Nature • May 2024

Natural killer cells show their cancer-fighting worth

As part of a study published in January, 37 people who had been through various failed treatments for blood cancer received infusions of genetically enhanced immune cells that researchers hoped would clear their disease1. The concept was not new — therapies based on T cells have been approved since 2017. But the source of the cells was. Researchers at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas, used frozen donor umbilical-cord blood to grow and prepare a lesser-known component of the immun

Nature • March 2023

SGLT2 inhibitors breathe life into kidney-disease care

Researchers want to expand the use of drugs that protect the hearts and kidneys of people with chronic kidney disease.

Science News • June 2021

A repurposed TB vaccine shows early promise against diseases like diabetes and MS

The effects of the BCG shot on infections and autoimmune diseases is beginning to make sense

Knowable Magazine | Annual Reviews • January 2021

Unseen scars of childhood trauma

Twenty years of research have established the connection between adverse childhood experiences and long-term health. Now researchers are looking for ways to measure the biology behind the correlation and try to reverse it.

Nature • May 2020

Redefining the diagnostic criteria for COPD

Many people with symptoms of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease don’t meet the criteria for diagnosis. The field is grappling with how to define and treat these patients.

Science News • November 2019

Mom’s immune system and microbiome may help predict premature birth

Every Monday, Jennifer Degl leads a group through the halls of the neonatal intensive care unit at Maria Fareri Children’s Hospital in Valhalla, N.Y. The volunteers offer support to the parents of babies born early and struggling to survive. Seven years ago, Degl, a high school science teacher in Putnam County, was one of those anxious parents.

Nature Medicine • August 2019

Single-cell sequencing edges into clinical trials

Parsing the DNA of individual cells gives a higher-resolution view of health and disease.

The Scientist Magazine® • June 2019

Do Commensal Microbes Stoke the Fire of Autoimmunity?

Molecules produced by resident bacteria and their hosts may signal immune cells to attack the body’s own tissues.

The Scientist Magazine® • January 2019

Exosomes Make Their Debut in Plant Research

A growing branch of research on how plants use exosomes to interact with their environment is opening up a new field of plant biology.

Nature Medicine • October 2018

Back in the spotlight

A long-neglected virus returns to the top of researchers’ to-do lists.

Nature Medicine • August 2018

Just the messenger

A new class of therapeutics instruct the body to make its own drugs.

The Scientist Magazine® • April 2018

Exome Sequencing Helps Crack Rare Disease Diagnosis

Clinical analyses of patients’ gene sequences are helping to provide answers where none were available before.

The Scientist Magazine® • March 2018

Macrophages Play a Double Role in Cancer

Macrophages play numerous roles within tumors, leaving cancer researchers with a choice: eliminate the cells or recruit them.

The Scientist Magazine® • October 2017

Getting Drugs Past the Blood-Brain Barrier

To treat neurological disease, researchers develop techniques to bypass or trick the guardian of the central nervous system.

Nature Medicine • September 2017

Uncovering cancer: How enlisting T cells can boost the power of immunotherapy

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Nature Medicine • May 2017

Host with the most: Targeting host cells instead of pathogens to fight infectious disease

Treating influenza with compounds that work on components of human cells, rather than on viral particles—an approach often called host-directed therapy—is gaining traction in virology.

Nature Medicine • November 2016

Shapeshifters in cancer: How some tumor cells change phenotype to evade therapy

For Himisha Beltran, the mystery began when she looked into the microscope at cells from a patient who had endured one of the most taxing treatments for prostate cancer.

The Scientist Magazine® • October 2016

Immune System Maintains Brain Health

Once thought only to attack neurons, immune cells turn out to be vital for central nervous system function.

Nova Next, PBS • July 2016

The ‘Quantum Theory’ of Cancer Treatment

By solving a decades-old medical mystery, researchers may have discovered a highly effective cancer treatment.

Nature Medicine • May 2016

Saving face: The search for alternatives to life-long immunosuppression for face transplants

In February 2006, a team of French surgeons captured the world's attention when they appeared at a press conference alongside their patient, Isabelle Dinoire, on whom they had transplanted the lower half of a deceased donor's face just a few months earlier.