Researchers have developed a drug delivery technique for diabetes treatment in which a sponge-like material surrounds an insulin core. The sponge expands and contracts in response to blood sugar levels to release insulin as needed. The technique could also be used for targeted drug delivery to cancer cells.

The future is looking good for drugs designed to combat Alzheimer's disease. Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) scientists have unveiled how two classes of drug compounds currently in clinical trials work to fight the disease. Their research suggests that these compounds target the disease-causing peptides with high precision and with minimal side-effects.

Chemically modified inhibitors of the COX-2 enzyme relieve anxiety behaviors in mice by activating natural "endocannabinoids" without gastrointestinal side effects, Vanderbilt University scientists will report next week. Endocannabinoids are natural signaling molecules that activate cannabinoid receptors in the brain, the same receptors turned on by the active ingredient in marijuana.

Not all placebos are equal, and patients who respond to one placebo don't always respond to others, according to research published July 31 in the open access journal PLOS ONE by Jian Kong from Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School and colleagues from other institutions.

A new method of vaccine design, called the Multiple Antigen Presentation System (MAPS), may result in vaccines that bring together the benefits of whole-cell and acellular or defined subunit vaccination. The method, pioneered by researchers at Boston Children's Hospital, permits rapid construction of new vaccines that activate mulitple arms of the immune system simultaneously against one or more pathogens, generating robust immune protection with a lower risk of adverse effects.

Many drugs such as agents for cancer or autoimmune diseases have nasty side effects because while they kill disease-causing cells, they also affect healthy cells. Now a new study has demonstrated a technique for developing more targeted drugs, by using molecular "robots" to hone in on more specific populations of cells.

Small proteins called peptides that consist of 10 to 50 amino acids are being studied as cancer vaccines and as possibly safer, more effective and less costly alternatives to the monoclonal-antibody-based drugs and small-molecule inhibitors now used to treat many malignancies.