A single injection that could cure rheumatoid arthritis is being developed by British scientists. The treatment works like a vaccine and could be available within five years. Cells would be taken from the body, altered, and injected back into the affected joint.

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Antibodies against plasminogen linked to blood clots in patients with ANCA vasculitis
The discovery of “complementary” antibodies against plasminogen in patients with blood vessel inflammation caused by anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibodies (ANCAs) may lead to new approaches to research, testing, and treatment of ANCA vasculitis and other autoimmune diseases, suggests a paper in the December Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (JASN).

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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted marketing approval for Viread for the treatment of chronic hepatitis B, Gilead Sciences Inc. said reported late Monday.

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A combination of chemotherapy agents that have been tested in other tumor types appears to be a promising alternative to standard treatment for advanced non-small cell lung cancer, according to a report in the August 15 issue of Clinical Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.

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Humans worsen spread of deadly emerging infectious disease

Amphibians, reigning survivors of past mass extinctions, are sending a clear, unequivocal signal that something is wrong, as their extinction rates rise to unprecedented levels, according to a paper published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). Humans are exacerbating two key natural threats – climate change and a deadly disease that is jumping from one species to another.

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As people age, their cells become less efficient at getting rid of damaged protein — resulting in a buildup of toxic material that is especially pronounced in Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s disease, and other neurodegenerative disorders.

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Patients taking some common medications for high cholesterol and irregular heart beats can suffer severe muscle damage because of a problem in the way the drugs interact, the government warned on Friday.

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A spin out company from basic structural biology, Asterion Ltd., has led to new technology that provides a way of creating therapeutic proteins to tackle major diseases such as cancer, diabetes and infertility. The research was carried out at the University of Sheffield in laboratories supported by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC). This work is reported in the current edition of BBSRC Business, the quarterly research highlights magazine of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council.

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University of Manchester scientists have uncovered the 3D structure of Mps1 – a protein that regulates the number of chromosomes during cell division and thus has an essential role in the prevention of cancer – which will lead to the design of safer and more effective therapies.
Mps1 belongs to the family of proteins called kinases. When subsets of these enzymes become deregulated, cancer can be one of the outcomes – making them a critical target for research by oncologists. Over 100 of the 500 or so kinases have been shown to be associated with cancer, but so far scientists only know the 3D structure of a handful. Knowing the structure is critical for the design of new kinase inhibitors as therapeutic agents, an area of enormous importance to the pharmaceutical industry. Over 100 kinase inhibitors are currently in clinical trials, and the revolutionary kinase inhibitor Glivec was approved for treating Leukaemia in the UK in 2001.

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Ground-breaking research using tailor-made regulatory cells shows promising findings
Researchers have developed a ground-breaking procedure that could avoid the need for transplant patients to spend the rest of their lives taking a cocktail of drugs to stop their system from rejecting their new organ, according to a series of papers in the August issue of Transplant International.

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