Scientists have confirmed for the first time that bacteria can change form to avoid being detected by antibiotics in the human body. Studying samples from elderly patients with recurring urinary tract infections, the Newcastle University team used state-of-the art techniques to identify that a bacteria can lose its cell wall - the common target of many groups of antibiotics.
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Leukemia drug shows promise for treating a childhood brain cancer
A drug used to treat chronic myeloid leukemia appears to be more effective at stopping a type of medulloblastoma in mouse models than existing treatments for the deadly pediatric brain tumor, reports a multi-institutional team led by researchers at Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at University of California San Diego.
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Gene-targeted cancer drugs, slow release overcome resistance
Biomedical engineers at Duke University have developed a method to address failures in a promising anti-cancer drug, bringing together tools from genome engineering, protein engineering and biomaterials science to improve the efficacy, accuracy and longevity of certain cancer therapies.
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A promising treatment for an incurable, deadly kidney disease
A potential treatment for polycystic kidney disease - a genetic disorder that causes the kidneys to swell with multiple cysts and can eventually lead to organ failure - has shown promising results in animal testing. A study describing the drug's development and testing appears today in Nature Communications. The study shows an approximately 50 percent reduction in kidney size in afflicted mice following treatment.
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New drug may protect against memory loss in Alzheimer's disease
A new drug discovered through a research collaboration between the University at Buffalo and Tetra Therapeutics may protect against memory loss, nerve damage and other symptoms of Alzheimer's disease. Preclinical research found that the drug - called BPN14770 - deters the effects of amyloid beta, a hallmark protein of Alzheimer's that is toxic to nerve cells.
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Breast cancer can form 'sleeper cells' after drug treatment
Breast cancer medicines may force some cancer cells into 'sleeper mode', allowing them to potentially come back to life years after initial treatment. These are the early-stage findings from scientists at Imperial College London, who studied human breast cancer cells in the laboratory.
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Experimental validation confirms the ability of artificial intelligence to accelerate drug discovery
Insilico Medicine, a global leader in artificial intelligence for drug discovery, today announced the publication of a paper titled, "Deep learning enables rapid identification of potent DDR1 kinase inhibitors," in Nature Biotechnology. The paper describes a timed challenge, where the new artificial intelligence system called Generative Tensorial Reinforcement Learning (GENTRL) designed six novel inhibitors of DDR1, a kinase target implicated in fibrosis and other diseases, in 21 days.
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