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n2doc's JournalWhat Time Is It on Your Circadian Clock?
by Dennis Normile
Are you a morning lark or a night owl? Scientists use that simplified categorization to explain that different people have different internal body clocks, commonly called circadian clocks. Sleep-wake cycles, digestive activities, and many other physiological processes are controlled by these clocks. In recent years, researchers have found that internal body clocks can also affect how patients react to drugs. For example, timing a course of chemotherapy to the internal body time of cancer patients can improve treatment efficacy and reduce side effects.
But physicians have not been able to exploit these findings because determining internal body time is, well, time consuming. It's also cumbersome. The most established and reliable method requires taking blood samples from a patient hourly and tracking levels of the hormone melatonin, which previous research has tied closely to internal body time.
Now a Japanese group has come up with an alternative method of determining internal body time by constructing what it calls a molecular timetable based on levels in blood samples of more than 50 metabolites—hormones and amino acids—that result from biological activity. The researchers established a molecular timetable based on samples from three subjects and validated it using the conventional melatonin measurement. They then used that timetable to determine the internal body times of other subjects by checking the levels of the metabolites in just two blood samples from each subject per day.
Having such a timetable could allow doctors to synchronize drug delivery to internal body time, the team reports online today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "Usually personalized medicine is focusing on genetic differences, but there are also temporal differences [among patients]. That will be the next step in personalized medicine," says systems biologist Hiroki Ueda of the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology in Kobe, Japan, who heads the research group.
more
http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2012/08/what-time-is-it-on-your-circadia.html
Enlisting the AIDS Virus to Fight Cancer
ScienceDaily (Aug. 28, 2012) — Can HIV be transformed into a biotechnological tool for improving human health? According to a CNRS team at the Architecture et Réactivité de l'ARN (RNA Architecture and Reactivity) laboratory, the answer is yes. Taking advantage of the HIV replication machinery, the researchers have been able to select a specific mutant protein. Added to a culture of tumor cells in combination with an anticancer drug, this protein improves the effectiveness of the treatment at 1/300 the normal dosage levels.
Published in PLoS Genetics on 23 August 2012, these findings could lead to long-term therapeutic applications in the treatment of cancer and other pathologies.
The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which causes AIDS, uses human cell material to multiply, primarily by inserting its genetic material into the host cells' genome. The distinctive characteristic of HIV is that it mutates constantly, and consequently generates several mutant proteins (or variants) in the course of its successive multiplications. This phenomenon allows the virus to adapt to repeated environmental changes and resist the antiviral treatments that have been developed so far.
At the IBMC (Institut de Biologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire) in Strasbourg, the researchers of the CNRS Architecture et Réactivité de l'ARN laboratory had the idea of using this multiplication strategy to rechannel the effects of the virus for therapeutic purposes, in particular the treatment of cancer.
more
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120828073304.htm
Before Gunfire, Hints of ‘Bad News’
By ERICA GOODE, SERGE F. KOVALESKI, JACK HEALY and DAN FROSCH
Published: August 26, 2012
AURORA, Colo. — The text message, sent to another graduate student in early July, was cryptic and worrisome. Had she heard of “dysphoric mania,” James Eagan Holmes wanted to know?
The psychiatric condition, a form of bipolar disorder, combines the frenetic energy of mania with the agitation, dark thoughts and in some cases paranoid delusions of major depression.
She messaged back, asking him if dysphoric mania could be managed with treatment. Mr. Holmes replied: “It was,” but added that she should stay away from him “because I am bad news.”
It was the last she heard from him.
more
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/27/us/before-gunfire-in-colorado-theater-hints-of-bad-news-about-james-holmes.html
At Convention, 2 Disruptions: Tropical Storm and Ron Paul
By MICHAEL D. SHEAR
Published: August 27, 2012
TAMPA, Fla. — Mitt Romney’s hopes for a highly disciplined and scripted nominating convention continued to fray Monday morning as a tropical storm barreled toward New Orleans and was expected to strengthen into a hurricane.
Mr. Romney’s convention organizers were also warily keeping an eye on some restive delegates, including supporters of Representative Ron Paul of Texas, who were poised to challenge parts of the convention’s rules and platform when it begins Tuesday afternoon.
Broadcast and cable networks on Monday began shifting some of their resources toward the hurricane-threatened Gulf Coast after it became clear that the storm’s impact on the Tampa area was minimal, as Republicans continued preparations to open their convention a day late.
“We are going to make sure that we monitor the storm as it proceeds,” said Russ Schriefer, a top adviser to Mr. Romney who is helping to produce the convention. “Obviously, our first concern is for the people who are in the path of the storm. We have a wait-and-see attitude to see what happens.”
more
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/28/us/politics/romney-camp-looks-to-head-off-storm-during-convention.html
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