Research News

Colorectal cancer is one of the most common cancers. Its treatment is mainly based on chemotherapy. However, over time, chemotherapy induces resistance in the majority of patients, who end up being unresponsive to the drugs. As a result, the five-year survival rate for those affected is still low. After succeeding in reproducing this resistance in the laboratory, a team from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) has found a way to overcome it.

A three-dose course of the hepatitis B vaccine HEPLISAV-B fully protected adults living with HIV who had never been vaccinated against or infected with the hepatitis B virus (HBV), according to study findings presented today at the IDWeek conference in Washington, D.C. The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, sponsors the ongoing Phase 3 ACTG A5379 clinical study.

Pancreatic cancer often lurks as a silent disease. With no known symptoms, it can progress undetected and spread to other organs.

According to the National Cancer Institute, more than 60,000 Americans will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer this year, and only about 1 in 10 of those diagnosed will survive the next five years.  The disease ranks as the third leading cause of cancer deaths in the U.S. because it is rarely detected in the early stages when treatment options are most effective.

During brain development, neurons have to migrate long distances through complex environments until they reach their final destination. In order to find guidance, they must establish several interactions —which are still hard to study— between their receptors and the surrounding molecules.

The 2012 EU Bioeconomy Strategy is delivering on key actions and has seen a two-fold increase in EU R&I funding for the bioeconomy under Horizon 2020, today Horizon Europe.

Orthopaedics faculty at LSU Health New Orleans participated in a study comparing two antisepsis aqueous solutions in reducing the risk of infection in patients requiring surgery for open fractures. In the largest known randomized-controlled trial, the research team found that contrary to current international recommendations, chlorhexidine gluconate was not superior to povidone-iodine in an alcohol or aqueous solution in preventing surgical site infection.

Cancer cells use an unusual mechanism to migrate into new tissue and form metastases there. The same process probably also keeps some immune cells on their toes. This is the result of a recent study led by the University of Bonn. According to the study, certain structures, the centrioles, increase in number. This makes it easier for them to maintain their direction and thus migrate more quickly to the lymph nodes, where they activate other immune cells. The results have now been published in the Journal of Cell Biology.

Blocking the action of calcium signals in immune cells suppresses the most common form of asthma, but without compromising the body’s defenses against flu viruses, a new study finds. 

Cambridge scientists have shown that it may be possible to spot signs of brain impairment in patients as early as nine years before they receive a diagnosis for one of a number of dementia-related diseases.

In research published today in Alzheimer's & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer's Association, the team analysed data from the UK Biobank and found impairment in several areas, such as problem solving and number recall, across a range of conditions.