Medicine
12 articles in this category
A drop of blood and a crank are enough to learn your blood type in a minute
A drop of finger-prick blood, a plastic chip and a crank: after a minute you can see the blood type and how many red cells the blood contains. Taiwanese researchers want to give this to paramedics; for now it is a prototype.
A dialysis drug softens the shield around pancreatic cancer in patients’ biopsies
Pancreatic tumours surround themselves with dense tissue that shields them from drugs and immune cells. In a small trial, an old drug for kidney patients weakened this shield and let more immune cells into the tumour.
After one CAR-T infusion, three of six RA patients stop their drugs
People with severe arthritis received one drip of immune cells engineered the way cancer teams do. Three of six improved enough to stop their drugs.
Every other seemingly healthy adult already shows arterial plaque
In more than half of adults with no symptoms, plaque already sits in the arteries — sometimes even before age thirty. A large Denmark–Spain study shows a paper risk score alone will not reveal that.
An ointment clears aged-skin cells that slow healing
Researchers painted aged mouse skin with a drug that clears worn-out cells. Wounds then closed clearly more often than without that prep.
A lymph node trains T cells that later harm a tau-burdened brain
T cells that help destroy the brain in Alzheimer-like disease get their instructions in a lymph node outside the brain. In mice, cutting that path protects memory even when protein deposits remain.
A pumpkin protease cuts peanut proteins but does not erase the allergy
Researchers in Wrocław show that a pumpkin enzyme can weaken the immune system’s reaction to peanut proteins in lab tests. This is not yet food that is safe for people with peanut allergy — protein fragments that can still bind remain after processing.
Remission still leaves gut cells primed to die
Even when IBD symptoms are quiet, gut lining cells can stay set for cell death. A Science study from Melbourne links that signal to relapse risk and new monitoring paths.
Skull marrow trains immunity closer to the brain than a lymph node
Mouse skull bone marrow holds lymph-node-like immune hubs that sense brain signals before distant nodes. The discovery opens a local route to treat neurological disease — still preclinical.
A mini-tumor in a chip reveals a drug the plate does not detect
Flat cancer-cell cultures are often too still: a real tumor is a sphere under slow fluid flow. A Brazilian team built an openable chip that grows mini-tumors and tests drugs in motion — closer to tissue, aiming to reduce animal testing.
Mucus flow changes the verdict on the antibiotic
Classic antibiotic tests use still culture media, while lung bacteria feel mucus flow. A Spanish team built a simple platform that recreates that shear and better predicts which drug will work.
A nanocapsule delivers the antibiotic to the ulcer despite stomach mucus
Half of humanity carries H. pylori, and pills often never reach under the stomach mucus. A Korean team built nanoparticles that, in a mouse model, cut the antibiotic dose tenfold.