For every scientific advance I cover, there is another that I look at with regret and ignore. With the increase in overall scientific output, the fact that there is lots of good research that I never get to write about will not change any time soon. There are also those stories that our readers need to know about, but do not lend themselves well to covering as a story. Retractions and back-and-forth disagreements between labs can be in this category; so can the third excellent paper on a very similar topic within a week or two, as can findings that...
The sinoatrial node is "part of the heart, but a very specialized part of the heart," Mark Anderson told BioWorld Today. The cells that make up the pacemaker are different from normal cells, he explained. They are "more effective at beating on their own, but they don't have much mechanical function," or as much strength to contract as regular heart muscle cells. "They just kind of quiver."
Oncogene targeting is a frequent strategy in cancer research. In the July 13, 2011, issue of Nature, scientists reported preclinical successes using a different strategy: by targeting what they termed a non-oncogene co-dependency.
Genentech Inc.'s tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), the only FDA-approved stroke drug, works by getting rid of the blood clot that is blocking blood flow.
Scientists at Beijing University of Chemical Technology have reported a way to express human-derived gelatin in yeast cells, and suggest that human-derived gelatin might be a useful alternative to pig-and cow derived gelatin for use in the food industry. This, in turn, has set the blogosphere abuzz: Is it vegetarian? Cannibalistic? Just plain gross? Some blogs have compared this to San Francisco company FibroGen Inc., which is making vaccine and biologics stabilizers. But medical uses seem different. I’m not sure what FibroGen intends to put into its gelatin capsules, but what if it’s a recombinant therapeutic protein? Does the yuck...
Almost 15 percent of couples are infertile, at least by the definition of the World Health Organization: no pregnancy after a year of trying without birth control. In about half of those cases, the male partner is the one who is infertile; and in nearly a fifth of those cases, no one can figure out why.
Researchers from the Scripps Research Institute and Dutch biotech company Crucell BV may have found what children will surely consider the best Dutch invention since bread with chocolate sprinkles: a broadly neutralizing antibody to influenza viruses. Together with another antibody identified earlier by the same group, the new antibody may point the way toward a universal vaccine to replace the current annual jab.
