Mysterious new SARS-like coronavirus came from bats

Mysterious new SARS-like coronavirus came from bats

Genetic analysis has confirmed that the cases of SARS-like viral disease that made headlines this fall—first killing a Saudi Arabian man in June and then sickening a Qatari man in September—were the result of a single coronavirus that made the leap from bats to humans.  Read more

Brigham and Women’s obtains ‘clarity’

Brigham and Women’s obtains 'clarity'

It’s got to be quite a competition when the winner can boast solving a family’s  medical mystery, but those are the bragging rights the clinical genetics division at Brigham and Women’s Hospital captured when it won Boston Children’s Hospital’s first CLARITY contest.  Read more

Insurance challenges may lie ahead for New York labs hit by hurricane

Insurance challenges may lie ahead for New York labs hit by hurricane

At the end of turbulent week, the extent of the damage caused by Hurricane Sandy on biomedical research in the Northeast remains unclear, particularly at New York University’s Smilow Research Center, which flooded during the storm. The most devastating loss at the labs there may be the death of thousands of genetically modified mice and rats, and these animals represent the culmination of many years of research and thousands of dollars in funding. Although the cages the rodents lived in may be insured, it’s likely impossible to recoup the money and time spent to engineer the animals themselves. Biomedical scientists may not think about the insurance needs for their labs on a daily basis, and as some Nature Medicine spoke with, it’s not always easy to get experiments up and running even when insurance is in place.  Read more

Lupus antibodies may provide new option for cancer therapies

Radiation and chemotherapy are sometimes not strong enough to conquer aggressive tumors, but a new method promises to help cancer treatment become more effective. The approach uses antibodies produced by the body when a person has Lupus, an autoimmune disorder that can affect the skin, joints, and other organs. These lupus antibodies can weaken cancerous cells by penetrating the cells’ nuclei and disrupting their DNA, priming the cells for destruction by radiation or chemotherapy, according to a preliminary study published in Science Translational Medicine on 24 October.  Read more

Mouse stem cells manipulated to create egg-producing ovary

Mouse stem cells manipulated to create egg-producing ovary

From recent news about uterus transplants to controversy over the possibility of so-called ‘three-parent children’, the lengths to which modern medicine will go to achieve conception are increasingly expanding. Creating an ovary that can itself produce viable eggs might soon be added to that list.  Read more