http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/index.html News about Johns Hopkins Medicine activities in patient care, research, and education. en-us Johns Hopkins Copyright 2007 Scientists at Johns Hopkins have outlined a new path for potential therapies to combat inflammation associated with sinusitis and asthma based on a new understanding of the body’s earliest immune response in the nose and sinus cavities. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_29_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_29_08.html Even when their blood pressure is kept strictly under control with the best available medicine, African-American patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) continue to lose their kidney function over time, research led by a Johns Hopkins team shows. The finding suggests that treating CKD in this population may be vastly more complex than researchers had previously thought, with blood pressure control being only one piece of the therapeutic puzzle. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_28_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_28_08.html On average, two Marylanders each day are diagnosed with potentially fatal oral cancers that are often curable if identified and treated early. The Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene’s Office of Oral Health reports that the state ranks in the country’s top 10 for number of deaths caused by oral cancers. Nationally, statistics show that the death rate from these cancers is higher than those of cervical cancer, Hodgkin's lymphoma, testicular cancer, and thyroid and malignant melanoma. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_21_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_21_08.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have uncovered the molecular underpinnings of one of the earliest steps in human development using human embryonic stem cells. Their identification of a critical signal mediated by the protein BMP-4 that drives the differentiation of stem cells into what will become the placenta, will be published in the April issue of Cell Stem Cell. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_09_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_09_08.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered that blood vessels in the head can guide growing facial nerve cells with blood pressure controlling proteins. The findings, which suggest that blood vessels throughout the body might have the same power of persuasion over many nerves, are published this week in Nature. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_10_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/04_10_08.html What is believed to be the largest study of its kind for the genetic roots of inflammatory bowel diseases has suggested new links to Crohn’s Disease as well as further evidence that some people of Jewish descent are more likely to develop it. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_26_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_26_08.html One day last spring, fossil hunter and anatomy professor Kenneth Rose, Ph.D. was displaying the bones of a jackrabbit’s foot as part of a seminar at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine when something about the shape of the bones looked oddly familiar. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_19_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_19_08.html Kidney damage often sets off a slew of complications in patients, spreading organ failure like wildfire throughout their bodies. Now, researchers at Johns Hopkins say they have evidence in mice that this deadly progression-at least to the lungs-may be due to genetic alterations in kidney-based genes that sabotage inflammation control and send toxic signals to healthy organs. The signals convince these organs to react as if they, too, are damaged. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_13_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_13_08.html Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center have teased out two distinct sets of risk factors for head and neck cancers, suggesting that there are two completely different kinds of the disease. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_11b_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_11b_08.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered that two clinically different inherited syndromes are in fact variations of the same disorder. Reporting in the April issue of Nature Genetics, the team suggests that at least for this class of disorders, the total number and “strength” of genetic alterations an individual carries throughout the genome can generate a range of symptoms wide enough to appear like different conditions. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_09_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_09_08.html Using pacemakers to electrically retune a heart damaged by long bouts of a wobbling heartbeat, where one heart muscle wall is beating sooner than the other, leads to fast improvements in the tissue levels of more than a dozen proteins key to the organ’s health, scientists at Johns Hopkins report in experiments in dogs. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_05_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_05_08.html Patients cared for by hospitals with residents in training have a 17 percent less chance of dying after lung cancer surgery compared with patients undergoing surgery at non-teaching hospitals, according to results of a Johns Hopkins study published in the March issue of the Annals of Thoracic Surgery http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_04_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/03_04_08.html A pair of Johns Hopkins and government scientists have discovered that when jazz musicians improvise, their brains turn off areas linked to self-censoring and inhibition, and turn on those that let self-expression flow. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/02_26_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/02_26_08.html Johns Hopkins researchers from the Whiting School of Engineering and the School of Medicine have devised a micro-scale tool - a lab on a chip - designed to mimic the chemical complexities of the brain. The system should help scientists better understand how nerve cells in the brain work together to form the nervous system. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/02_12_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/02_12_08.html Staging mock cardiac and respiratory arrests – “code” situations in hospital parlance – easily expose common failures in rapid response with CPR and other life-saving care for children and also set up powerful incentives to sharpen emergency skills and move fast to use them, suggests a study from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=405 http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=405 A researcher at the Johns Hopkins Institute of Genetic Medicine has led the effort to compile to date the largest free resource of experimental information about human proteins. Reporting in the February issue of Nature Biotechnology, the research team describes how all researchers around the world can access this data and speed their own research. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/02_07_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/02_07_08.html An antiretroviral drug already in widespread use in the developing world to prevent the transmission of HIV from infected mothers to their newborns during childbirth has also been found to substantially cut the risk of subsequent HIV transmission during breast-feeding. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/02_04_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/02_04_08.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered the first genetic evidence that secondhand smoke can worsen lung disease. The report in this week’s Journal of the American Medical Association describes one gene variation that can weaken lung function as well as shorten the lifespan of those affected by cystic fibrosis and also are exposed to secondhand smoke. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_29b_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_29b_08.html Heart surgeons at Johns Hopkins have evidence to support further tightening rather than easing of standards used to designate hospitals that are best at performing heart transplants. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_29_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_29_08.html An estimated one in 20 patients undergoing a common operation to boost blood supply to the heart and to ward off repeat heart attacks may do better if their surgeons also remold the heart to a near normal size, by cutting and suturing together stretched muscle and scar tissue resulting from the initial attack, according to cardiac surgeons at Johns Hopkins. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_29a_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_29a_08.html A modified version of a popular high-protein, low-carbohydrate diet can significantly cut the number of seizures in adults with epilepsy, a study led by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests. The Atkins-like diet, which has shown promise for seizure control in children, may offer a new lifeline for patients when drugs and other treatments fail or cause complications. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_28_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_28_08.html Research by a group of scientists studying the effects of heavy marijuana use suggests that withdrawal from the use of marijuana is similar to what is experienced by people when they quit smoking cigarettes. Abstinence from each of these drugs appears to cause several common symptoms, such as irritability, anger and trouble sleeping - based on self reporting in a recent study of 12 heavy users of both marijuana and cigarettes. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_24_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_24_08.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have identified a common genetic alteration that appears to be associated with autism only when inherited by sons from their mother. The CNTNAP2 gene, also identified by two other groups publishing jointly in the January issue of The American Journal of Human Genetics, is one of the strongest common genetic links to autism susceptibility found to date. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_22_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_22_08.html Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered a previously unsuspected mechanism of cell death that may afford a new way to find and develop stronger yet less-harmful anticancer drugs. Specifically, they have found that a cellular stress-response protein prevents cells from dying by interacting with a particular signaling protein and mediating its response to some conventional anticancer drugs. The results appear in last week’s Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_21_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_21_08.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered a window in kidney growth that affects the onset of polycystic kidney disease and can mean, in mice, the difference between developing severe cystic disease early in adolescence or late in adulthood. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_17_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_17_08.html Findings from what is believed to be the largest comparison of blood samples collected from healthy individuals and people with schizophrenia suggest that infection with the common Toxoplasma gondii parasite, carried by cats and farm animals, may increase the risk of schizophrenia. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=403 http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=403 William Stewart Halsted, The Johns Hopkins Hospital’s first surgeon in chief, is widely credited as the first to develop and introduce rubber surgical gloves in the United States. That was in 1894, five years after the institution opened. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_15_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_15_08.html More than three decades after the shutdown of the notorious Tuskegee study, a team of Johns Hopkins physicians has found that Tuskegee’s legacy of blacks’ mistrust of physicians and deep-seated fear of harm from medical research persists and is largely to blame for keeping much-needed African Americans from taking part in clinical trials. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_14_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_14_08.html New ways to make sure people are adequately informed about the risks and benefits of taking part in a clinical trial can be field-tested for effectiveness as rigorously as new medical treatments themselves, a study led by a Johns Hopkins bioethicist suggests. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_11_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_11_08.html One way cancer arises is when tumor suppressor genes that normally keep cell growth in check are mysteriously turned off. Now, researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered that at least one tumor suppressor gene is in fact turned off by a “noncoding” single stranded RNA nucleic acid similar to its double-stranded DNA cousin. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_09_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_09_08.html They say that a picture can be worth a thousand words. This especially is true for describing the structures of molecules that function to promote cancer. Researchers at Johns Hopkins have built a three-dimensional picture of an enzyme often mutated in many types of cancers. The results, published Dec. 14 in Science, suggest how the most common mutations in this enzyme might lead to cancer progression. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_04_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_04_08.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins and Ohio State University have found that the number of copies of a particular gene can affect the severity of colon cancer in a mouse model. Publishing in the Jan. 3 issue of Nature, the research team describes how trisomy 21, or Down syndrome in humans, can repress tumor growth. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_03_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_03_08.html Activating a protein found on some immune cells seems to halt the cells’ typical job of spewing out substances that launch allergic reactions, a study by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests. The findings could eventually lead to new treatments for allergic reactions ranging from annoying bouts of hay fever to deadly asthma attacks. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_02_08.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2008/01_02_08.html New research from Johns Hopkins specialists suggests that obese kidney disease patients face not only the usual long odds of a tissue match and organ rejection, but also are significantly less likely than normal-weight people to receive a kidney transplant at all. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_19_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_19_07.html Noncombat-related acute and recurrent chronic pain are the leading causes of soldier attrition in modern war, with the return-to-duty rate as low as 2 percent when these soldiers are treated outside the theaters of operation. However, that rate jumps to 95 percent when troops and officers are treated and managed for pain in the field of instead of being sent elsewhere for therapy, according to a new study from a Johns Hopkins anesthesiologist. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_17_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_17_07.html Considered “transitional” a generation ago, milk and egg allergies now appear to be more persistent and harder to outgrow, according to new research from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=402 http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=402 It has no current market, not even a prescription price. Its makers stopped commercial production years ago, because demand was so low. But an antibiotic long abandoned as a weak, low-dose treatment for tuberculosis (TB) may have found renewed purpose, this time as a potent, high-dose fighter against the most common and actively contagious form of the lung disease. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_17a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_17a_07.html Surrounding the small islands of genes within the human genome is a vast sea of mysterious DNA. While most of this non-coding DNA is junk, some of it is used to help genes turn on and off. As reported online this week in Genome Research, Hopkins researchers have now found that this latter portion, which is known as regulatory DNA and contributes to inherited diseases like Parkinson’s or mental disorders, may be more abundant than we realize. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_11_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_11_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered that cancers arising from epigenetic changes - in this case the inappropriate activation of a normally silent gene - develop by becoming addicted to certain growth factors. Reporting online in next week’s Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences, the team shows that blocking this “addiction” can greatly prevent cancer growth. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_10a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_10a_07.html Researchers from Johns Hopkins and the University of Pennsylvania have uncovered another reason why one of the most commonly activated proteins in cancer is in fact so dangerous. As reported in Nature Genetics this week, the Myc protein can stop the production of at least 13 microRNAs, small pieces of nucleic acid that help control which genes are turned on and off. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_10_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_10_07.html A team of Johns Hopkins scientists has catalogued chemical tags attached to more than 800 genes from 76 human brain samples and collected the first evidence of how these special, inherited epigenetic “marks” might account for different brain functions. The results appear in the December issue of The American Journal of Human Genetics. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_04_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/12_04_07.html The first 320-slice computed tomography (CT) scanner in North America, the most powerful X-ray imaging machine in its class, has been installed and is in operation at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_26_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_26_07.html The extra blood volume produced in the obese may so dilute levels of a telltale protein produced by prostates that the popular PSA test may be significantly less effective for diagnosing prostate cancer in men carrying extra pounds, a new study in The Journal of the American Medical Association suggests. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_21_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_21_07.html In a bid to clean up misleading institutional safety comparisons and go further to fix safety problems, Johns Hopkins experts are proposing standard guidelines to be used as hospital safety rating tools. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_06a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_06a_07.html Heart surgeons at Johns Hopkins say people who need heart transplants can largely avoid transplant failure due to elevated blood pressure in their lungs with the help of proper drug treatment. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_06_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_06_07.html Alzheimer’s disease (AD) may progress more rapidly in people with high blood pressure or a form of irregular heartbeat, atrial fibrillation, according to results of a Johns Hopkins study published in the Nov. 6, 2007, issue of Neurology. The findings suggest that treating these conditions may also slow memory loss in people with AD. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_05b_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_05b_07.html Heart experts at Johns Hopkins and elsewhere have evidence that at least 522 lives can be saved annually in the United States and Canada by the widespread placement of automated external defibrillators, the paddle-fitted, electrical devices used to shock and revive people whose hearts have suddenly stopped beating. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_05a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_05a_07.html A study by an international team of cardiac imaging specialists, led by researchers at Johns Hopkins, concludes that sophisticated computed tomography (CT) scans of the heart and its surrounding arteries are almost as reliable and accurate as more invasive procedures to check for blockages. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_05_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_05_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have evidence to explain why the supposedly natural act of aging is by itself a very potent risk factor for life-threatening heart failure. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_04_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_04_07.html Because even mild asthma among young inner-city children appears to be more unpredictable than ever, four or more check-ups a year after diagnosis is a wise move as a hedge against dangerous flare-ups of wheezing and trips to the emergency room, according to a study from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=397 http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=397 Emergency departments across the nation are failing to meet national goals in treating many heart attack and pneumonia patients, according to a study by Johns Hopkins researchers published in the October issue of Academic Emergency Medicine. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_31b_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_31b_07.html The Johns Hopkins Heart Institute today announced a $1.5 million gift from the Mirowski Family Foundation for cardiovascular research. The Michel Mirowski, M.D. Discovery Fund, named in honor of Mirowski and his wife, Anna, will support researchers pursuing novel ideas not yet eligible for traditional sources of funding. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_01_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/11_01_07.html The genetic family ties that bind brothers and sisters also link their risk for developing clogged arteries and having potentially fatal heart attacks, scientists at Johns Hopkins report. And according to researchers, brothers bear the brunt of the burden. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_30_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_30_07.html Brain scientists at Johns Hopkins have discovered how cells in the developing ear make their own noise, long before the ear is able to detect sound around them. The finding, reported in this week’s Nature, helps to explain how the developing auditory system generates brain activity in the absence of sound. It also may explain why people sometimes experience tinnitus and hear sounds that seem to come from nowhere. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_31_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_31_07.html The Down Syndrome Research and Treatment Foundation has awarded a $250,000 grant to Roger H. Reeves, Ph.D., a professor of physiology and member of the McKusick-Nathans Institute of Genetic Medicine at Johns Hopkins. Reeves and his research team will extend their current studies on a potential drug to see if its positive effects can improve brain development in mouse models of Down syndrome. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_31a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_31a_07.html A team of Johns Hopkins scientists reports in this week’s issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that humans can be protected against the damaging effects of ultraviolet (UV) radiation - the most abundant cancer-causing agent in our environment - by topical application of an extract of broccoli sprouts. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_22b_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_22b_07.html Johns Hopkins researchers and colleagues have found a previously unrecognized role for tiny hair-like cell structures known as cilia: They help form our sense of touch. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_22c_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_22c_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins’ McKusick-Nathans Institute of Genetic Medicine today are releasing newly generated genetic data to help speed autism research. The Hopkins data, coordinated with a similar data release from the Autism Consortium, aims to help uncover the underlying hereditary factors and speed the understanding of autism by encouraging scientific collaboration. These data provide the most detailed look to date at the genetic variation patterns in families with autism http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_22a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_22a_07.html Simply informing the poor about government-provided health, educational, and social services they are entitled to could empower them to take greater advantage of free or low-cost public services, a study in India suggests. The finding, reported in this week’s Journal of the American Medical Association, could be an overlooked, relatively easy way to boost health and well-being in developing countries around the world. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_22_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_22_07.html A five-minute eye exam might prove to be an inexpensive and effective way to gauge and track the debilitating neurological disease multiple sclerosis, potentially complementing costly magnetic resonance imaging to detect brain shrinkage - a characteristic of the disease’s progression. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_15_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_15_07.html One year after completing the first large-scale report sequencing breast and colon cancer genes, Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center scientists have studied the vast majority of protein-coding genes which now suggest a landscape dominated by genes that each are mutated in relatively few cancers. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_11_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_11_07.html Both extensive psychological research and personal experiences confirm that events that happen during heightened states of emotion such as fear, anger and joy are far more memorable than less dramatic occurrences. In a report this week in Cell, Johns Hopkins researchers and their collaborators at Cold Spring Harbor and New York University have identified the likely biological basis for this: a hormone released during emotional arousal “primes” nerve cells to remember events by increasing their chemical sensitivity at sites where nerves rewire to form new memory circuits. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_04_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_04_07.html Johns Hopkins researchers say they have figured out how human and all animal cells tune in to a key signal, one that literally transmits the instructions that shape their final bodies. It turns out the cells assemble their own little radio antenna on their surfaces to help them relay the proper signal to the developmental proteins “listening” on the inside of the cell. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_03a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_03a_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have found that high-normal uric acid (UA) levels may cause barely detectable mini strokes that potentially contribute to mental decline in aging adults. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_01a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_01a_07.html A popular prostate cancer treatment called androgen deprivation therapy may encourage prostate cancer cells to produce a protein that makes them more likely to spread throughout the body, a new study by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_01_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/10_01_07.html Johns Hopkins’ McKusick-Nathans Institute of Genetic Medicine is one of two gene-hunting facilities in the nation to win a new $11.7 million four-year federal grant to rigorously sort out how such environmental factors as diet, exercise, stress and addictions interact with people’s individual genetic makeup to affect their risk for disorders as wide-ranging as cancer, diabetes, tooth decay and heart disease. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_25a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_25a_07.html Scientists at Johns Hopkins have developed a mouse model for schizophrenia in which a mutated gene linked to schizophrenia can be turned on or off at will. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_10a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_10a_07.html Nearly 30 years after Nobel laureate Linus Pauling famously and controversially suggested that vitamin C supplements can prevent cancer, a team of Johns Hopkins scientists have shown that in mice at least, vitamin C - and potentially other antioxidants - can indeed inhibit the growth of some tumors ? just not in the manner suggested by years of investigation. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_10_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_10_07.html How the gene that has been pegged as a major risk factor for schizophrenia and other mood disorders that affect millions of Americans contributes to these diseases remains unclear. However, the results of a new study by Hopkins researchers and their colleagues, appearing in Cell this week, provide a big clue by showing what this gene does in normal adult brains. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_07_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_07_07.html Mandatory classes that aim to improve the quality of medical care seem to successfully teach doctors new concepts but don’t necessarily improve patient outcomes, suggests a thorough review of articles that examine quality improvement (QI) curricula. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_05_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/09_05_07.html Researchers from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center and Cambridge University in England have designed an automated means of continuously tracking potentially dangerous changes in blood flow to the brain in real time, a system that shows promise for preventing brain damage and death in children with head injuries. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=394 http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=394 The Johns Hopkins scientist who first showed that the absence of the protein myostatin leads to oversized muscles in mice and men has now found a second protein, follistatin, whose overproduction in mice lacking myostatin doubles the muscle-building effect. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_29_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_29_07.html ---- Some biochemical processes, especially those in bacteria, have been so well studied it’s assumed that no discoveries are left to be made. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_24_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_24_07.html ---- Tests in chinchillas show promise for treating long-term unsteadiness and blurry vision. Hearing and balance experts at Johns Hopkins report successful testing in animals of an electrical device that partly restores a damaged or impaired sense of balance. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_06a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_06a_07.html --Researchers at Johns Hopkins have found a way to overcome a major stumbling block to developing successful insulin-cell transplants for people with type I diabetes. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_06_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_06_07.html --Johns Hopkins researchers have genetically engineered the first mouse that models both the anatomical and behavioral defects of schizophrenia, a complex and debilitating brain disorder that affects over 2 million Americans. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_02a_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_02a_07.html --When quizzed about their knowledge in diagnosing tuberculosis and deciding on the best treatment, medical residents in Baltimore and Philadelphia get almost half the answers wrong, according to a survey by TB disease experts at Johns Hopkins and elsewhere. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_02_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/08_02_07.html --A 5-year-old with abdominal pain, nausea and fever may have appendicitis or any of a number of other problems. But how does the child’s doctor decide whether to schedule an emergency appendectomy to surgically remove a presumably inflamed appendix — a procedure that carries its own risks like any surgery — or wait and observe what could be a ticking time bomb that could rupture and kill the patient in a matter of hours? http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=392 http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=392 --Infants and young children living in Baltimore's inner-city homes are at risk for serious perils, including fires, falls and poisoning, according to a small but revealing study from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=391 http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=391 --A type 2 diabetes drug taken orally and in widespread use for more than a decade has been found to have distinct advantages over nine other, mostly newer medications used to control the chronic disease, according to a study by researchers at Johns Hopkins. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/07_24_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/07_24_07.html --persistent changes in "slow" nerve currents may also link memory and addiction. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/07_18_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/07_18_07.html -- Johns Hopkins researchers have added to the growing mound of evidence that many of the genetic bits and pieces that drive evolutionary changes do not confer any advantages or disadvantages to humans or other animals. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/07_17_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/07_17_07.html -- Doctors urge caution in diagnosis based on test results http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=389 http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=389 -- Discovery explains why anticancer vaccines mostly fail http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/07_16_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/07_16_07.html Study identified risks for co-infected patients about taking entecavir. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/06_20_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/06_20_07.html Searching for less invasive screening tests for cancer, Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered proteins present in blood that accurately identify colon cancer and precancerous polyps. http://www.hopkinskimmelcancercenter.org/news/archive_details.cfm?documentid=897 http://www.hopkinskimmelcancercenter.org/news/archive_details.cfm?documentid=897 Johns Hopkins researchers have found a way to directly observe cell migration -- in real time and in living tissue. In a report in the June 5 issue of Developmental Cell, the scientists say their advance could lead to strategies for controlling both normal growth and the spread of cancer, processes that depend on the programmed, organized movement of cells across space http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/06_08_07.html http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/06_08_07.html Like hobos on a train, HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, uses a pre-existing transport system to leave one infected cell and infect new ones, Hopkins scientists have discovered. Their findings, published in the June issue of Plos Biology, counter the prevailing belief that HIV and other retroviruses can only leave and enter cells by virus-specific mechanisms. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/06_04_07.html A team of biomedical engineers has developed a computer model that makes use of more or less predictable “guesstimates” of human muscle movements to explain how the brain draws on both what it recently learned and what it’s known for some time to anticipate what it needs to develop new motor skills. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/06_01_07.html Scientists at Johns Hopkins have discovered one way the p53 gene does what it's known for-stopping the colon cancer cells. Their report will be published in the June 8 issue of Molecular Cell. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/05_31_07.html The simple notion of copying the bodys own natural waste disposal chemistry to mop up potentially toxic nitrogen has saved an estimated 80 percent of patients with urea cycle disorders --- most of them children - according to a report in this weeks New England Journal of Medicine summarizing a quarter century of experience with the treatment. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/05_30_07.html Studying a rare inherited syndrome, researchers at Johns Hopkins have found that cancer cells can reprogram themselves to turn down their own energy-making machinery and use less oxygen, and that these changes might help cancer cells survive and spread. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/05_07a_07.html Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered to their surprise that nerves in the mammalian brain’s white matter do more than just ferry information between different brain regions, but in fact process information the way gray matter cells do. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/05_07_07.html Throughout May — stroke awareness month — Johns Hopkins Children’s Center neurologists are sounding the alarm for parents about a common myth: that children don’t suffer strokes. In fact, nearly 3,200 children have so-called brain attacks each year, and half of them end up with permanent neurological damage, according to Lori Jordan, M.D. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=384 Hopkins researchers have identified a backup supply of stem cells that can repair the most severe damage to the nerves responsible for our sense of smell. These reservists normally lie around and do nothing, but when neighboring cells die, the scientists say, the stem cells jump into action. A report on the discovery will appear online next week in Nature Neuroscience. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_29_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered to their surprise that a drug commonly used to treat toenail fungus can also block angiogenesis, the growth of new blood vessels commonly seen in cancers. The drug, itraconazole, already is FDA approved for human use, which may fast-track its availability as an antiangiogenesis drug. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_26a_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered that the same ingredient used in dandruff shampoos to fight the burning, itching and flaking on your head also can calm overexcited nerve cells inside your head, making it a potential treatment for seizures. Results of the study can be found online in Nature Chemical Biology. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_26b_07.html New studies of a blood protein recently identified at Johns Hopkins, early prostate cancer antigen-2 (EPCA-2), may change the way men are screened for prostate cancer - a disease that kills tens of thousands of men every year. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_26_07.html A Johns Hopkins team has stopped in its tracks a form of blood cancer in mice by engineering and inactivating an enzyme, telomerase, thereby shortening the ends of chromosomes, called telomeres. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_25_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins took advantage of a new technique that reads the makeup of proteins to identify nearly all chemical changes nature makes by adding phosphate to proteins manufactured in human cells. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_23_07.html Infection control and critical care experts at The Johns Hopkins Hospital have ordered testing for the two most common hospital superbugs for every child admitted to its pediatric intensive care unit. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_16_07.html A Johns Hopkins study of adult patients admitted to The Johns Hopkins Hospital showed that patients who resided in nursing homes or other kinds of long-term care facilities at any time within the last six months were far more likely than other adult patients to carry or be infected with a drug-resistant superbug http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_16a_07.html People with a family history of pancreas cancer now have a way to accurately predict their chance of carrying a gene for hereditary pancreas cancer and their lifetime risk of developing the disease. Developed by Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center researchers, the novel computer software tool is designed to help genetic counselors and physicians decide who would most benefit from early screening. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_16b_07.html Working with fruit flies, scientists at Johns Hopkins have discovered a protein required for two neighboring cells to fuse and become one “super cell.” http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_10_07.html Spring is here, the sky is blue, the grass is green and it’s time to give that lawn a trim. But beware: Lawn mower injuries are a seasonal threat to children and the leading cause of amputations in adolescents, say specialists from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, Maryland’s designated pediatric trauma center where the most severe injuries are treated. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=381 Engineers at the Johns Hopkins Urology Robotics Lab report the invention of a motor without metal or electricity that can safely power remote-controlled robotic medical devices used for cancer biopsies and therapies guided by magnetic resonance imaging. The motor that drives the devices can be so precisely controlled by computer that movements are steadier and more precise than a human hand. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_06_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered how cells fine-tune their oxygen use to make do with whatever amount is available at the moment. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_05b_07.html Researchers at Johns Hopkins may have discovered an unintended benefit in the drugs millions of Americans take to lower their cholesterol: The medications, all statins, seem to lower the risk of a potentially lethal blood infection known as sepsis in patients on kidney dialysis. The study is published in the current issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/04_05a_07.html Research led by specialists at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center has found that teenage boys who hold some traditional beliefs about what it means to be a “real man” can undermine their sexual health and good preventive care in general. Their report, in the April edition of Pediatrics, is the result of a nationwide study believed to be the first linking teens’ beliefs about manhood to their use of health care services. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=380 Researchers at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and its Donald W. Reynolds Cardiovascular Clinical Research Center have been awarded $12.6 million in additional funding from its original namesake, the Las Vegas-based Donald W. Reynolds Foundation, to continue studies into the causes of sudden cardiac death. More than 300,000 Americans die each year when the heart suddenly stops pumping blood, triggered by an electrical disturbance in the heart. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_28_07.html Generally healthy African Americans may be at higher risk of heart failure because of racial variations in heart muscle’s pumping ability, a Johns Hopkins study suggests. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_26c_07.html Diabetes and high blood pressure, two conditions rooted in genetics and environmental surroundings, play a much greater role than race alone in determining who is mostly likely to develop heart failure, according to the latest study from cardiologists at Johns Hopkins. Each year, nearly 300,000 Americans die from heart failure. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_27_07.html Johns Hopkins Medicine has installed for three months of initial safety and clinical testing a 256-slice computed tomography (CT) scanner, believed to be the world’s most advanced CT imaging software and machinery. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_26b_07.html Contrary to widespread belief, total surgical replacement of arthritic shoulder joints carries no greater risk of complications than replacement of other major joints, a Johns Hopkins study suggests. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_26_07.html In a first of its kind study, researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine have developed a new technique that transports therapeutic stem cells in a multilayer microcapsule that not only protects the cells from being attacked by the body's immune system but also enables them to be seen on X-ray. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_25_07.html Researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and their colleagues have found that mice simply expressing a human light receptor in addition to their own can acquire new color vision, a sign that the brain can adapt far more rapidly to new sensory information than anticipated. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_22_07.html Scientists’ inability to follow the whereabouts of cells injected into the human body has long been a major drawback in developing effective medical therapies. Now, researchers at Johns Hopkins have developed a promising new technique for noninvasively tracking where living cells go after they are put into the body. The new technique, which uses genetically encoded cells producing a natural contrast that can be viewed using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), appears much more effective than present methods used to detect injected biomaterials. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_20_07.html Johns Hopkins University and a consortium of seven other leading U.S. scientific and medical institutions today warned Congress that persistent flat funding of biomedical research could thwart advances in treatments for such diseases as cancer and Alzheimer’s disease, and erode U.S. dominance in science. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_19_07.html "Kidney disease occurs more often than we think, but it is also more treatable than we used to think, especially when caught early,” says Barbara Fivush, M.D., director of nephrology at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. “Children and adolescents should be monitored carefully because kidney disease that seems to suddenly strike young adults often has its roots in childhood.” http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=378 Johns Hopkins emergency medicine specialists have developed a tool to help hospitals prepare for disasters with the potential to overwhelm services. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/03_06a_07.html A Johns Hopkins study has proven false established medical practice that an antiretroviral drug widely used to treat hepatitis B liver infections was safe to use on its own in patients co-infected with HIV. Their findings demonstrate that treatment with entecavir leads to cross-resistance to other antiviral drugs used to treat the AIDS virus. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_28_07.html In the first genome-wide search for the genetic roots of the most common form of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), Johns Hopkins scientists have newly identified 34 unique variations in the human genetic code among 276 unrelated subjects with ALS. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_20b_07.html A Johns Hopkins-led study has found evidence that a genetic tendency toward suicide has been linked to a particular area of the genome on chromosome 2 that has been implicated in two additional recent studies of attempted suicide. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_19_07.html By first probing the way primitive yeast make cholesterol, a team of scientists has discovered a long-sought protein whose human counterpart controls cholesterol production and potentially drug metabolism. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_16_07.html Biomedical scientists at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have won a $750,000 NASA grant to design the prototype for a mini mass spectrometer that fits on a Mars Rover and can analyze the chemicals of life as it crawls over the Red Planet’s dust. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_14_07.html Johns Hopkins cardiologists are calling for an expansion of the criteria widely used by physicians to detect and assess a postmenopausal woman’s chances of developing cardiovascular disease, the leading cause of death among women in the United States. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_13a_07.html Sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) – the leading cause of death in infants under 1 year of age – can happen at any time. But parents and caregivers should be extra careful during the cold winter months, when the flu and other infections and the urge to bundle up babies extra warmly increase the risk of SIDS, say experts from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. http://www.hopkinschildrens.org/pages/news/pressdetails.cfm?newsid=373 Human nerve stem cells transplanted into rats’ damaged spinal cords have survived, grown and in some cases connected with the rats’ own spinal cord cells in a Johns Hopkins laboratory, overturning the long-held notion that spinal cords won’t allow nerve repair. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_13_07.html Johns Hopkins brain scientists have hit on how and why some powerful drugs used for treating mental illnesses cause patients to gain so much weight that they often develop life-threatening complications such as diabetes and heart disease. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_12_07.html Millions of middle-aged and older men experience the symptoms of an enlarged prostate multiple times during the day and night. What they may not know is that the disease known as BPH (benign prostatic hyperplasia), marked by urgency and frequent urination, is not one but at least a pair of disorders, and that one of the pair ― tied to a newly identified gene ― has far more serious implications. http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/Press_releases/2007/02_05_07.html PLEASE UPDATE YOUR NEWS AGGREGATORS TO POINT TO: http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/RSS/HopkinsRSS.xml http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/RSS/HopkinsRSS.xml