Modified CRISPR-based enzymes improve the prospect of inserting entire genes into the genome to overcome diverse disease-causing mutations
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- Category: Research
Many genetic diseases are caused by diverse mutations spread across an entire gene, and designing genome editing approaches for each patient’s mutation would be impractical and costly.
Investigators at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) recently developed an optimized method that improves the accuracy of inserting large DNA segments into a genome.
Study identifies potential new approach for treating lupus
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- Category: Research
Targeting iron metabolism in immune system cells may offer a new approach for treating systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) - the most common form of the chronic autoimmune disease lupus.
A multidisciplinary team of investigators at Vanderbilt University Medical Center has discovered that blocking an iron uptake receptor reduces disease pathology and promotes the activity of anti-inflammatory regulatory T cells in a mouse model of SLE.
Nanotechnology may improve gene therapy for blindness
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- Category: Research
Using nanotechnology that enabled mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines, a new approach to gene therapy may improve how physicians treat inherited forms of blindness.
A collaborative team of researchers with Oregon Health & Science University and Oregon State University have developed an approach that uses lipid nanoparticles - tiny, lab-made balls of fat - to deliver strands of messenger ribonucleic acid, or mRNA, inside the eye.
Incurable liver disease may prove curable
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- Category: Research
Research led by Associate Professor Duc Dong, Ph.D., has shown for the first time that the effects of Alagille syndrome, an incurable genetic disorder that affects the liver, could be reversed with a single drug. The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, has the potential to transform treatment for this rare disease and may also have implications for more common diseases.
Scientists develop a cancer vaccine to simultaneously kill and prevent brain cancer
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- Category: Research
Scientists are harnessing a new way to turn cancer cells into potent, anti-cancer agents. In the latest work from the lab of Khalid Shah, MS, PhD, at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, a founding member of the Mass General Brigham healthcare system, investigators have developed a new cell therapy approach to eliminate established tumors and induce long-term immunity, training the immune system so that it can prevent cancer from recurring.
Time-restricted eating reshapes gene expression throughout the body
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- Category: Research
Numerous studies have shown health benefits of time-restricted eating including increase in life span in laboratory studies, making practices like intermittent fasting a hot topic in the wellness industry. However, exactly how it affects the body on the molecular level, and how those changes interact across multiple organ systems, has not been well understood.
COVID-19 vaccines, prior infection reduce transmission of Omicron
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- Category: Research
Vaccination and boosting, especially when recent, helped to limit the spread of COVID-19 in California prisons during the first Omicron wave, according to an analysis by researchers at UC San Francisco that examined transmission between people living in the same cell.
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