Johns Hopkins Children’s Center cardiologist Allen Everett recently won more than $460,000 in stimulus grant funding to identify the biomarkers of idiopathic pulmonary hypertension (IPH), a progressive and highly lethal condition in children and adults marked by persistently elevated pressure in the artery that carries blood from the heart to the lungs.

From a lethal distraction for drivers to dehumanizing personal interactions, text messaging has gotten a bum rap lately. But for doctors treating patients with chronic diseases, text messaging can be an invaluable tool, according to Johns Hopkins Children’s Center pediatrician Delphine Robotham.

By combining a research technique that dates back 136 years with modern molecular genetics, a Johns Hopkins neuroscientist has been able to see how a mammal’s brain shrewdly revisits and reuses the same molecular cues to control the complex design of its circuits.

Spinal cord disorders like spina bifida arise during early development when future spinal cord cells growing in a flat layer fail to roll up into a tube. In the Dec. 6 issue of Nature Cell Biology, researchers from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine team with colleagues at the University of California, Berkeley to report a never-before known link between protein transport and mouse spinal cord development, a discovery that opens new doors for research on all spinal defects.

Researchers led by specialists at the Johns Hopkins Wilmer Eye Institute have found that injecting a corticosteroid, triamcinolone, directly into the eye may slow the progression of proliferative diabetic retinopathy, a complication of diabetes that frequently leads to blindness.

Scratching below the surface of a troublesome sensation that’s equal parts tingle-tickle-prickle, sensory scientists from Johns Hopkins have discovered in mice a molecular basis for nonallergic itch.

Seven Johns Hopkins researchers from four of the university’s schools have been elected by their peers as fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

The well-worn notion that patients in the United States have unfettered access to the most expensive cancer drugs while the United Kingdom’s nationalized health care system regularly denies access to some high-cost treatments needs rethinking, a team of bioethicists and health policy experts says in a report out today.

Genes that don’t themselves directly affect the inherited characteristics of an organism but leave them increasingly open to variation may be a significant driving force of evolution, say two Johns Hopkins scientists. 

Results of a preliminary study by scientists at the National Institutes of Health and Johns Hopkins show that "mini" stem cell transplantation may safely reverse severe sickle cell disease in adults.

Blood vessel blockage, a common condition in old age or diabetes, leads to low blood flow and results in low oxygen, which can kill cells and tissues. Such blockages can require amputation resulting in loss of limbs. Now, using mice as their model, researchers at Johns Hopkins have developed therapies that increase blood flow, improve movement and decrease tissue death and the need for amputation. The findings, published online last week in the early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, hold promise for developing clinical therapies.

Infection with the H1N1 virus, or swine flu, causes more life-threatening complications than seasonal flu in children with sickle cell disease, according to research from Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. The findings, to be presented on Dec. 7 at the annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology, warn parents and caregivers that such children are more likely to need emergency treatment and stays in an intensive-care unit.

The body is a battle zone. Cells constantly compete with one another for space and dominance. Though the manner in which some cells win this competition is well known to be the survival of the fittest, how stem cells duke it out for space and survival is not as clear. A study on fruit flies published in the October 2 issue of Science by Johns Hopkins researchers describes how stem cells win this battle by literally sticking around.

Working with mice, scientists at Johns Hopkins publishing in the December issue of Neoplasia have shown that a protein made by a gene called “Twist” may be the proverbial red flag that can accurately distinguish stem cells that drive aggressive, metastatic breast cancer from other breast cancer cells.

Repeated use of the drug popularly known as “ecstasy” significantly raises the risk of developing sleep apnea in otherwise healthy young adults with no other known risk factors for the sleep disturbance, a new study by Johns Hopkins scientists suggests. The finding is the latest highlighting the potential dangers of the amphetamine-style chemical, currently used illegally by millions of people in the United States.

Flu experts at The Johns Hopkins Hospital have received confirmation from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DHMH) that two recently treated patients with 2009 H1N1 flu, both since discharged, had drug-resistant forms of the virus.

Medical students are commonly stuck by needles — putting them at risk of contracting potentially dangerous blood-borne diseases — and many of them fail to report the injuries to hospital authorities, according to a Johns Hopkins study published in the December issue of the journal Academic Medicine.

A protein known to stimulate blood vessel growth has now been found to be responsible for the cell overgrowth in the development of polyps that characterize one of the most severe forms of sinusitis, a study by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests. The finding gives scientists a new target for developing novel therapies to treat this form of the disease, which typically resists all current treatments.

The Johns Hopkins Medicine community mourns the sudden death of cardiologist Kenneth L. Baughman, M.D., who was killed in an accident Monday while running in Orlando, Fla. He was attending the annual Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association, and had attempted to cross a street when a car struck him.

Spot blood pressure readings in children with chronic kidney disease often fail to detect hypertension – even during doctor’s office visits — increasing a child’s risk for serious heart problems, according to research from Johns Hopkins Children’s Center and other institutions. A report of the findings appears online in the Journal of American Society of Nephrology.

Surgeons who are burned out or depressed are more likely to say they had recently committed a major error on the job, according to the largest study to date on physician burnout. The new findings suggest that the mental well-being of the surgeon is associated with a higher rate of self-reported medical errors, something that may undermine patient safety more than the fatigue that is often blamed for many of the medical mistakes.

Asthma symptoms can worsen in children with depressed mothers, according to research from Johns Hopkins Children’s Center published online in the Journal of Pediatric Psychology.

Scientists at Johns Hopkins and their colleagues have developed sugar-coated polymer strands that selectively kill off cells involved in triggering aggressive allergy and asthma attacks. Their advance is a significant step toward crafting pharmaceuticals to fight these often life-endangering conditions in a new way.

The routine prescription of extended-release niacin, a B vitamin (1,500 milligrams daily), in combination with traditional cholesterol-lowering therapy offers no extra benefit in correcting arterial narrowing and diminishing plaque buildup in seniors who already have coronary artery disease, a new vascular imaging study from Johns Hopkins experts shows.

Be prepared, that old Boy Scout motto, is being applied with great success to operating room patients whose anatomy may make it difficult for physicians to help them breathe during surgery, Johns Hopkins researchers report in a new study.

Several leaders at the Johns Hopkins Avon Foundation Breast Center have issued a statement regarding the new mammography screening guidelines suggested by the United States Preventive Task Force Service.

Healthy, older adults free of heart disease need not fear that bouts of rapid, irregular heartbeats brought on by vigorous exercise might increase short- or long-term risk of dying or having a heart attack, according to a report by heart experts at Johns Hopkins and the U.S. National Institute on Aging (NIA).

Women more at risk than men; risk particularly high in those with visual symptoms Pooling results from 21 studies, involving 622,381 men and women, researchers at Johns Hopkins have affirmed that migraine headaches are associated with more than twofold higher chances of the most common kind of stroke: those occurring when blood supply to the brain is suddenly cut off by the buildup of plaque or a blood clot.

Heart experts at Johns Hopkins are calling premature the early halt of a study by researchers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and Washington Hospital Center on the benefits of combining extended-release niacin, a B vitamin, with cholesterol-lowering statin medications to prevent blood vessel narrowing. Cardiovascular atherosclerosis, as it is also known, is believed responsible for one in three deaths in the United States each year.

A team of U.S., Canadian and Italian scientists led by researchers at Johns Hopkins report evidence from studies in animals and humans supporting a link between Alzheimer’s disease and chronic heart failure, two of the 10 leading causes of death in the United States.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins are reporting what is believed to be the first conclusive evidence in men that the long-term ill effects of vitamin D deficiency are amplified by lower levels of the key sex hormone estrogen, but not testosterone

To best detect early signs of life-threatening heart defects in young athletes, screening programs should include both popular diagnostic tests, not just one of them, according to new research from heart experts at Johns Hopkins.

Military personnel evacuated out of Iraq and Afghanistan because of back pain are unlikely to return to the line of duty regardless of the treatment they receive, according to research led by a Johns Hopkins pain management specialist.

Drugs sometimes have beneficial side effects. A glaucoma treatment causes luscious eyelashes. A blood pressure drug also aids those with a rare genetic disease. The newest surprise discovered by researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine is a gonorrhea medication that might help battle cancer.

JOHNS HOPKINS KIMMEL CANCER CENTER TO HOST VOLUNTEER CONCERT FOR PATIENTS & FAMILIES

A study at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center found that girls diagnosed with pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) who watched a short educational video were three times more likely to discuss their condition with their partners and to ensure partner treatment than girls diagnosed and treated without seeing the film.

The same genes that are chemically altered during normal cell differentiation, as well as when normal cells become cancer cells, are also changed in stem cells that scientists derive from adult cells, according to new research from Johns Hopkins and Harvard.

Saturated fats have a deservedly bad reputation, but Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered that a sticky lipid occurring naturally at high levels in the brain may help us memorize grandma’s recipe for cinnamon buns, as well as recall how, decades ago, she served them up steaming from the oven.

Like all tissues in the body, the eye needs a healthy blood supply to function properly. Poorly developed blood vessels can lead to visual impairment or even blindness. While many of the molecules involved in guiding the development of the intricate blood vessel architecture are known, only now are we learning how these molecules work and how they might affect sight.

Lack of health insurance might have led or contributed to nearly 17,000 deaths among hospitalized children in the United States in the span of less than two decades, according to research led by the Johns Hopkins Children's

Since the completion of the human genome sequence, a question has baffled researchers studying gene control: How is it that humans, being far more complex than the lowly yeast, do not proportionally contain in our genome significantly more gene-control proteins

Pregnant women who catch the flu are at serious risk for flu-related complications, including death, and that risk far outweighs the risk of possible side effects from injectable vaccines containing killed virus, according to an extensive review of published research and data from previous flu seasons.

The recent creation of live mice from induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) not only represents a remarkable scientific achievement, but also raises important issues, according to bioethicists at the Berman Institute of Bioethics.

After decades of focusing on the management of respiratory failure, circulatory shock and severe infections that lead to extended stays in hospital intensive care units, critical care researchers are increasingly turning attention to what they believe is a treatable complication developed by many who spend days or weeks confined to an ICU bed: debilitating muscle weakness that can linger long after hospital discharge.

Johns Hopkins scientists report having used a commercially available drug to successfully “rescue” animal brain cells that they had intentionally damaged by manipulating a newly discovered gene that links susceptibility genes for schizophrenia and autism.

Deep in the ear, 95 percent of the cells that shuttle sound to the brain are big, boisterous neurons that, to date, have explained most of what scientists know about how hearing works. Whether a rare, whisper-small second set of cells also carry signals from the inner ear to the brain and have a real role in processing sound has been a matter of debate.

TOP LOCAL ELECTED OFFICIALS HEADLINE LIST OF CELEBRITY BAGGERS AT SAFEWAY STORES THIS MONTH

Doctors have less respect for their obese patients than they do for patients of normal weight, a new study by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests. The findings raise questions about whether negative physician attitudes about obesity could be affecting the long-term health of their heavier patients.

Johns Hopkins scientists have been awarded a $3.7 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to learn more about the nerve and muscle-wasting disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) using stem cells developed from ALS patients’ skin. The award, given over a two-year span, will be shared with three other laboratories, including one at Harvard University and two at Columbia University.

More than a century ago, Johns Hopkins revolutionized the teaching of medicine with a new curriculum that merged evidence-based science with patient-centered clinical care. This so-called Hopkins model became the national gold standard for modern medical education.

• GETTING TO THE ROOT OF MENTAL ILLNESS
• RECEPTORS, SYNAPSES AND MEMORIES: RICHARD HUGANIR, PH.D
• SPEEDING DISCOVERY: THE NOSE KNOWS
• NERVE TRANSPLANTS AS POSSIBLE TREATMENT FOR ALS-RELATED FOR ALS-RELATED RESPIRATORY
• GINGKO DELIVERS STRIKE FOR STROKE

Two Johns Hopkins Children’s Center researchers have assembled a 25-member editorial board of international experts to launch a quarterly online medical journal devoted to original research and commentary on the use of computer automation in the day-to-day practice of medicine.

David E. Tunkel, M.D., director of the Division of Pediatric Otolaryngology at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center and associate professor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, has received the Distinguished Service Award of the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery (AAO-HNS).

Hispanic children diagnosed with brain tumors get high-quality treatment at hospitals that specialize in neurosurgery far less often than other children with the same condition, potentially compromising their immediate prognosis and long-term survival, according to research from Johns Hopkins published in October’s Pediatrics.

For the 14th straight year, the National Research Corporation (NRC) has given The Johns Hopkins Hospital its Consumer Choice Award for the Baltimore region. For 2009-2010, Hopkins also was rated as the top choice by consumers in the Bethesda, Md., area. The award is based on ratings from health care consumers, who assessed hospital standings based on four metrics: best overall quality, best image/reputation; best doctors, and best nurses.

Sequencing the human genome was just one step in understanding our biology: Researchers still know very little about the function of most of our DNA. Now, a team of researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine has been awarded $1 million in stimulus funding to examine how certain mobile segments of DNA known as transposons contribute to human genetic diversity by mapping transposon locations in more than 100 people over the next two years.

Hispanic children diagnosed with brain tumors get high-quality treatment at hospitals that specialize in neurosurgery far less often than other children with the same condition, potentially compromising their immediate prognosis and long-term survival, according to research from Johns Hopkins published in October’s Pediatrics.

Experts in emergency medicine, infectious diseases and pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center and the University of Maryland Hospital for Children will host an update on H1N1 flu advice for parents in the wake of a sharp increase in cases since the last week of August.

Before and after delivery, the mothers of unborn babies prenatally diagnosed with severe birth defects want doctors to walk a fine line between giving them realistic information-no matter how grim the prognosis-and giving them hope for the best possible outcome.

About 90 percent of autism spectrum disorders have suspected genetic causes but few genes have been identified so far. Now, leading an international team, Johns Hopkins researchers have identified several genetic links to autism, chief among them a variant of semaphorin 5A, whose protein product controls nerve connections in the brain.

Carol Greider, Ph.D., 48, one of the world’s pioneering researchers on the structure of chromosome ends known as telomeres, today was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. The Academy recognized her for her 1984 discovery of telomerase (ta-LAW-mer-ace), an enzyme that maintains the length and integrity of chromosome ends and is critical for the health and survival of all living cells and organisms.
MEDIA ADVISORY

Infection control experts at Johns Hopkins and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control report that a contentious debate in the medical community over what type of protective masks health workers should wear to prevent the spread of H1N1 and other flu viruses is dangerously distracting the health care community from focusing on simple prevention measures that are clearly known to work.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has awarded $10.4 million to Johns Hopkins and The University of Southern California (USC) to decipher epigenetic marks in the cancer genome. The joint five-year grant is expected to help scientists develop drugs and tests that target epigenetic changes in cancer cells.

Patient safety experts at Johns Hopkins and elsewhere are taking their prescription for avoiding medical errors in hospital care one step beyond already successful “no fault, no blame” approaches, calling now for penalties for doctors and nurses who fail to comply with proven safety measures.

Johns Hopkins has a wide range of experts available for interviews and comments about H1N1 and seasonal flu, emergency preparedness, infection control, transmission in children, vaccine safety, flu treatment, public health ethics, flu in cancer patients, and public communications strategies. If you would like to interview a Johns Hopkins expert, call or email the designated information officer in the list below. If you do not see an expert in your field of interest, contact Media Relations at 410-955-4288.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has awarded $10.4 million to Johns Hopkins and The University of Southern California (USC) to decipher epigenetic marks in the cancer genome.  The joint five-year grant is expected to help scientists develop drugs and tests that target epigenetic changes in cancer cells.

Funds will further research on genetic regulation’s role in diseases
Johns Hopkins’ Center for the Epigenetics of Common Human Disease has been chosen as one of four recipients of a $45 million National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant for Centers of Excellence to advance genomics research. The Hopkins Center will receive $16.8 million over five years.

A Johns Hopkins scientist who proposes to manipulate forces to activate enzymes in live cells, and a second researcher who has developed a way to hunt down tuberculosis germs with real-time imaging have received a total of $4 million in special awards from the National Institutes of Health.

Johns Hopkins Medicine, a co-host of the 2009 World Stem Cell Summit, is telling a comprehensive stem cell story via a new interactive Web site http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/stem_cell_research/ on which its researchers and clinicians collectively describe their explorations into stem cell biology and engineering.

After more than 50 experiments in mice, medical scientists at Johns Hopkins have mapped out the basic steps taken by a particular set of white blood cells in setting the pace of recovery after serious lung injury.

Robert A. Montgomery, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Johns Hopkins Comprehensive Transplant Center and 11 Johns Hopkins patients, who were part of the first eight-way, multihospital, domino kidney transplant this summer, will be featured on the new Dr. Oz Show.

Critical care experts at Johns Hopkins are reporting initial success in boosting recovery and combating muscle wasting among critically ill, mostly bed-bound patients using any one of a trio of mild physical therapy exercises during their stays in the intensive care unit (ICU).

In a small “proof of principle” study, stroke researchers at Johns Hopkins and the University of Illinois have found that a simple, one-minute eye movement exam performed at the bedside worked better than an MRI to distinguish new strokes from other less serious disorders in patients complaining of dizziness, nausea and spinning sensations.

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine have discovered how one antioxidant protein controls the activity of another protein, critical for the development of spinal cord neurons. The research, publishing this week in Cell, describes a never-before known mechanism of protein control.

More than seventy percent of people who contract Hepatitis C will live with the virus that causes it for the rest of their lives and some will develop serious liver disease including cancer. However, 30 to 40 percent of those infected somehow defeat the infection and get rid of the virus with no treatment. In this week’s Advanced Online Publication at?Nature, Johns Hopkins researchers working as part of an international team report the discovery of the strongest genetic alteration associated with the ability to get rid of the infection.

Some Baltimore traditions just keep getting bigger and better. That's certainly the case with this year's Johns Hopkins Best Dressed Sale and Boutique 2009, now in its 42nd year. Exclusive designer dresses and shoes, chic contemporary fashions, classic accessories and enduring vintage clothing will be on the racks, waiting for a favored place in the closets of bargain-conscious – but demanding – shoppers.

A committee of scientists led by Johns Hopkins investigators has published a new guide to the biology, diagnosis and treatment of lung cancer in never-smokers, fortifying measures for what physicians have long known is a very different disease than in smokers.

Every moment, millions of a body’s cells flawlessly divvy up their genes and pinch perfectly in half to form two identical progeny for the replenishment of tissues and organs — even as they collide, get stuck, and squeeze through infinitesimally small spaces that distort their shapes.

The Hedgehog signaling pathway is involved in a preliminary study and case report describing positive responses to an experimental anticancer drug in a majority of people with advanced or metastatic basal cell skin cancers. One patient with the most common type of pediatric brain cancer, medulloblastoma, also showed tumor shrinkage.

Giving critically ill hospital patients a daily bath with a mild, soapy solution of the same antibacterial agent used by surgeons to “scrub in” before an operation can dramatically cut down, by as much as 73 percent, the number of patients who develop potentially deadly bloodstream infections, according to a new study by patient safety experts at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and five other institutions.

Patients infected with a particular subtype of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, are more likely to develop dementia than patients with other subtypes, a study led by Johns Hopkins researchers shows.

Johns Hopkins’ Brain Tumor Center is one of the largest brain tumor treatment and research centers in the world. With specialists ranging from neurosurgeons, oncologists, and laboratory researchers currently developing new cutting edge treatments, Johns Hopkins can provide you with unique sources who can answer your timely questions about brain tumors.

Disclosure of financial conflicts of interests to potential participants in research is important, but may have a limited role in managing these conflicts, according to a new study by Johns Hopkins, Duke and Wake Forest.

Is it more urgent for hospitals, doctors and nurses to focus resources on preventing the thousands of falls that injure hospitalized patients each year, or to home in on preventing rare but dramatic instances of wrong-side surgery? Is it best to concentrate immediately on preventing pediatric medical errors or on preventing drug interactions in the elderly?

Johns Hopkins scientists say they have figured out how bacteria that cause diarrhea may also be the culprit in some colon cancers. The investigators say that strains of the common Bacteroides fragilis (ETBF) dupe immune system cells into permitting runaway colon tissue inflammation, a precursor for malignant growth.

Some children with a history of severe milk allergy can safely drink milk and consume other dairy products every day, according to research led by the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center and published in the Aug. 10 online edition of the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.

Nightly bouts of interrupted, oxygen-deprived sleep from a collapsed airway in the upper neck raises the chances of dying in middle-aged to elderly people by as much as 46 percent in the most severe cases, according to a landmark study on sleep apnea by lung experts at Johns Hopkins and six other U.S. medical centers.

The promise of stem cell therapy may lie in uncovering how adult cells revert back into a primordial, stem cell state , whose fate is yet to be determined. Now, cell scientists at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have identified key molecular players responsible for this reversion in fruit fly sperm cells. Reporting online this week in Cell Stem Cell, researchers show that two proteins are responsible redirecting cells on the way to becoming sperm back to stem cells.

Powerful cells located in same tissue location as bladder stem cells
Johns Hopkins scientists have tracked down a powerful set of cells in bladder tumors that seem to be primarily responsible for the cancer’s growth and spread using a technique that takes advantage of similarities between tumor and organ growth. The findings, reported in the July Stem Cells, could help scientists develop new ways of finding and attacking similar cells in other types of cancer.

John D. Strandberg, Distinguished Member of the American College of Veterinary Pathologists and former director of the Division of Comparative Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, passed away on Aug. 1 in St. Paul, Minn. after a long illness. He was 69.

Dietary sugar intake unlikely to have any impact, scientists caution

Brain scientists and cardiac surgeons at Johns Hopkins have evidence from 227 heart bypass surgery patients that long-term memory losses and cognitive problems they experience are due to the underlying coronary artery disease itself and not ill after-effects from having used a heart-lung machine.

Dr. Ruth Faden, director of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics, is available to discuss the ethical ramifications of this recommendation and other morally challenging dimensions of pandemic influenza, health care reform, and research involving pregnant women.

Four Johns Hopkins psychiatrists have been named “Top Therapists” in this month’s Washingtonian magazine. The list includes geriatric psychiatrist Peter V. Rabins, M.D., M.P.H.; eating disorders psychiatrist Angela S. Guarda, M.D.; general psychiatrist Todd S. Cox, M.D.; and child and adolescent psychiatrist Elizabeth A. Kastelic, M.D.

Hopkins experts in applied physics, computer engineering, infectious diseases, emergency medicine, microbiology, pathology and surgery have unveiled a 7-foot-tall, $10,000 shower-cubicle-shaped device that automatically sanitizes in 30 minutes all sorts of hard-to-clean equipment in the highly trafficked hospital emergency department. The novel device can sanitize and disinfect equipment of all shapes and sizes, from intravenous line poles and blood pressure cuffs, to pulse oximeter wires and electrocardiogram (EKG) wires, to computer keyboards and cellphones.

Nearly all species have some ability to detect light. At least three types of cells in the retina allow us to see images or distinguish between night and day. Now, researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine have discovered in fish yet another type of cell that can sense light and contribute to vision.

Results of a long-awaited study of 3,070 American adults at Johns Hopkins and 118 other U.S. medical centers show that treatment with either of the two standard antiviral drug therapies is safe and offers the best way for people infected with hepatitis C to prevent liver scarring, organ failure and death.

A study led by Johns Hopkins and Utah State University researchers suggests that a particularly close relationship with caregivers may give people with Alzheimer’s disease a marked edge over those without one in retaining mind and brain function over time. The beneficial effect of emotional intimacy that the researchers saw among participants was on par with some drugs used to treat the disease.

Johns Hopkins researchers have developed a novel way to monitor in real time the behavior of the TB bacterium in mouse lungs noninvasively pinpointing the exact location of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The new monitoring system is expected to speed up what is currently a slow and cumbersome process to test the safety and efficacy of various TB drug regimens and vaccines in animals. Plans are already under way for developing a similar system to monitor TB disease in humans.

Johns Hopkins Medicine is co-sponsoring the 2009 World Stem Cell Summit to be held in Baltimore this September.

July 17, 2009- Pablo A. Celnik, M.D., an assistant professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation and neurology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and Thao (Vicky) Nguyen, 32, assistant professor of mechanical engineering in the Whiting School of Engineering at The Johns Hopkins University, are among the 100 winners of this year’s Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE).

A new, intensive, one-year master’s degree program designed to prepare graduates for informatics leadership positions in clinical, public health and scientific settings will be offered beginning in September by the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. The Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC) approved the new program in June.

The Johns Hopkins Hospital has once again – for the 19th consecutive time -- earned the top spot in U.S. News & World Report’s annual rankings of more than 4,800 American hospitals, placing first in three medical specialties and in the top 16 in 13 others.

Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered a novel protein that can protect brain cells by interrupting a naturally occurring “stress cascade” resulting in cell death.

Surgeon John L. Cameron, M.D., for 19 years the surgeon in chief at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, is among the 2009 recipients of the Hope Funds Awards of Excellence in cancer research. He is being honored for decades of work refining the Whipple procedure, one of the most common surgical treatments for pancreatic cancer, work that has helped reduce postsurgery death rates from 25 percent to less than 5 percent.

Donald Small, M.D., Ph.D., a nationally recognized leader in the research and treatment of childhood blood cancers, has been selected to head the Pediatric Oncology Division of the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins.

A team of ethicists from Johns Hopkins, Duke and Georgetown universities is urging organizers of a recently begun $3 billion decades-long study of children’s health to immediately add provisions to look at the health and medical profiles of the children’s mothers during their pregnancies.

A Johns Hopkins veterinarian whose vocation is HIV research and avocation is the care of dog “athletes” has been named the 2009 Outstanding Woman Veterinarian of the Year by the Association for Women Veterinarians Foundation.

Donates $35,000 to Johns Hopkins' Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center to Support Childhood Cancer Research

Infants and young children treated with heart drugs get the wrong dose or end up on the wrong end of medication errors more often than older children, according to research led by the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center to be published July 6 in Pediatrics.

Surgical teams at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, INTEGRIS Baptist Medical Center in Oklahoma City and Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit successfully completed the first eight-way, multihospital, domino kidney transplant. The transplant involved eight donors — 3 men and 5 women along with eight organ recipients — 3 men and 5 women.

More than 40 scientists, bioethicists, lawyers and science journal editors are calling on their colleagues, policy makers and the public to begin developing guidelines for the research and reproductive use of stem cell-derived eggs and sperm, even though such use may be a decade or more away.

Ahead of schedule, officials of Suburban Hospital Healthcare System (SHHS) and The Johns Hopkins Health System Corporation completed and signed documents on June 30, 2009, officially integrating the Montgomery County-based SHHS into the Johns Hopkins Health System (JHHS). Under terms of the transaction, which does not involve any financial exchange, SHHS becomes a wholly owned subsidiary corporation of JHHS and a member of Johns Hopkins Medicine (JHM), while retaining its commitment to the local community and community physicians. The SHHS name is not expected to change at this time, and both leadership and day-to-day operations at Suburban will remain the same.

Cancer experts at Johns Hopkins say a study tracking 774 prostate cancer patients for a median of eight years has shown that a three-way combination of measurements has the best chance yet of predicting disease metastasis.

Tuberculosis (TB) experts at Johns Hopkins have evidence from a four-year series of experiments in mice that anti-inflammatory drugs could eventually prove effective in treating the highly contagious lung disease, adding to current antibiotic therapies.

The same bee and other insect venom shots that doctors use to prevent deadly systemic reactions to insect stings can also tone down large local allergic reactions that, while not dangerous, can be painful and inconvenient, a Johns Hopkins study shows. Results of the study are published in the June 2009?Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.

A dogged review of the medical literature has produced what is believed to be the nation's first comprehensive estimate of the extent of dozens of endocrine disorders in the United States.

Phase II study showed effects of short-term green tea use on prostate cancer, Green tea reduced incidence, progression of prostate cancer, Right combination of polyphenols can slow prostate cancer growth

Having partnered last year with an international team that surveyed the genomes of 12,000 individuals to find a genetic cause for gout, Johns Hopkins scientists now have shown that the malfunctioning gene they helped uncover can lead to high concentrations of blood urate that forms crystals in joint tissue, causing inflammation and pain — the hallmark of this disease.

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine have successfully edited the genome of human- induced pluripotent stem cells, making possible the future development of patient-specific stem cell therapies. Reporting this week in Cell Stem Cell, the team altered a gene responsible for causing the rare blood disease paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria, or PNH, establishing for the first time a useful system to learn more about the disease

The most popular type of gastric bypass surgery appears to nearly?double the chance that a patient will develop kidney stones, despite earlier assumptions that it would not, Johns Hopkins doctors report in a new study. The overall risk, however, remains fairly small at about 8 percent.

A previously healthy teenager shows up at the doctor’s office with a sore throat, fever, aches and general malaise. Routine blood tests are normal, an HIV test comes back negative, and the pediatrician sends the patient home with a diagnosis of acute viral infection.

Johns Hopkins Children’s Center is among the top ten children’s hospitals in the nation, according to U.S. News & World Report’s annual rankings of American children’s hospitals. This year, the 2009 America's Best Children's Hospitals included an “Honor Roll” of 10 pediatric hospitals in no particular order that ranked in all 10 specialties. Hopkins Children’s is among the ten best.

Scientists at Johns Hopkins have discovered a potential strategy for cancer therapy by focusing on what’s missing in tumors.

Our ability to form long-term memories depends on cells in the brain making strong connections with each other. Yet while it’s not well understood how those connections are made, lost or changed, the process is known to involve the movement of the AMPA receptor protein to and from those neuronal connections

The Wilmer Eye Institute at Johns Hopkins will celebrate the end of construction of the new Wilmer building at The Johns Hopkins Hospital with a one-hour ceremony and ribbon cutting, starting at 11 a.m., on Wednesday, June 10.

Johns Hopkins HealthCare LLC (JHHC), the managed care arm of Johns Hopkins Medicine (JHM), has signed an agreement with The Winkenwerder Company LLC for strategic consulting services, a move designed to build on and expand Johns Hopkins’ longstanding relationships with government health agencies.

Johns Hopkins brain scientists have figured out why a faulty protein accumulates in cells everywhere in the bodies of people with Huntington’s disease (HD), but only kills cells in the part of the brain that controls movement, causing negligible damage to tissues elsewhere. The answer, reported this week in Science, lies in one tiny protein called “Rhes” that’s found only in the part of the brain that controls movement. The findings, according to the Hopkins scientists, explain the unique pattern of brain damage in HD and its symptoms, as well as offer a strategy for new therapy.

In what is believed to be the first U.S. study designed to prevent anxiety disorders in the children of anxious parents, researchers at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center have found that a family-based program reduced symptoms and the risk of developing an anxiety disorder among these children.

An evening of opera music featuring Metropolitan opera star Denyise Graves was held recently to raise funds to benefit organ transplant surgery research and care at Johns Hopkins. The event, titled “Let the Music Move You,” was attended by 70 guests at Graves’ home in Bethesda, Md.

A documentary history of long-time Johns Hopkins patient Cody Unser, the daughter and granddaughter of Indy 500 car racing greats, will premiere at a benefit June 2 at the Hershey Theater in Hershey, Pa. The event is hosted by Mario Andretti and his wife Dee Ann. Andretti is the only driver to win the Indianapolis 500, the Daytona 500 and the Formula One World Championship.

The Ethisphere Institute, a New York-based think-tank established to advance best practices in business ethics and corporate social responsibility, has named The Johns Hopkins Hospital to its 2009 list of the business world’s most ethical companies and institutions.

A TV industry- and celebrity-driven cancer research project has chosen scientists at Johns Hopkins for two of five multi-institutional “dream teams” financed by “Stand Up to Cancer “ grants totaling more than $6 million.

A full third of American adults, 69 million men and women over age 40, are up to 12 times more likely to have a serious fall because they have some form of inner-ear dysfunction that throws them off balance and makes them dizzy, according to Johns Hopkins experts.

For the second year in a row, volunteer heart disease experts from Johns Hopkins will staff and run Maryland’s only screening program to detect early signs of life-threatening heart abnormalities, including hypertrophic cardiomyopathies, in student athletes.

Come spend the day learning about the latest in sensory biology research at the Institute for Basic Biomedical Sciences of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Johns Hopkins Medicine’s patient safety program has earned second place in Healthcare Informatics magazine’s eighth annual Innovator Awards.

Denton A. Cooley, M.D., an American pioneer in heart surgery, will be the guest speaker at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine’s 114th convocation on Friday, May 22, 2009 at 10:30 a.m. at the Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall in Baltimore.

Research from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center exposes alarming gaps in training hospital residents in “first response” emergency treatment of staged cardiorespiratory arrests in children, while at the same time offering a potent recipe for fixing the problem.

Approximately 350 million to 500 million cases of malaria are diagnosed each year mostly in sub-Saharan Africa. While medications to prevent and treat malaria do exist, the demand for new treatments is on the rise, in part, because malaria parasites have developed a resistance to existing medications. Now, researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have discovered one way to stop malaria parasite growth, and this new finding could guide the development of new malaria treatments.

Research from the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center reveals that the drug most commonly used in type 2 diabetics who don’t need insulin works on a much more basic level than once thought, treating persistently elevated blood sugar — the hallmark of type 2 diabetes — by regulating the genes that control its production.

If two people have the same genetic disease, why would one person go blind in childhood but the other later in life or not at all? For a group of genetic diseases — so-called ciliary diseases that include Bardet-Biedl syndrome, Meckel-Gruber syndrome, and Joubert syndrome — the answer lies in one gene that is already linked to two of these diseases and also seems to increase the risk of progressive blindness in patients with other ciliary diseases.

Bert Vogelstein, M.D., whose published studies of cancer genetics are the most highly cited works in the field, received this year’s American Society of Clinical Oncology “Science of Oncology” Award at the group’s annual meeting in Orland, Fla., on June 1.

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, along with an international team of collaborators, have identified common genetic changes associated with blood pressure and hypertension. The study, reporting online next week in Nature Genetics, breaks new ground in understanding blood pressure regulation and may lead to advances in hypertension therapy.

Of dozens of candidates potentially involved in increasing a person’s risk for the most common type of Alzheimer’s disease that affects more than 5 million Americans over the age of 65, one gene that keeps grabbing Johns Hopkins researchers’ attention makes a protein called neuroglobin.

MAY 2-5, BALTIMORE CONVENTION CENTER, 1 PRATT ST.

• BLACK KIDS WITH HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE MAY BE AT HIGHER RISK FOR HEART DISEASE
• MEMO TO DOCS: MINIMIZE SCANS THAT EXPOSE YOUNG PATIENTS TO RADIATION WHEN POSSIBLE
• FLU SHOTS A MUST FOR KIDS WITH SICKLE CELL DISEASE
• TEEN PARENTS OF CRITICALLY ILL NEWBORNS DON’T GET SEVERITY OF ILLNESS
• HIV TREATMENT LAGGING BEHIND FOR MANY INFECTED YOUTH

Metal detectors for removing surgical screws, intensive care walkers and radiological markers for locating tumors—what will they think of next?

MicroRNAs are single-stranded snippets that, not long ago, were given short shrift as genetic junk. Now that studies have shown they regulate genes involved in normal functioning as well as diseases such as cancer, everyone wants to know: What regulates microRNAs?

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have found that a chemical commonly used in the production of such medical plastic devices as intravenous (IV) bags and catheters can impair heart function in rats.

The Baltimore Sun’s Health and Science Reporter Stephanie Desmon, author of an acclaimed six-part series about breast cancer clinical trials volunteers, will speak about the critical role of clinical medical trials at CISCRP’s AWARE for All program in Baltimore on May 9, 2009.

As always, Johns Hopkins' first priority is the safety and care of patients, visitors, employees and students. Experts and officials at Johns Hopkins Medicine are working closely with federal, state and local public health offices during this rapidly changing public health problem. The Johns Hopkins Office of Critical Event Preparedness and Response (CEPAR) has plans for emerging infections. These plans are being implemented as needed, and JHM will take all required steps to help assure your safety.

In a move to build on longstanding ties and to address growing regional interest in more efficient, integrated regional health care services for patients, officials of Suburban Hospital Healthcare System (SHHS)?and The Johns Hopkins Health System Corporation have formally agreed to integrate SHHS into the Johns Hopkins Health System (JHHS).

Once again, the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine has retained its top-tier ranking in U.S. News & World Report’s edition on the best graduate schools in the nation.

Having both lungs replaced instead of just one is the single most important feature determining who lives longest after having a lung transplant, more than doubling an organ recipient’s chances of extending their life by over a decade, a study by a team of transplant surgeons at Johns Hopkins shows.

It’s a homecoming, of sorts. Elias Zerhouni, M.D., director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) from 2002 to 2008 and former Johns Hopkins Medicine executive vice dean, returns to Hopkins May 1, 2009, as a senior advisor to Johns Hopkins Medicine.

New studies in pregnant mice using antibodies against fetal brains made by the mothers of autistic children show that immune cells can cross the placenta and trigger neurobehavioral changes similar to autism in the mouse pups.

One cell…one initial set of genetic changes – that’s all it takes to begin a series of events that lead to metastatic cancer.  Now, Johns Hopkins experts have tracked how the cancer process began in 33 men with prostate cancer who died of the disease.  Culling information from autopsies, their study points to a set of genetic defects in a single cell that are different for each person’s cancer.

April 18–22, New Orleans, La.

• CHIPPING AWAY AT PROTEINS
• THE PROMISE OF CHEMICAL RESCUE
• HOW CELLS FOLLOW THEIR "NOSE"

Annual scratch-off game benefitting children’s cancer research began on April 9, 2009

Psychiatrists and critical care specialists at Johns Hopkins have begun to tease out what there is about a stay in an intensive care unit (ICU) that leads so many patients to report depression after they go home.

Johns Hopkins School of Medicine will honor 18 young researchers who have gone above and beyond in their search for answers.

Lung experts from Johns Hopkins and elsewhere are calling on physicians to suspend the routine use of potent heartburn medications in asthmatics solely to temper recurrent attacks of wheezing, coughing and breathlessness.

Johns Hopkins Medicine has adopted a new policy that significantly limits interactions with industry while ensuring effective, principled and appropriate partnerships with drug and medical device makers.

A just-out study suggests that what keeps chronic nervous system diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s and ALS going — until they overcome the internal protective mechanisms a body can throw at them — may largely come down to poor conversational skills.

A cancer scientist from Johns Hopkins has convinced an international group of colleagues to delay their race to find new cancer biomarkers and instead begin a 7,000-hour slog through a compendium of 50,000 scientific articles already published to assemble, decode and analyze the molecules that might herald the furtive presence of pancreatic cancer

A small, pilot study in 50 people in Japan suggests that eating two and a half ounces of broccoli sprouts daily for two months may confer some protection against a rampant stomach bug that causes gastritis, ulcers and even stomach cancer.

A new survey of U.S. physicians commissioned by AARP ranks The Johns Hopkins Hospital among the “most frequently recommended” medical centers for heart disease, cancer, “mystery diagnoses,” neurosurgery and ophthalmology. Results of the survey, conducted by Consumers’ Checkbook, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit research organization, are published in AARP magazine’s May/June issue.

“Hopkins,” the seven-part ABC network news documentary filmed entirely at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and aired in late summer of 2008, is among the 2008 winners of the 68th Annual Peabody Awards for electronic media. Winners, chosen by the Peabody board, were named in a ceremony on April 1 by The University of Georgia's Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication.

Metal detectors for removing surgical screws, intensive care walkers and radiological markers for locating tumors, what will they think of next?

Physician-science investigator Edward Kasper, M.D., an expert in chronic heart failure and the heart transplantation that often results from the disease, has been named the new clinical director of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine’s Division of Cardiology and co-director of the School’s Heart and Vascular Institute.

Three researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have been named early career scientists by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). Xinzhong Dong, Ph.D., Joshua Mendell, M.D., Ph.D., and Sinisa Urban, Ph.D., all will remain faculty at Hopkins but also become employees of HHMI, which will provide research funding and salary for the next six years.

Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered a new energy-making biochemical twist in determining the lifespan of yeast cells, one so valuable to longevity that it is likely to also functions in humans.

The “are you driving yet?” talk should become part of every pediatrician’s regular physical exam for teenagers, Hopkins Children’s experts say. Pediatrician Letitia Dzirasa, M.D., notes that car accidents kill more 15- to -20-year-olds than any disease, so teenage driving should be considered a risky behavior, in need of as much attention as unprotected sex or underage drinking.

A buildup of chemical bonds on certain cancer-promoting genes, a process known as hypermethylation, is widely known to render cells cancerous by disrupting biological brakes on runaway growth.  Now, Johns Hopkins scientists say the reverse process — demethylation — which wipes off those chemical bonds may also trigger more than half of all cancers.

One minute, he’s a strapping 40-year-old with an enviable cholesterol level, working out on his treadmill. The next, he’s dead.

Millions more patients could benefit from taking statins, drugs typically used to prevent heart attacks and strokes, than current prescribing guidelines suggest, Johns Hopkins doctors report in a new study.

LAB-ON-A-CHIP HOMES IN ON HOW CANCER CELLS BREAK FREE

Although the majority of the nation’s fourth-year medical students can go online to find out which residencies are theirs, the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine class of ’09 will continue the school’s annual ritual of gathering and opening official letters in the presence of classmates, professors and loved ones.

Two of the world’s leading experts in cardiac surgery will be in Pavia, Italy, tomorrow to attend the signing ceremony of a three-year collaboration agreement between Johns Hopkins Medicine International and San Matteo Hospital.

A new variation in kidney paired donation (KPD) — pioneered and developed at Johns Hopkins — could theoretically generate an endless number of transplants, researchers report.

Johns Hopkins patient safety experts say it’s high time for diagnostic errors to get the same attention from medical institutions and caregivers as drug-prescribing errors, wrong-site surgeries and hospital-acquired infections. Diagnostic misadventures represent a potentially much larger source of preventable health problems and deaths than many of the more popular targets of safety reform, they say in a commentary in the March 11 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

March 11, 2009- Jeremy Nathans, M.D., Ph.D., professor of molecular biology and genetics, neuroscience and ophthalmology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, has been awarded the sixth annual Edward M. Scolnick Prize in Neuroscience by the McGovern Institute at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The Scolnick Prize is awarded each year to recognize an individual who has made outstanding advances in the field of neuroscience.

An unlikely brew of seaweed and glow-in-the-dark biochemical agents may hold the key to the safe use of transplanted stem cells to treat patients with severe peripheral arterial disease (PAD), according to a team of veterinarians, basic scientists and interventional radiologists at Johns Hopkins.

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Washington University School of Medicine have identified a key to eye development — a protein that regulates how the light-sensing nerve cells in the retina form. While still far from the clinic, the latest results, published in the Jan. 29 issue of Neuron, could help scientists better understand how nerve cells develop.

Scientists at the Sol Goldman Pancreatic Cancer Research Center at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center have used "personalized genome" sequencing on an individual with a hereditary form of pancreatic cancer to locate a mutation in a gene called PALB2 that is responsible for initiating the disease.

The Clemenceau Medical Center (CMC) in Beirut, Lebanon, has been awarded the official accreditation of the Joint Commission International (JCI). CMC is one of only two medical centers in Lebanon to hold JCI accreditation.

A widely heralded Johns Hopkins safety initiative to reduce bloodstream infections in intensive care units (ICUs) was implemented in 30 states starting Feb. 1 and could save an estimated $3 billion dollars and 30,000 lives annually. In addition, the program has been launched in Spain and will begin in the United Kingdom starting in April. Pilot programs are also under discussion with health care leaders in Peru and Chile.

Certain men age 75 to 80 are unlikely to benefit from routine prostate specific antigen (PSA) testing, according to a Johns Hopkins study published in the April 2009 issue of The Journal of Urology.

Patients continued to improve function six months after treatment. New results from a multicenter study led by Johns Hopkins show that patients who got an experimental clot-busting treatment for a particularly lethal form of stroke were not only dramatically more likely to survive but also continued to shed lingering disabilities six months later.

Scientists at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center and Duke University Medical Center have linked mutations in two genes, IDH1 and IDH2, to nearly three-quarters of several of the most common types of brain cancers known as gliomas. Among the findings: people with certain tumors that carry these genetic alterations appear to
survive at least twice as long as those without them.

Platelets, tiny and relatively uncharted tenants of the bloodstream known mostly for their role in blood clotting, turn out to also rally sustained immune system inflammatory responses that play a critical role in organ transplant rejection, according to a new report from Johns Hopkins scientists.

Surgical teams at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis and Integris Baptist Medical Center in Oklahoma City successfully completed Saturday the first six-way, multihospital, domino kidney transplant. All six donors — one man and five women, and six organ recipients – four men and two woman — are in good condition, according to Robert Montgomery, M.D., Ph.D., chief transplant surgeon at Johns Hopkins.

Cancer cells need a lot of nutrients to multiply and survive. While much is understood about how cancer cells use blood sugar to make energy, not much is known about how tey get other nutrients. Now, researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have discovered how the Myc cancer-promoting gene uses microRNAs to control the use of glutamine, a major energy source. The results, which shed light on a new angle of cancer that might help scientists figure out a way to stop the disease, appear Feb. 15 online at Nature.

Transposons — the traveling salesmen of the genome composed of DNA sequences with no fixed address — are the focus of a symposium at the annual meeting of the AAAS led by experts from the Johns Hopkins

Antiretroviral drug therapy in an HIV-positive man or women can alone help prevent the transmission of HIV to an uninfected partner, regardless of counseling, the patient’s use of condoms or other safe-sex practices, AIDS experts at Johns Hopkins report

It’s a classic academic mismatch: Researchers aren’t able to make use of seminal improvements in technology—often from colleagues just across the street—either because they don’t know about them or because gaining familiarity makes unrealistic demands on their time.

February 9, 2009- A Johns Hopkins study reveals that older black women who spend time with young children in the classroom are not only more active than similar women who don’t volunteer, but seem to stay active.

Johns Hopkins and Ugandan scientists say counting the number of HIV viruses in the blood rather than relying solely on counting the number of circulating HIV-fighting CD4 immune system cells is a far better way to uncover early signs that antiretroviral drugs are losing their punch, and to signal the need to get patients on more potent treatments to keep the disease in check.

A team of Johns Hopkins experts is offering a free, Web-based tool it developed that calculates and predicts in advance the impact on individual hospitals of a flu epidemic, bioterrorist attack, flood or plane crash, accounting for such elements as numbers of victims, germ-carrying wind patterns, available medical resources, bacterial incubation periods and bomb size.

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine are one gene closer to understanding schizophrenia and related disorders. Reporting in the Jan. 9 issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics, the team describes how a variation in the neuregulin 3 gene influences delusions associated with schizophrenia.

Physician-scientist Gordon Tomaselli, M.D., an expert on sudden cardiac death and heart rhythm disturbances, has been named the new director of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine’s Division of Cardiology and co-director of the School’s Heart and Vascular Institute.

In what is believed to be a first-ever procedure, surgeons at Johns Hopkins have successfully removed a healthy donor kidney through a small incision in the back of the donor’s vagina.

A survey study believed to be one of the first efforts to put hard numbers around long-held beliefs about diversity in medical school faculties has affirmed that awareness and sensitivity to racial and ethnic diversity are believed by most faculty to be poor and even poorer among faculty who are members of underrepresented minorities.

A century-old drug that failed in its original intent to treat tuberculosis but has worked well as an antileprosy medicine now holds new promise as a potential therapy for multiple sclerosis and other autoimmune diseases.

Johns Hopkins Medicine International (JHI), the international arm of Johns Hopkins Medicine, has appointed Ronald S. Lavater chief executive officer of Al Corniche Hospital (Abu Dhabi, UAE), which handles more than 12,000 births and 216,000 outpatient visits a year. Al Corniche Hospital is a Joint Commission International (JCI)-accredited health care facility owned by the Abu Dhabi Health Services Company (SEHA).

Transplant surgeons at Johns Hopkins have evidence that hospitals performing at least 20 lung transplant procedures a year, on average, have the best overall patient survival rates and lowest number of deaths from the complex surgery.

Results from a large-scale Johns Hopkins study of more than 40 hospitals and 160,000 patients show that when health information technologies replace paper forms and handwritten notes, both hospitals and patients benefit strongly.

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have discovered how a whole class of commonly used chemotherapy drugs can block cancer growth. Their findings, reported online this week at the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Early Edition, suggest that a subgroup of cancer patients might particularly benefit from these drugs.

By tweaking a system in the ear that limits how much sound is heard, a global team of researchers has discovered one alteration that shows that the ability of the ear to turn itself down contributes to protecting against permanent hearing loss.

A Johns Hopkins study finds that HIV-positive kidney transplant recipients could have the same one-year survival rates for themselves and their donor organs as those without HIV, provided certain risk factors for transplant failure are recognized and tightly managed.

Scientists who study how human chemistry can permanently turn off genes have typically focused on small islands of DNA believed to contain most of the chemical alterations involved in those switches. But after an epic tour of so-called DNA methylation sites across the human genome in normal and cancer cells, Johns Hopkins scientists have found that the vast majority of the sites aren’t grouped in those islands at all, but on nearby regions that they’ve named “shores.”

Experiments at Johns Hopkins have found that the gradual maturing of embryonic cells into cells as varied as brain, liver and immune system cells is apparently due to the shut off of several genes at once rather than in individual smatterings as previous studies have implied.

Johns Hopkins Medicine International (JHI)—the Baltimore, Maryland, USA-based international arm of Johns Hopkins Medicine—and Hospital Punta Pacífica (HPP) in Panama City, Panama, have entered into a seven-year agreement that gives JHI complete managerial oversight of the 75-bed hospital.

A Johns Hopkins transplant surgeon has found strong evidence that women over 45 are significantly less likely to be placed on a kidney transplant list than their equivalent male counterparts, even though women who receive a transplant stand an equal chance of survival.

New cells are born every day in the brain’s hippocampus, but what controls this birth has remained a mystery. Reporting in the January 1 issue of Science, neuroscientists at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have discovered that the birth of new cells, which depends on brain activity, also depends on a protein that is involved in changing epigenetic marks in the cell’s genetic material.

The enzyme machine that translates a cell’s DNA code into the proteins of life is nothing if not an editorial perfectionist.

Pterosaurs have long suffered an identity crisis. Pop culture heedlessly — and wrongly — lumps these extinct flying lizards in with dinosaurs. Even paleontologists assumed that because the creatures flew, they were birdlike in many ways, such as using only two legs to take flight.

Digitalis-based drugs like digoxin have been used for centuries to treat patients with irregular heart rhythms and heart failure and are still in use today. In the Dec. 16 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine now report that this same class of drugs may hold new promise as a treatment for cancer.

Johns Hopkins and other researchers report what is believed to be the first direct evidence in lab animals that the erectile dysfunction drug sildenafil amplifies the effects of a heart-protective protein.

Babies born to HIV-positive mothers and given the antiretroviral drug nevirapine through the first six weeks of life to prevent infection via breast-feeding are at high risk for developing drug-resistant HIV if they get infected anyway, a team of researchers report. But the investigators highlight the proven superiority of the six-week regimen in preventing mother-to-child HIV transmission in breast-fed infants.