Monthly Archives: February 2012

It can look as if a child is simply in a daze, awake but daydreaming. Yet inside their brain, a flurry of high-frequency signals is firing from neurons resulting in a so-called absence seizure. A Canadian-led research team has developed a new drug that completely suppresses absence seizures in rats, and could have groundbreaking effects on the treatment of epilepsy in children. The findings were published Wednesday in the peer-reviewed science journal Science Translational Medicine. The team began testing the drug on humans in December and expects to finish the first phase of clinical trials later this year, said neuroscientist Terry Snutch, the senior author of the study. Snutch, a professor and Canada Research Chair in the Michael Smith Laboratories at the University of British Columbia, said his team is cautiously optimistic the drug will have the same effect on humans. "It's far enough along that we would know in relatively short order," he said. "We are quite confident that it will interact with the human channel in the same way that it does in the rats to alleviate the epilepsy." Although the drugs have only been completely tested on rats so far, earlier tests on cloned human cells had … Continue reading →

By Stephanie Allmon sallmon@star-telegram.com Whether science bears out Catherine Ruehle's assertion that she is staying well through nutrition and lifestyle changes alone -- without the use of prescription drugs -- depends on which medical and nutrition experts are asked. Those who adhere to the emerging philosophy of healthcare called "functional medicine" believe that chronic illnesses and autoimmune disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis are highly attributable to genetic makeup and environmental and lifestyle factors, and that those things should be taken into account by physicians. Too often, they say, doctors use an acute-care model (say, that of a broken bone or appendicitis) to treat chronic disease; they treat the symptoms rather than the causes. The Institute for Functional Medicine (www.functionalmedicine.org) states, "Most physicians are not adequately trained to assess the underlying causes of complex, chronic disease and to apply strategies such as nutrition, diet and exercise to both treat and prevent these illnesses in their patients."Fort Worth registered dietitian Kim Hogue, a member of the IMF, has not consulted with Ruehle but says she thinks her approach makes perfect sense."Food is medicine," Hogue says, adding that gluten, in particular, is a substance that many people don't know they're sensitive to. One … Continue reading →

ScienceDaily (Feb. 15, 2012) — For decades, researchers have sought a genetic explanation for idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), a weakening and enlargement of the heart that puts an estimated 1.6 million Americans at risk of heart failure each year. Because idiopathic DCM occurs as a familial disorder, researchers have long searched for genetic causes, but for most patients the etiology for their heart disease remained unknown. Now, new work from the lab of Christine Seidman, a Howard Hughes Investigator and the Thomas W. Smith Professor of Medicine and Genetics at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital, and Jonathan Seidman, the Henrietta B. and Frederick H. Bugher Foundation Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School, has found that mutations in the gene TTN account for 18 percent of sporadic and 25 percent of familial DCM. "Until the development of modern DNA sequencing platforms, the enourmous size of the TTN gene prevented a comprehensive analyses -- but now we know TTN is a major cause of DCM," said Christine Seidman, who reported the findings February 16 in the New England Journal of Medicine. Idiopathic DCM is one of three different types of cardiomyopathy (the term "idiopathic" indicates that acquired causes … Continue reading →

ScienceDaily (Feb. 15, 2012) — A UCSF stem cell study conducted in mice suggests a novel strategy for treating damaged cardiac tissue in patients following a heart attack. The approach potentially could improve cardiac function, minimize scar size, lead to the development of new blood vessels -- and avoid the risk of tissue rejection. In the investigation, reported online in the journal PLoS ONE, the researchers isolated and characterized a novel type of cardiac stem cell from the heart tissue of middle-aged mice following a heart attack. Then, in one experiment, they placed the cells in the culture dish and showed they had the ability to differentiate into cardiomyocytes, or "beating heart cells," as well as endothelial cells and smooth muscle cells, all of which make up the heart. In another, they made copies, or "clones," of the cells and engrafted them in the tissue of other mice of the same genetic background who also had experienced heart attacks. The cells induced angiogenesis, or blood vessel growth, or differentiated, or specialized, into endothelial and smooth muscle cells, improving cardiac function. "These findings are very exciting," said first author Jianqin Ye, PhD, MD, senior scientist at UCSF's Translational Cardiac Stem Cell … Continue reading →

A new study at Johns Hopkins University has shown that stem cells from patients' own cardiac tissue can be used to heal scarred tissue after a heart attack. This is certainly exciting news considering heart failure is still the No. 1 cause of death in men and women. The study included 25 heart attack victims, 17 of whom got the stem cell treatment. Those patients saw a 50% reduction in cardiac scar tissue after one year, while the eight control patients saw no improvement. The procedure involves removing a tiny portion of heart tissue through a needle, cultivating the stem cells from that tissue, and reinserting them in a second minimally invasive procedure, according to Bloomberg. "If we can regenerate the whole heart, then the patient would be completely normal," said Eduardo Marban, director of Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute who was the study's lead author. "We haven't fulfilled that yet, but we've gotten rid of half of the injury, and that's a good start." Business section: Investing ideas Interested in investing in the promise that stem cell therapy holds? For a look at the investing landscape, we compiled a list of the 10 largest companies involved in stem cell therapy. Do … Continue reading →