Messenger RNA (mRNA) technology has become popular in the last few years due to its use in COVID-19 vaccines. This technology has been so groundbreaking that it recently won the 2023 Nobel Prize in medicine "for discoveries concerning nucleoside base modifications that enabled the development of effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19." This isn't new technology, however - modified mRNAs have been studied for decades and show significant potential for therapeutic applications.

A team of researchers at the Medical University of Vienna has discovered that dormant tumor cells surviving chemotherapy can be targeted through the inhibition of a specific protein called P-glycoprotein (P-gp). This discovery opens up new possibilities for delaying relapse and is particularly relevant for aggressive triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), for which there are currently few effective treatments.

Researchers at Boston Medical Center and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute conducted one of the first-ever analyses of neuroendocrine tumors (NETs) at single cell resolution, unlocking new insights into this rare and often hard-to-treat cancer. The findings represent a tremendous leap forward in understanding why these tumors are largely resistant to immunotherapy and provide key insights that could lead to future treatments.

Lung fibrosis is a debilitating disease affecting nearly 250,000 people in the U.S. alone with 50,000 new cases reported each year. There is currently no cure and limited available treatment options, underscoring the pressing need to better understand why people get this disease.

In a new study, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine researchers have identified that abnormal interactions between different cell types, particularly platelets and lung immune cells, promote lung fibrosis.

Researchers from the University of Arizona Cancer Center have identified a new method of activating specific molecules to target cancer cells while leaving healthy cells unharmed.

In their recent study, published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, Wei Wang, PhD, and his team developed a new strategy called click-release proteolysis targeting chimeras, or crPROTACs, that allows for the activation and release of PROTACs only in cancer cells.

A cancer drug could play an important role in limiting the damaging effects of lung disease in COVID-19 patients, thanks to new research at Hudson Institute of Medical Research.

The body's inflammatory response to infection is important in controlling viruses, such as SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, but when inflammation gets out of control the effects can be lethal.

In recent years, cancer researchers have hailed the arrival of chimeric antigen receptor T cell (CAR T) therapy, which has delivered promising results, transforming the fight against various forms of cancer. The process involves modifying patients' T-cells to target cancer cells, resulting in remarkable success rates for previously intractable forms of cancer.

Six CAR T cell therapies have secured FDA approval, and several more are in the pipeline.