It has been known for years that running away from your problems, if it's done on a treadmill, can protect from stress-induced depression. Exercise, especially aerobic exercise, appears to be as effective as drugs in relieving depression.
CRISPR/Cas has gotten a lot of attention in recent years because it is a genome-editing system that is simpler than zinc finger technology. Science named the technology one of its top 10 breakthroughs of 2013.
Whether artificial sweeteners cause weight loss or weight gain has been a matter of debate for some time – at least as far as their human use is concerned. Such sweeteners are routinely used in animal feed to increase appetite and weight gain.
Scientists from Cambridge, Mass.-based biotech company Blueprint Medicines Corp. have identified multiple new fusion kinases that play roles in different cancers. They published their findings in the Sept. 10, 2014, issue of Nature Communications.
The Lasker Foundation announced last Monday that University of Washington researcher Marie Claire King had won the 2014 Lasker-Koshland Special Achievement award in Medical Science "for bold, imaginative and diverse contributions to medical science and human rights."
Researchers have discovered that commensal bacteria of the human microbiome synthesize thousands of potentially drug-like small molecules, including at least one class, the thiopeptides, which is in clinical trials.
Alim Louis Benabid and Mahlon R. DeLong are the recipients of the 2014 Lasker~DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award "for Development of Deep Brain Stimulation of the Subthalamic Nucleus," a treatment for patients with Parkinson's disease who no longer respond to treatment with the drug L-dopa.
Researchers reported Friday that in primates, the experimental antibody cocktail Zmapp could reverse Ebola disease in monkeys when it was administered up to five days after infection, at a point where the animals were severely ill.