A pioneering drug developed to treat women with inherited cancers can also benefit men with advanced prostate cancer, a major new clinical trial concludes. The trial is a milestone in cancer treatment as the first to show the benefits of 'precision medicine' in prostate cancer - with treatment matched to the particular genetic characteristics of a man's tumour.

Scientists at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University developing novel nanotherapeutics for clearing obstructed blood vessels have teamed up with researchers at University of Massachusetts' New England Center for Stroke Research (NECSTR) to develop a new, highly effective drug-device combination for treating life-threatening blood clots in patients with stroke.

Insulin, the hormone essential to all mammals for controlling blood sugar levels and a feeling of being full after eating, plays a much stronger role than previously known in regulating release of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that helps control the brain's reward and pleasure centers, new studies by researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center show.

Muscular dystrophy, which affects approximately 250,000 people in the U.S., occurs when damaged muscle tissue is replaced with fibrous, fatty or bony tissue and loses function. For years, scientists have searched for a way to successfully treat the most common form of the disease, Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD), which primarily affects boys.

An FDA-approved drug for leukemia improved cognition, motor skills and non-motor function in patients with Parkinson's disease and Lewy body dementia in a small phase I clinical trial, report researchers at Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) in Washington. In addition, the drug, nilotinib (Tasigna® by Novartis), led to statistically significant and encouraging changes in toxic proteins linked to disease progression (biomarkers).

Drugs produced using biotechnology are among the most expensive medicines available. Biosimilars that offer a real alternative are becoming increasingly available on the market. The promise of biosimilars is that, once patent protection has elapsed for established biologics, more patients will be able to access effective and well-tolerated drugs.

Researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences have found that the breast cancer drug tamoxifen gives white blood cells a boost, better enabling them to respond to, ensnare and kill bacteria in laboratory experiments. Tamoxifen treatment in mice also enhances clearance of the antibiotic-resistant bacterial pathogen MRSA and reduces mortality.