp.
The company said a large clinical trial found that its test detected 92.3 percent of colorectal cancers in average-risk patients based on a combination of DNA and hemoglobin markers.
While a colonoscopy is considered the most accurate method of detecting colon cancer and polyps, many people avoid the test, which involves inserting a flexible tube into the colon.
Pfizer lung cancer drug beats chemo for previously untreated patients
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Pfizer Inc’s Xalkori delayed progression of lung cancer longer than chemotherapy in patients who had never previously been treated for the disease, according to results of a late-stage study released on Tuesday.
The medicine, which received U.S. approval in 2011 for lung cancer patients who have a specific gene mutation, had shown in a previous Phase III trial that it significantly delayed disease progression among those who have already undergone chemotherapy for non-small-cell lung cancer, the most common form of the illness.
Pfizer said favorable results from the latest trial, combined with those from the earlier big study, establish that Xalkori is appropriate for first-line as well as second-line use, meaning for patients receiving initial treatment as well as for those who have already undergone chemotherapy.
Mass. General study identifies path to safer drugs for heart disease, cancer
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Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators may have found a way to solve a problem that has plagued a group of drugs called ligand-mimicking integrin inhibitors, which have the potential to treat conditions ranging from heart attacks to cancer metastasis. In a Nature Structural & Molecular Biology paper receiving advance online publication, the researchers provide a structural basis for the design of new and safer integrin inhibitors.
Integrins are receptor proteins found on the surface of cells that determine whether or not cells adhere to adjacent cells and the surrounding extracellular matrix. Under normal circumstances, integrins only become activated - which allows them to bind to other cells or extracellular molecules - in response to specific signals from within the cell. If integrins become overactive, cells become too “sticky” - leading to clogged arteries, pathological inflammation, the excess tissue growth called fibrosis or the spread of cancer. Current drugs developed to inhibit integrin activation by mimicking the shape of ligands - the molecules that interact with receptors - have had unintended effects in some patients, and as a result only a handful have received FDA approval.
“Integrins have an intrinsic ability to shape-shift when they switch from an inactive to an active, adhesive state,” explains M. Amin Arnaout, MD, director of the MGH Leukocyte Biology Program and the Inflammation and Structural Biology Program, senior author of the study. “Unfortunately, under some circumstances the integrin inhibitors that have been developed to date can inadventently induce this shape shifting, and use of these drugs have produced serious, sometimes fatal side effects such as excessive bleeding.”
Gates Foundation awards Notre Dame $23 million for malaria, dengue studies
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The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has awarded $23 million for research being led by University of Notre Dame biologists to prevent malaria and dengue fever, the school said.
The five-year project by biologists Neil Lobo and Nicole Achee aims to show the effectiveness of a new method of mosquito control, called spatial repellency, in quelling the illnesses, the university said in a statement this week.
According to the World Health Organization, 207 million cases of malaria were reported in 2012, and 50 million to 100 million dengue infections occur yearly.
Both the malaria parasite and dengue virus are transmitted through the bites of infected mosquitoes. Spatial repellents, such as coils or candles, release a material that drives mosquitoes away from enclosed areas.
