Tag Archive for 'Understanding Genomics and Global Health Impacts'

Synthetic Drug Users at Thirty to Forty Million

Drugs such as amphetamine-type stimulants and prescription medications are more and more what people are choosing according to the United Nations Drug Report for 2010. The number using such drugs will eventually exceed those using opiates and cocaine. Drug use in developed countries has remained relatively stable says the document. But in developing countries it [...]

Stem Cells Used to Create Abnormal Heart Cells

Researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine have for the first time differentiated human stem cells to become heart cells with cardiomyopathy, a condition in which the heart muscle cells are abnormal. The discovery will allow scientists to learn how those heart cells become diseased and from there, they can begin developing drug therapies to [...]

Genome Sequencing for $30 – A Harvard Spin-off Promise

The scramble to come up with a faster and cheaper way to sequence a genome just got a credible new contender which aims to do the job for the bargain basement rate of $30. The first time scientists sequenced a human genome, the price tag hit $3 billion. That price point has quickly plunged to [...]

Pharma Trifecta: Generics, New Markets and Personalization

What three trends are most important to pharma these days? Generics, emerging markets and personalized medicine, according to the Harvard Business Review. Branded generics are the wave of Big Pharma’s future, HBR says. These branded versions of off-patent meds sell at higher prices than regular generics do, but are cheaper than the branded meds themselves. They give [...]

New Nerve Stem Cells — Even in Old Age

After birth the brain loses many nerve cells and this continues throughout life — most neurons are formed before birth, after which many excess neurons degenerate. However, there are some cells that are still capable of division in old age — in the brains of mice, at least. According to scientists from the Max Planck [...]

Global CRO Industry – China’s Growing Appeal

I had a chance to speak with Charles River Laboratories’ Chris Perkin recently about the CRO’s burgeoning presence in China. Perkin, who established Charles River’s preclinical ops in China, was distinctly bullish on the country as the coming place in the industry for animal research. One big reason: Local authorities were quick to accommodate the [...]

New Genes Identified in Variation of Human Eye Color

Three new genetic loci have been identified with involvement in subtle and quantitative variation of human eye color. The study, led by Manfred Kayser of the Erasmus University Medical Center Rotterdam, The Netherlands, is published May 6 in the open-access journal PLoS Genetics.

Toward Making the Blind See: Gene Therapy Restores Vision in Mice

Scientists from Buffalo, Cleveland, and Oklahoma City made a huge step toward making the blind see, and they did it by using a form of gene therapy that does not involve the use of modified viruses. In a research report published in the April 2010 print issue of The FASEB Journal, scientists describe how they [...]

Studies on Nutrients, Gene Expression Could Lead to Tailored Diets for Disease Prevention

Personal health recommendations and diets tailored to better prevent diseases may be in our future, just by focusing on genetics.  Researchers at Kansas State University recently published an academic journal article discussing the potential for nutrigenomics, a field that studies the effects of food on gene expression. The researchers discussed the possibility of using [...]

Exposure to Nitrogen Dioxide Lowers in Vitro Fertilization Success

Exposure to an increased level of air pollutants, especially nitrogen dioxide, has been associated with lower likelihoods of successful pregnancy among women undergoing in vitro fertilization, according to a team of fertility researchers. The team examined the outcomes of the first pregnancy attempt of 7,403 women undergoing IVF at Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical [...]