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Newswise — Whether you see the gossamer wings of a butterfly or the delicate opened petals of a flower, there is beauty in the eye of the beholder — a mouse retina described and visually captured by scientists at the National Center for Microscopy and Imaging Research (NCMIR) at University of California San Diego School of Medicine and Shiley Eye Institute at UC San Diego Health. The confocal microscope image, which depicts a mouse retina sparkling with fluorescent molecules, has been awarded first prize in the National Institutes of Health’s 2016 Combined Federal Campaign “Beauty of Science,” an arts competition to inspire awareness and support of federal scientific efforts. The image was featured in a study published last year in the journal Cell Death and Disease by UC San Diego School of Medicine and Shiley Eye Institute researchers investigating potential restorative therapies for glaucoma, a progressive disease involving damage to the eye’s optic nerve and irreversible vision loss. An estimated 70 million people worldwide, including 3 million Americans, suffer from glaucoma, though many are unaware and undiagnosed. It is the leading cause of blindness in persons over age 60. Glaucoma is characterized by the gradual death of neurons called retinal ganglion cells, which transmit light information from the retina to the brain via the optic nerve. “Past research has suggested that targeting these cells with gene therapy designed to prevent their death might slow progression of the disease,” said Robert N. Weinreb, MD, director of both the Hamilton Glaucoma Center and Shiley Eye Institute, and a co-author of the 2015 Cell Death and Disease paper. Weinreb, with senior author Wonkyu Ju, PhD, associate professor, and colleagues investigated whether a non-disease-causing virus could be used to effectively deliver therapeutic genes to retinal ganglion cells. In the award-winning image, created by Ju, associate project scientist Keunyoung Kim, PhD, and NCMIR director Mark Ellisman, PhD, a virus carrying a gene tagged with green fluorescent protein (GFP) was introduced into the eyes of 7-month-old mice. Two months later, the retinas were examined using large-scale mosaic confocal microscopy, a technique pioneered at NCMIR with funding support from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences. “It’s similar to Google Earth in that we computationally stitch together many, many small high-resolution images,” said Ellisman, who also directs the Center for Research in Biological Systems, which promotes cross-disciplinary research involving NCMIR, the San Diego Supercomputer Center, the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology and UC San Diego Health Sciences. In the image, GFP expression (yellow) is observed broadly distributed in all parts of retinal ganglion cells, suggesting the viral delivery system could deliver therapeutic genes. The blue dots indicate Brn3a-positive retinal ganglion cells. Brn3a is a marker for retinal ganglion cells. This was stained for examining transduction efficiency of AAV2-GFP in retinal ganglion cells. ###    

Newswise — CHICAGO – A unique wearable artificial vision device may help people who are legally blind “read” and recognize faces. It may also help these individuals accomplish everyday tasks with significantly greater ease than using traditional assistive reading devices, suggests a study presented today at AAO 2016, the 120th annual meeting of the American Academy of Ophthalmology. Approximately 246 million people worldwide have low vision. This sight loss impairs a person’s ability to do simple daily tasks. Optical and electronic devices such as hand-held magnifiers, tele-microscopic glasses and computer and video magnifiers can help. But, typically these devices are bulky, cumbersome or not readily portable. With recent advancements in wearable electronic devices and optical character recognition technology that converts images to computer-readable text, University of California, Davis researchers hypothesized that these newer technologies could help improve patients’ ability to function in daily life. To test their theory, researchers asked a group of visually impaired patients to use a wearable artificial vision device to see its impact. They found that the device vastly improved patients’ daily productivity. The researchers used the Orcam My Eye for their study. The device is unique because it clips to glasses, making it hands-free. It features a miniature camera that sees and recognizes what the user is viewing, whether text or a face, and then reads what it is seeing to the user via a small bone-conduction earpiece. The user activates the device by simply pointing a finger to the object or text, tapping it or pressing a trigger button. Researchers tested the device on 12 legally blind people, who all had a visual acuity of less than 20/200. Study participants performed a 10-item test simulating activities of daily life, including recognizing products and reading a variety of items such as emails, letters, newspapers, book and signs. They earned one point for the successful completion of each item, and a zero for each not completed. The total possible score was 10. The researchers studied the participants at three stages. First, they observed the participants doing the tasks without the device, then while wearing it after receiving a 90- to 120-minute training session and finally after wearing the device for one week. The researchers’ findings were as follows:•Without wearing the device, the participants’ average score was 2.5 out of 10.•When they first tried the device, their average score improved to 9.5 out of 10.•After a week of wearing the device, the average score of participants improved to 9.8 out of 10. •Seven of the patients completed the test using other low-vision aids such as magnifying glasses, resulting in an average score of 6. When they switched to the portable device, their average score improved to 9.7. “While there have been many advances in eye care, the options for assistance in completing daily tasks are limited and cumbersome,” said Elad Moisseiev, M.D., a vitreoretinal surgeon who was the study lead at U.C. Davis, but is now with the Tel Aviv Medical Center, Israel. “This represents a new step in the evolution of assistance devices for people with low vision, giving them hope for improving their functionality, independence and quality of life.” The pilot study was the first to evaluate the device in people with low vision, establishing its efficacy and ease of use and demonstrating the achievement of statistically significant differences in test scores, said Dr. Moisseiev. He noted that additional studies should include more people, ideally stratifying them by level of visual impairment.A Portable Artificial Vision Device is a Useful Aid for Patients with Low Vision is being presented at AAO 2016, the 120th annual meeting of the American Academy of Ophthalmology. The event is being held in conjunction with the Asia-Pacific Academy of Ophthalmology Oct. 14-18 at McCormick Place, Chicago. Known as the place "Where all of Ophthalmology Meets®," the Academy’s annual meeting is the world’s largest conference for eye physicians and surgeons. For more information, see AAO 2016 highlights. Dr. Moisseiev has no financial interest in or connection to the device company. About the American Academy of OphthalmologyThe American Academy of Ophthalmology is the world’s largest association of eye physicians and surgeons. A global community of 32,000 medical doctors, we protect sight and empower lives by setting the standards for ophthalmic education and advocating for our patients and the public. We innovate to advance our profession and to ensure the delivery of the highest-quality eye care. Our EyeSmart® program provides the public with the most trusted information about eye health. For more information, visit aao.org. SEE ORIGINAL STUDY

Newswise — After analyzing 10 years of medical tests on more than 2,700 people in a federally funded heart disease study, researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine and elsewhere conclude that taking calcium in the form of supplements may raise the risk of plaque buildup in arteries and heart damage, although a diet high in calcium-rich foods appears be protective. In a report on the research, published Oct. 10 in the Journal of the American Heart Association, the researchers caution that their work only documents an association between calcium supplements and atherosclerosis, and does not prove cause and effect. But they say the results add to growing scientific concerns about the potential harms of supplements, and they urge a consultation with a knowledgeable physician before using calcium supplements. An estimated 43 percent of American adult men and women take a supplement that includes calcium, according the National Institutes of Health. "When it comes to using vitamin and mineral supplements, particularly calcium supplements being taken for bone health, many Americans think that more is always better," says Erin Michos, M.D., M.H.S., associate director of preventive cardiology and associate professor of medicine at the Ciccarone Center for the Prevention of Heart Disease at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. "But our study adds to the body of evidence that excess calcium in the form of supplements may harm the heart and vascular system." The researchers were motivated to look at the effects of calcium on the heart and vascular system because studies already showed that "ingested calcium supplements -- particularly in older people -- don't make it to the skeleton or get completely excreted in the urine, so they must be accumulating in the body's soft tissues," says nutritionist John Anderson, Ph.D., professor emeritus of nutrition at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Gillings School of Global Public Health and a co-author of the report. Scientists also knew that as a person ages, calcium-based plaque builds up in the body's main blood vessel, the aorta and other arteries, impeding blood flow and increasing the risk of heart attack. The investigators looked at detailed information from the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis, a long-running research project funded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, which included more than 6,000 people seen at six research universities, including Johns Hopkins. Their study focused on 2,742 of these participants who completed dietary questionnaires and two CT scans spanning 10 years apart. The participants chosen for this study ranged in age from 45 to 84, and 51 percent were female. Forty-one percent were white, 26 percent were African-American, 22 percent were Hispanic and 12 percent were Chinese. At the study's onset in 2000, all participants answered a 120-part questionnaire about their dietary habits to determine how much calcium they took in by eating dairy products; leafy greens; calcium-enriched foods, like cereals; and other calcium-rich foods. Separately, the researchers inventoried what drugs and supplements each participant took on a daily basis. The investigators used cardiac CT scans to measure participants' coronary artery calcium scores, a measure of calcification in the heart's arteries and a marker of heart disease risk when the score is above zero. Initially, 1,175 participants showed plaque in their heart arteries. The coronary artery calcium tests were repeated 10 years later to assess newly developing or worsening coronary heart disease. For the analysis, the researchers first split the participants into five groups based on their total calcium intake, including both calcium supplements and dietary calcium. After adjusting the data for age, sex, race, exercise, smoking, income, education, weight, smoking, drinking, blood pressure, blood sugar and family medical history, the researchers separated out 20 percent of participants with the highest total calcium intake, which was greater than 1,400 milligrams of calcium a day. That group was found to be on average 27 percent less likely than the 20 percent of participants with the lowest calcium intake -- less than 400 milligrams of daily calcium -- to develop heart disease, as indicated by their coronary artery calcium test. Next, the investigators focused on the differences among those taking in only dietary calcium and those using calcium supplements. Forty-six percent of their study population used calcium supplements. The researchers again accounted for the same demographic and lifestyle factors that could influence heart disease risk, as in the previous analysis, and found that supplement users showed a 22 percent increased likelihood of having their coronary artery calcium scores rise higher than zero over the decade, indicating development of heart disease. "There is clearly something different in how the body uses and responds to supplements versus intake through diet that makes it riskier," says Anderson. "It could be that supplements contain calcium salts, or it could be from taking a large dose all at once that the body is unable to process." Among participants with highest dietary intake of calcium -- over 1,022 milligrams per day -- there was no increase in relative risk of developing heart disease over the 10-year study period. "Based on this evidence, we can tell our patients that there doesn't seem to be any harm in eating a heart-healthy diet that includes calcium-rich foods, and it may even be beneficial for the heart," says Michos. "But patients should really discuss any plan to take calcium supplements with their doctor to sort out a proper dosage or whether they even need them." According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, coronary heart disease kills over 370,000 people each year in the U.S. More than half of women over 60 take calcium supplements -- many without the oversight of a physician -- because they believe it will reduce their risk of osteoporosis. Other authors on the study included Bridget Kruszka and Joseph Delaney of the University of Washington, Ka He of Indiana University, Gregory Burke of Wake Forest University, Alvaro Alonso of Emory University, Diane Bild of the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute and Matthew Budoff of UCLA Medical Center. The study was funded by contracts (N01-HC-95159, N01-HC-95160, N01-HC-95161, N01-HC-95162, N01-HC-95163, N01-HC-95164, N01-HC-95165, N01-HC-95167, N01-HC-95168 and N01-HC-95169); a grant (R21HL120394-01) from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute; grants (UL1-TR-000040 and UL1-TR-001079) from the National Center for Research Resources; a grant (R01NS072243) from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; and the Blumenthal Scholars Award in Preventive Cardiology.

Newswise — CHICAGO – Chicago will become the global epicenter of the latest discoveries in ophthalmology this week as thousands of eye physicians and surgeons attend AAO 2016, the American Academy of Ophthalmology’s 120th annual meeting. The world's largest showcase for vision research and innovation will be held in conjunction with the Asia-Pacific Academy of Ophthalmology on Oct. 14-18 at McCormick Place. More than 25,000 are expected to attend the Academy’s annual meeting, making it one of the largest medical meetings in the United States. It features more than 350 instruction courses, 56 surgical skills labs, 51 symposia and 585 exhibitors, collectively addressing all aspects of the ophthalmic profession. Highlights include:Progress in the precision of cataract and LASIK surgeryProfessor and Allen, Mosbacher and Law Chair of the Baylor College of Medicine Ophthalmology Department Douglas E. Koch, M.D., will discuss how new technology has great potential to improve the precision of cataract and LASIK surgery during theJackson Memorial Lecture, the premiere lectureship in ophthalmology. Dr. Koch will describe innovations such as intraocular lenses whose optical power can be modified postoperatively. Surgical alternatives to reading glassesSurgical treatments for presbyopia, the blurred near vision people often get starting around age 40, will be the focus of two named lectures. Julian D. Stevens, D.O., Consultant Ophthalmic Surgeon at Moorfields Eye Hospital, will discuss corneal inlays during the Whitney G. Sampson Lecture. Dean of the College of Medicine at University of Illinois Dimitri T. Azar, M.D., will deliver the Castroviejo Lecture where he will review recent advancements in the field such as the development of the Google/Verily smart accommodating intraocular lenses. Zika and trachomaThe visual impacts of infectious diseases will be covered at different events at AAO 2016. Representatives from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention and ophthalmologists from Brazil and the United States will examine how Zika affects babies born to infected mothers. In a separate session, Thomas M. Lietman, M.D. will deliver the Jones/Smolin Lecture, describing the efforts underway in sub-Saharan Africa to eradicate trachoma, the world’s leading cause of preventable blindness. Saving eyes on the battlefield and at homeCol. Robert A. Mazzoli, M.D., former consultant to the Surgeon General of the U.S. Army, will highlight the role military ophthalmologists have played in improving care for injured military personnel and how the lessons of battlefield care that can be adapted to peacetime practice. In a separate session, representatives from the Association of Veterans Affairs Ophthalmologists and the Society of Military Ophthalmologists will highlight innovative approaches to expanding access to veterans' eye care services through residency programs. The IRIS® Registry: Measuring value and improving qualitySeveral talks will focus on the Academy’s IRIS® Registry (Intelligent Research in Sight), the world’s largest real-time database of ophthalmic patient outcomes. As the focus of healthcare shifts from volume to value, the IRIS Registry is helping ophthalmologists track, report and improve quality performance, evaluate patient outcomes and perform simple analytics. Medicare and the FDASeveral sessions will focus on new policies that promise to impact eye care and access to quality physician-led treatments. Medicare is set to implement a sweeping new physician payment system focused on the value of care instead of volume of service. Academy’s physician leaders and health policy experts will discuss what this means to ophthalmology and its patients. In another session, U.S. Food and Drug Administration representatives will answer attendees' questions about preserving access to sight-saving medications and the ophthalmic device approval process. X-ray technology uncovers true colors in 19th Century artFrancesca Casadio, PhD., will deliver the Michael F. Marmor, M.D. Lecture in Ophthalmology and the Arts. The A.W. Mellon Senior Conservation Scientist with The Art Institute of Chicago will discuss how she used technology such as Macro X-ray Fluorescence Spectometry to uncover the original color of Van Gogh’s bedroom. “The Academy’s annual meeting continues to be a beacon for our profession,” said Jonathan B. Rubenstein, M.D., secretary of the American Academy of Ophthalmology’s annual meeting. “No other meeting in the world provides the wide breadth of content and numerous opportunities to meet and interact with local and international colleagues. I look forward to seeing the many developments that will be presented at AAO 2016 that promise to advance our profession’s efforts to fight eye disease and promote global eye health.” The Academy provides free access to credentialed members of the media. Learn more athttp://www.aao.org/newsroom/annual-meeting-for-media. For more information about the meeting, visithttp://www.aao.org/annual-meeting/. A searchable program is available at www.aao.org/mobile. Selected hours of educational content will be streamed live Oct. 14-18. Learn more and sign up at http://www.aao.org/virtual-meeting. About the American Academy of OphthalmologyThe American Academy of Ophthalmology is the world’s largest membership association of eye physicians and surgeons. A global community of 32,000 ophthalmologists, we are passionate about protecting sight and fighting preventable blindness. For more than 120 years, we have been educators, innovators and advocates for the public and our profession to ensure the highest-quality medical and surgical eye care. Our EyeSmart® program is a preeminent source of eye health information for the public and empowers people to preserve their vision. For more information, visit www.aao.org.

Newswise — ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, ILL  – When testing for food allergies, allergists often ask about family history. If your parents have food allergies, the chances are higher that you too will have them. Problem is, not everyone who reports a food allergy actually has one. A study in Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, the scientific publication of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI) reports only 28 percent of parents of kids with food allergies tested positive to the foods to which they reported allergies. A sensitivity to a food can be indicated in a skin prick test or a blood test, but does not always show a true allergy unless there has been a previous reaction to the food. “Parents of kids with food allergies had a higher rate of positive blood and skin tests to foods than the general population,” said allergist Melanie Makhija, MD, MSc, ACAAI member and co-lead author. “But of the 2,477 parents, only 28 percent of those who self-reported a food allergy actually tested positive. This tells us that either people haven’t been tested and are assuming an allergy from a previous reaction to a food, or they haven’t been tested properly and may not truly have an allergy. Allergy testing, including blood and skin prick testing, is not always reliable; there are a lot of false positives.” Parents of children with food allergies were recruited from local hospital clinics and community settings. To be eligible, families had to have a child with a food allergy. In response to the questionnaire, 13.7 percent of parents reported having a food allergy. Of that group, only 28 percent tested positive to the food to which they reported being allergic. “Previous studies have focused on the general adult population,” said allergist Rachel Robison, MD, study co-lead author. “While we found positive test results were more common in parents of kids with food allergies, the actual levels in the blood for the foods were quite low. Low positives in allergy testing are more likely to be false positives This points to the importance of proper testing for any kind of allergy, but particularly food allergies. Interestingly, we also found that of the parents who reported no food allergy, 14 percent had positive tests to peanut and sesame, for example.” According to ACAAI, skin tests may reveal sensitization, but being sensitized to an allergen doesn't mean you are allergic. Oral food challenges remain the gold standard for allergy testing and are considered very accurate for diagnosing allergies. An allergy blood test alone is not as accurate. Food allergy tests aren’t able to predict future risk for someone who has never eaten the food before. Allergists are specially trained to administer allergy testing and diagnose the results. They can then tailor a plan specific to your allergies. To find an allergist near you, use the ACAAI allergist locator. More news and research from ACAAI will be released during the 2016 Annual Scientific Meeting, November 10-14 at The Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco. To register for the meeting, go to ACAAI Annual Meeting. Media may also call 847-725-2277, or e-mail media@acaai.org About ACAAIThe ACAAI is a professional medical organization of more than 6,000 allergists-immunologists and allied health professionals, headquartered in Arlington Heights, Ill. The College fosters a culture of collaboration and congeniality in which its members work together and with others toward the common goals of patient care, education, advocacy and research. ACAAI allergists are board-certified physicians trained to diagnose allergies and asthma, administer immunotherapy, and provide patients with the best treatment outcomes. For more information and to find relief, visitAllergyandAsthmaRelief.org. Join us on Facebook, Pinterest and Twitter.

Newswise — NEW YORK, NY -- Columbia College of Dental Medicine researchers have identified stem cells that can make new cartilage and repair damaged joints. The cells reside within the temporomandibular joint (TMJ), which articulates the jaw bone to the skull. When the stem cells were manipulated in animals with TMJ degeneration, the cells repaired cartilage in the joint. A single cell transplanted in a mouse spontaneously generated cartilage and bone and even began to form a bone marrow niche. The findings were published on October 10 in Nature Communications. “This is very exciting for the field because patients who have problems with their jaws and TMJs are very limited in terms of clinical treatments available,” said Mildred C. Embree, DMD, PhD, assistant professor of dental medicine at Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC) and the lead author of the study. Dr. Embree’s team, the TMJ Biology and Regenerative Medicine Lab, conducted the research with colleagues including Jeremy Mao, DDS, PhD, the Edwin S. Robinson Professor of Dentistry (in Orthopedic Surgery) at CUMC. Up to 10 million people in the United States, primarily women, have TMJ disorders, according to the National Institutes of Health. Options for treatment currently include either surgery or palliative care, which addresses symptoms but can’t regenerate the damaged tissue. Dr. Embree’s findings suggest that stem cells already present in the joint could be manipulated to repair it. Cartilage helps to cushion the joints and allows them to move smoothly. The type of cartilage within the TMJ is fibrocartilage, which is also found in the knee meniscus and in the discs between the vertebrae. Because fibrocartilage cannot regrow or heal, injury or disease that damages this tissue can lead to permanent disability. Medical researchers have been working to use stem cells, immature cells that can develop into various types of tissue, to regenerate cartilage. Given the challenges of transplanting donor stem cells, such as the possibility of rejection by the recipient, researchers are especially interested in finding ways to use stem cells already living in the body. “The implications of these findings are broad,” said Dr. Mao, “including for clinical therapies. They suggest that molecular signals that govern stem cells may have therapeutic applications for cartilage and bone regeneration. Cartilage and certain bone defects are notoriously difficult to heal.” Dr. Mao is co-director of the Center for Craniofacial Regeneration at Columbia. His own research with stem cells has regenerated teeth and the meniscus, the pad of cartilage within the knee joint, and the TMJ in 2003. In a series of experiments described in the new report, Dr. Embree, Dr. Mao, and their colleagues isolated fibrocartilage stem cells (FCSCs) from the joint and showed that the cells can form cartilage and bone, both in the laboratory and when implanted into animals. “I didn’t have to add any reagents to the cells,” Dr. Embree said. “They were programmed to do this.” And while some approaches to regenerating injured tissue require growth factors or biomaterials for the cells to grow on, she noted, the FCSCs grew and matured spontaneously. Dr. Embree and her team also identified a molecular signal, Wnt, that depletes FCSCs and causes cartilage degeneration. Injecting a Wnt-blocking molecule called sclerostin into degenerated TMJs in animals stimulated cartilage growth and healing of the joint. She and her colleagues are now searching for other small molecules that could be used to inhibit Wnt and promote FCSC growth. The idea, according to Dr. Embree, will be to find a drug with minimal side effects that could be injected right into the joint. Children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis can have stunted jaw growth that can’t be treated with existing drugs, Dr. Embree noted. Since the TMJ is a growth center for the jaw, the new research may offer strategies for treating these children, and lead to a better understanding of how the jaw grows and develops. While orthodontists currently rely on clunky technologies like headgear to modify jaw growth, she added, the findings could point towards ways to modulate growth on the cellular level. Ultimately, Dr. Embree and her team say, the findings could lead to strategies for repairing fibrocartilage in other joints, including the knees and vertebral discs. “Those types of cartilage have different cellular constituents, so we would have to really investigate the molecular underpinnings regarding how these cells are regulated,” the researcher said. The study is titled, “Exploiting endogenous fibrocartilage stem cells to regenerate cartilage and repair joint injury.” Authors included Mildred C. Embree (Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY), Mo Chen (CUMC), Serhiy Pylawka (CUMC), Danielle Kong (CUMC), George M. Iwaoka (CUMC), Ivo Kalajzic (University of Connecticut, Farmington CT), Hai Yao (Clemson University, Charleston, SC), Chancheng Shi (Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chongqing, China), Dongming Sun (Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ), Tzong-Jen Sheu (University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, NY), David A. Koslovsky (Metropolitan Oral Associates, New York, NY), Alia Koch (CUMC), and Jeremy J. Mao (CUMC). This investigation was supported by grants from the National Institute of Health (K99DE022060-01A, 5R00DE0220660, R01DE021134, S10RR027050, S10OD020056, and NO1-DE-22635. The authors declare no competing financial interests. ###

Newswise — LOS ANGELES  — Cedars-Sinai has awarded nearly $700,000 to scientists developing new treatments and technologies — such as advanced genetic profiling and biomedical sensors that can be worn at home — to deliver individualized healthcare to patients. The awards are part of a Cedars-Sinai campaign to transform its practice of medicine by harnessing advanced data on individuals’ specific genes, proteins, microbiome (bacterial communities) and other body chemistry, with the goal of tailoring therapies and medications for specific patients. Using this approach, patients one day might receive treatments as unique as their own fingerprints, based on tests that reveal their molecular makeups. "Our goal is to drive the development of the newest technology and best research, coupled to the finest clinical practice, to rapidly deliver precise and personalized healthcare solutions," said Dermot McGovern, MD, PhD, FRCP(Lon), professor of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences and director of the campaign, known as Cedars-Sinai Precision Health. The institutionwide effort is a partnership among scientists, clinicians and industry. The eight projects selected for funding deploy sophisticated technologies, including individualized genetic and protein profiling, high-speed culturing of bacteria, next-generation ultrasound and mobile biosensors. Using these high-tech tools, researchers are striving to forge new prevention strategies and treatments for a range of diseases and conditions, including heart disease, cancer and gastrointestinal disorders. "Cedars-Sinai Precision Health is going to fundamentally change the way we practice medicine," said McGovern, the Joshua L. and Lisa Z. Greer Chair in Inflammatory Bowel Disease Genetics. As one of the largest nonprofit academic medical centers in the U.S., Cedars-Sinai is in a strong position to advance this work. Its cadre of scientists, led by 350 principal investigators, is currently conducting about 1,500 bioscience studies. While many institutions are pursuing precision healthcare strategies, Cedars-Sinai is especially suited to advance the promise of this medical revolution. "Cedars-Sinai's flexible organizational structure, combined with its research talent and large-scale, high-quality healthcare delivery operation, make it well-qualified to achieve national prominence in the delivery of precise health solutions," said Shlomo Melmed, MD, executive vice president, Academic Affairs, and dean of the medical faculty at Cedars-Sinai. "With Cedars-Sinai Precision Health, we plan to lead the way to the newest frontier of medicine." # # #    

Newswise — A new study by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests that a specialized area of the mosquito brain mixes tastes with smells to create unique and preferred flavors. The findings advance the possibility, they say, of identifying a substance that makes “human flavor” repulsive to the malaria-bearing species of the mosquitoes, so instead of feasting on us, they keep the disease to themselves, potentially saving an estimated 450,000 lives a year worldwide. A report on the research appeared online on Oct. 3 in the journal Nature Communications. Malaria is an infectious parasite disease of humans and animals transmitted by the bite of the female Anopheles gambiae mosquito. In 2015, experts estimate it affected 214 million people, mostly in Africa, despite decades of mosquito eradication and control efforts. There is no malaria vaccine, and although the disease is curable in early stages, treatment is costly and difficult to deliver in places where it is endemic. “All mosquitoes, including the one that transmits malaria, use their sense of smell to find a host for a blood meal. Our goal is to let the mosquitoes tell us what smells they find repulsive and use those to keep them from biting us,” says Christopher Potter, Ph.D., assistant professor of neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Because smell is essential to mosquito survival, each mosquito has three pairs of “noses” for sensing odors: two antennae, two maxillary palps and two labella. The maxillary palps are thick, fuzzy appendages that protrude from the lower region of the mosquito’s head, more or less parallel to its proboscis, the long, flexible sheath that keeps its “feeding needle” under wraps until needed. At the very tip of the proboscis are the labella, two small regions that contain both “gustatory” neurons that pick up tastes and olfactory neurons for recognizing odorants. To better understand how An. gambiae mosquitoes that cause malaria receive and process olfactory information from so many sensory regions, Potter’s team wanted to see where olfactory neurons from those regions go to in the brain. They used a powerful genetic technique — never before accomplished in mosquitoes, according to Potter — to make certain neurons “glow” green. The green glowing label was designed to appear specifically in neurons that receive complex odors through proteins called odorant receptors (ORs), since OR neurons are known to help distinguish humans from other warm-blooded animals in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which carry the Zika virus. “This is the first time researchers managed to specifically target sensory neurons in mosquitoes. Previously, we had to use flies as a proxy for all insects, but now we can directly study the sense of smell in the insects that spread malaria,” says Olena Riabinina, Ph.D., the lead author of the study and a postdoctoral fellow now at the Imperial College London. “We were pleasantly surprised by how well our genetic technique worked and how easy it is now to see the smell-detecting neurons. The ease of identification will definitely simplify our task of studying these neurons in the future.” As expected, Potter says, the OR neurons from the antennae and maxillary palps went to symmetrical areas of the brain called antennal lobes, just as they do in flies. But Potter was quite surprised when he saw that the OR neurons from the labella went to the so-called subesophageal zone, which, he says, had never before been associated with the sense of smell in any fly or insect; it had only been associated with the sense of taste. “That finding suggests that perhaps mosquitoes don’t just like our smell, but also our flavor,” says Potter. “It’s likely that the odorants coming off our skin are picked up by the labella and influence the preferred taste of our skin, especially when the mosquito is looking for a place to bite.” Potter says the finding potentially offers researchers one more way to repel mosquitoes. The antennae and maxillary palps are more specialized for picking up long-range signals, while the labella come into direct contact with our skin. In fact, Potter says, before injecting their needlelike proboscis, mosquitoes use the labella to probe about on a victim’s skin. “We don’t really know why they do that, but we suspect that they’re looking for sensory cues that hint at easy access to a blood vessel,” he says. “This suggests that a combination of repellants could keep mosquitoes from biting us in two ways. One could target the antennal neurons and reduce the likelihood that they come too close, while another could target the labellar neurons and make the mosquitoes turn away in disgust — before sucking our blood — if they got close enough to land on us.” The two-part genetic system Potter devised to generate the glowing neurons will make it much easier for his and other laboratories to mix and match genetically altered mosquitoes to generate new traits, he says. His group has already created a strain of An. gambiae mosquitoes whose OR neurons glow green upon activation. Scientists can thus see which neurons light up in response to a specific smell. “Using this method, we hope to find an odorant that is safe and pleasant-smelling for us but strongly repellant to mosquitoes at very low concentrations,” says Potter. His group was also able to compare the brains of male and female mosquitoes. Since only females use their sense of smell to find humans and males feed only on nectar, it was previously thought that males had just a rudimentary sense of smell. The Potter group found instead that males have the same level of complexity in their brains to detect odors as females but have fewer olfactory neurons. “It appears that males might just have a scaled-down version of a female’s sense of smell. So they can still smell everything a female smells, just not as well,” Potter says. His group plans to study other types of neurons to better understand how signals from the mosquitoes’ three types of olfactory receptors interact to influence their behavior. For example, why is lactic acid not attractive on its own but highly attractive when mixed with carbon dioxide? “We’d like to figure out what regions and neurons in the brain lead to this combined effect,” says Potter. “If we can identify them, perhaps we could also stop them from working.” Other authors of the report include Darya Task, Elizabeth Marr and Chun-Chieh Lin of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine; and Robert Alford and David O’ Brochta of the University of Maryland, College Park. This work was supported by grants from the Johns Hopkins Medicine Discovery Fund, the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute, and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (R01AI099060). SEE ORIGINAL STUDY    

Newswise — Over the course of the Rio Olympics, 450,000 condoms were distributed around the athlete's village. This may be surprising considering the common view that abstinence from sexual activity can boost athletic performance. These long-standing views have now been challenged by a recent analysis of current scientific evidence, published in the open-access journal Frontiers in Physiology. "Abstaining from sexual activity before athletic competition is a controversial topic in the world of sport;" said Laura Stefani, an Assistant Professor of Sports Medicine at the University of Florence, Italy, and lead author of this review;"We show no robust scientific evidence to indicate that sexual activity has a negative effect upon athletic results." The authors sifted through hundreds of studies with the potential to provide evidence, however big or small, on the impact of sexual activity upon sport performance. After setting a number of criteria to filter out the most reliable of these studies, only nine were included in the review. One of these found that the strength of female former athletes did not differ if they had sex the night before. Another actually observed a beneficial effect on marathon runners' performance. While these small handful of studies provided some clues about the real effects of sex on sport performance, Dr. Stefani and her colleagues were disappointed with the research on this subject to date. "We clearly show that this topic has not been well investigated and only anecdotal stories have been reported;" explained Dr. Stefani; "In fact, unless it takes place less than two hours before, the evidence actually suggests sexual activity may have a beneficial effect on sports performance." The review also revealed that males were more frequently investigated than females, with no comparison of effects across genders. In addition, it highlights that cultural differences in attitudes towards sexual activity may influence how much or how little impact it may have. Dr. Stefani emphasizes other factors that have been ignored. "No particular importance has been laid on the psychological or physical effects of sexual activity on sports performance, or upon the different kinds of sports." This is an important point, given each sport's different mental and physical challenges. This review demonstrates the need for proper scientific investigation into the impact of sexual activity on sport performance, clarifying any ethical, gender and sport differences. The authors conclude that because the current evidence debunks the long-held abstinence theories, athletes should not feel guilty when engaging in their usual sexual activity up to the day before competition. ###

Newswise — Atopic dermatitis, or eczema, is a common skin disorder that usually starts by 5 years of age, but virtually all of the studies that have defined the immune changes underlying eczema and are directing new treatment options have been done in adult skin. A study just published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology characterizes immune changes for the first time in the skin of young children with eczema. “Our findings offer new directions for targeted therapies for children with eczema,” says Amy Paller, MD, co-senior author and dermatologist at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, as well as Chair of Dermatology and Professor of Pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “While some characteristics of eczema in children are the same as in adults, our study showed substantial differences that are important for understanding eczema in children and developing tailored treatments that maximize effectiveness and minimize potential side effects.” Currently, there are no targeted therapies for affected children, who are usually treated with topical steroids and, in severe disease, with immunosuppressant drugs. This new study evaluated both affected and unaffected skin in children within the first 6 months of their eczema, and compared the immune profiles to those in skin from healthy children and also to the affected and unaffected skin of adults with eczema. The study verified the central and early role of the immune pathway that drives allergy (Th2), which helps explain the association of eczema, asthma, and allergies in kids. In a previous study, Paller and her associates found evidence of activation of this Th2 immune pathway in the blood as well. This pathway is currently the focus of development of targeted therapy for moderate-to-severe eczema, suggesting that these same agents being tested in adults could also be useful in young children. The observed increase in the biomarker for itch (IL-31) in skin points to another useful therapeutic target for children. In studies of blood samples from children with and without eczema during the first years of the life, the eczema group showed suppressed development of an immune pathway that handles infections (Th1). This observation may help to explain why children with more severe eczema have more widespread infections of herpes and molluscum viruses. Several differences in the skin of children with eczema raise doubts about findings in adults that are now considered central to understanding eczema. Adult eczema skin is deficient in the naturally produced agents that fight staph infections and certain viruses, and this deficiency has been thought to be an important reason for the high risk of these infections in eczema at all ages. But the levels of these antimicrobial factors in the skin of young children with eczema are very high, suggesting that deficiency does not play a role in the frequent skin infections at early ages. A characteristic trait of eczema at any age is a poor skin barrier, which leads to dryness and easier entry of triggers of the immune system, such as bacteria, irritating substances and allergens. Filaggrin, a key protein in skin barrier function, is deficient in adults. This has been attributed to both genetic deficiency and immune cell products that prevent production of filaggrin. The deficit of filaggrin has been blamed for the poor skin barrier in eczema. In contrast to adults, however, the skin of young children with eczema was found to have plenty of filaggrin, despite its poor barrier function and skin thickening that is comparable to skin of adults with eczema. This unexpected finding suggests that the filaggrin deficit may not be the driving force for barrier issues and that treatments targeting this protein might not be as beneficial for children with eczema as for adults. A panel of findings was generated from the blood and skin samples of each participating child affected by eczema. “Our study is the first step toward personalized medicine for children with eczema,” says Paller. “We need to collect much more data to start matching targeted treatments to an individual’s specific disease characteristics.” Research at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago is conducted through the Stanley Manne Children’s Research Institute. The Manne Research Institute is focused on improving child health, transforming pediatric medicine and ensuring healthier futures through the relentless pursuit of knowledge. Lurie Children’s is ranked as one of the nation’s top children’s hospitals in the U.S.News & World Report. It is the pediatric training ground for Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. Last year, the hospital served more than 174,000 children from 50 states and 48 countries.