ApoE variants are the strongest known genetic risk factor not just for Alzheimer's disease (AD), but for any disease. It was first described just about 25 years ago. "And I've worked on it since then," David Holtzman told BioWorld.
By delivering the gene for myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG), one of the proteins that is a frequent target of autoimmune attack in multiple sclerosis (MS), to the liver, researchers have been able to induce systemic immune tolerance. Depending on the timing of treatment, the approach could prevent or reverse the symptoms of even late-stage experimental autoimmune encephalitis (EAE), the mouse equivalent of MS.
Zika virus' greatest threat is its preference for developing brain cells. As a result, while infections in adults are mostly harmless – indeed, more often than not, they are asymptomatic – infections in pregnant women can have devastating effects on fetal brain development.
The most dangerous part of sepsis is not the phase of out-of-control inflammation, though that is plenty dangerous. It is the subsequent phase of immunosuppression, when septic individuals are highly susceptible to follow-on infections.
By considering information both from single cell types and across multiple cell types, scientists have been able to map the relationships of enhancers to gene expression levels in more than 900 different human primary cell types, tissue types and cell lines. Enhancers interact with promoters to regulate gene expression.
The 2017 Lasker Awards honored the discovery of the mTOR kinase by Michael Hall, the scientific groundwork that led to the development of the first preventive cancer vaccine by Douglas Lowy and John Schiller, and the women's health work done by Planned Parenthood.
