Our immune systems vary with the seasons, according to a study led by the University of Cambridge that could help explain why certain conditions such as heart disease and rheumatoid arthritis are aggravated in winter whilst people tend to be healthier in the summer.
The success of a clinical trial hinges on its ability to recruit enough patients. Dr Frank Waldron-Lynch from the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research explains how the use of the internet to directly contact patients with type 1 diabetes greatly accelerated the recruitment leading to the early completion of his team’s study of a potential new treatment for type 1 diabetes.
Alzheimer’s Research UK, the world’s largest dedicated dementia research charity, has announced a £30 million Drug Discovery Alliance, launching three flagship Drug Discovery Institutes at the Universities of Cambridge, Oxford and UCL (University College London). The Drug Discovery Institutes will see 90 new research scientists employed in state-of-the-art facilities to fast-track the development of new treatments for Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias.
The order in which genetic mutations are acquired determines how an individual cancer behaves, according to research from the University of Cambridge, published today in the New England Journal of Medicine.
The first comprehensive computer model to simulate the development of blood cells could help in the development of new treatments for leukaemia and lymphoma, say researchers at the University of Cambridge and Microsoft Research.
A new test for blood cancers will catch many more cases than the present test that identifies only 60 per cent.
Study has relevance to all cancers that are suspected to have a stem cell origin
Much hyped by the media, stem cells have tremendous power to improve human health. As part of the Cambridge Stem Cell Initiative, Dr Ludovic Vallier’s research in the Anne McLaren Laboratory for Regenerative Medicine shows how stem cells can further our understanding of disease and help deliver much-needed new treatments.
New discoveries by Cambridge scientists about a molecular waste-disposal process that ‘eats’ bacteria are influencing the clinical management of cystic fibrosis, and could be the basis of innovative new treatments to fight off bacteria.
The discovery by scientists in Cambridge and Alberta of a fifth adaptor protein – a tiny and vital component of many cells –will lay the foundations for a greater understanding of genetic disorders.
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