A newborn’s first stool can signal the child may struggle with persistent cognitive problems, according to Case Western Reserve University Project Newborn researchers. 
In particular, high levels of fatty acid ethyl esters (FAEE) found in the meconium (a newborn’s first stool) from a mother’s alcohol use during pregnancy can alert doctors that a child is at risk for problems with intelligence and reasoning.
Left untreated, such problems persist into the teen years, the research team from the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences found.
“We wanted to see if there was a connection between FAEE level and their cognitive development during childhood and adolescence—and there was,” said Meeyoung O. Min, PhD, research assistant professor at the Mandel School and the study’s lead researcher. “FAEE can serve as a marker for foetal alcohol exposure and developmental issues ahead.”

Detecting prenatal exposure to alcohol at birth could lead to early interventions that help reduce the effects later, Min said.

For this study, researchers analysed the meconium of 216 subjects for levels of FAEE. (FAEE are composed of a group of products from metabolizing alcohol; this study examined ethyl myristate, ethyl oleate ethyl linoleate and ethyl linolenate.) They then gave intelligence tests at ages 9, 11 and 15.
The conclusion: There was a link between those with high levels of FAEE at birth and lower IQ scores. 

“Although we already knew a mother’s alcohol use during her pregnancy may cause cognitive deficits, what is significant is that the early marker, not previously available, predicted this, establishing the predictive validity of FAEEs for determining alcohol exposure in utero” Min said. Case Western Reserve University

Innovative gastric cancer-detection technology can be used for the early detection of stomach cancer and for identifying persons at risk for developing the disease. The new detection method, based on breath analysis, has significant advantages over the existing detection technology.

Gastric cancer is one of the most lethal forms of cancer and in most cases, its diagnosis involves an endoscopy (the insertion of a tube into the oesophagus, requiring that the patient fast and receive an intravenous sedative). Treatment is aggressive chemotherapy, radiation and the full or partial removal of the stomach. The disease develops in a series of well-defined steps, but there’s currently no effective, reliable, and non-invasive screening test for picking up these changes early on. Thus, many people succumb to stomach cancer only because it was not diagnosed in time.

The new technology, developed by Prof. Hossam Haick of the Technion Faculty of Chemical Engineering, can be used to detect premalignant lesions at the earliest stage, when healthy cells start becoming cancerous.

The research, published as part of the doctoral thesis of Mr. Haitham Amal, was conducted in conjunction with a Latvian research group headed by Prof. Marcis Leja, based on the largest population sample ever in a trial of this type. 484 people participated in the trial, 99 of whom had already been diagnosed with stomach cancer. All the participants were tested for Helicobacter pylori, a bacterium known to increase the risk for stomach cancer, and two breath samples were taken from each person.

The first sample from each participant was analysed using the GCMS technique, which measures volatile organic substances in exhaled breath. The researchers noted that GCMS technology cannot be used to detect stomach cancer because the testing is very expensive and requires lengthy processing times and considerable expertise to operate the equipment.

The second breath sample was tested using nanoarray analysis, the unique technology developed by Prof. Haick, combined with a pattern recognition algorithm.

The findings:

Based on the concentrations of 8 specific substances (out of 130) in the oral cavity, the new technology can distinguish between three groups: gastric cancer patients, persons who have precancerous stomach lesions, and healthy individuals.
The new technology accurately distinguishes between the various pre-malignant stages.
The new technology can be used to identify persons at risk for developing gastric cancer.
The diagnosis is accurate, regardless of other factors such as age, sex, smoking habits, alcohol consumption and the use of anti-oxidant drugs.
In short, the nano-array analysis method developed by Prof. Haick is accurate, sensitive technology that provides a simple and inexpensive alternative to existing tests (such as GCMS). This new technology offers early, effective detection of persons at risk for developing stomach cancer, without unnecessary invasive tests (endoscopy). In order to assess the accuracy and effectiveness of the new, a wide-scale clinical trial is currently under way in Europe, with thousands of participants who have cancerous or pre-cancerous tumours. Technion

A new test developed by UBC researchers allows physicians to measure the effects of gene silencing therapy in Huntington’s disease and will support the first human clinical trial of a drug that targets the genetic cause of the disease.

The gene silencing therapy being tested by UBC researchers aims to reduce the levels of a toxic protein in the brain that causes Huntington’s disease.

The test was developed by Amber Southwell, Michael Hayden, and Blair Leavitt of UBC’s Centre for Molecular Medicine and Therapeutics and the Centre for Huntington Disease in collaboration with colleagues from Mayo Clinic.

“This is an important breakthrough for several promising gene silencing therapies in Huntington’s disease that are now moving from the bench to the bedside,” said Leavitt. “We can move forward with these clinical trials and accurately measure whether our treatments are working.”

Huntington’s disease is a genetic disorder but symptoms generally don’t appear until later in life. It affects the brain and gradually worsens, causing problems with coordination and movement, mental decline and psychiatric issues.

The genetic mutation responsible for Huntington’s produces a toxic form of a protein called huntingtin, which progressively injures brain cells. Reducing brain levels of this toxic protein should prevent or delay the onset of symptoms. Several huntingtin-lowering therapies have already shown great promise in animal models of Huntington’s disease and are rapidly approaching trials in humans.

The UBC research team found that they could accurately measure the levels of mutant huntingtin protein in the brain by collecting cerebrospinal fluid from a spinal tap. The ultrasensitive test detects small amounts of the toxic protein and can be used to follow changes in brain levels of the protein over time in response to new therapies.

This study enables Leavitt to initiate a new clinical trial of a huntingtin gene-silencing therapy for patients at the Centre for Huntington Disease at the Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health, a partnership between UBC and Vancouver Coastal Health. This trial will test the safety of a novel gene-silencing treatment in patients and is already in the process of screening patient candidates. The trial will be the first human study of a drug targeting mutant huntingtin. University of British Columbia

Researchers discovered a new mechanism of how fluorescent proteins can change colour. It enables the microscopic visualization of individual cells in their three-dimensional environment in living organisms.

Researchers at ETH Zurich’s Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering in Basel have developed a new microscopy technique that enables for the first time to selectively visualize individual cells within the complex, three-dimensional tissue of a living organism. The researchers have thus succeeded in capturing spectacular microscopic images, such as in the nervous system of a zebrafish larva, a preferred model organism for research. Motor neurons in the spinal cord can be seen in the researchers’ images; at the same time, a single neuron with all its extensions is highlighted in another colour.
An observation by William Dempsey, post-doc in the group of ETH professor Periklis Pantazis, led to the new application. He worked with a special class of fluorescent proteins that change colour when irradiated with laser light of a specific wavelength. One such ‘chameleon protein’ is called Dendra 2, which normally emits green light when illuminated with blue light. The emission of Dendra 2 is however shifted into the red when it is irradiated by intensive violet or ultraviolet (UV) laser light.

Dempsey and Pantazis specifically discovered that when Dendra 2 is irradiated by both a blue and a red laser at the same time, the protein’s colour can also change to red. For this dual-colour illumination low intensity laser light is sufficient. In contrast to high intensity violet or UV irradiation it does not damage living cells.

ETH professor Pantazis and his colleagues then had an idea of how this finding could be deployed in light microscopy. Fluorescent proteins can be used to make whole cells, precise cell structures or single molecules visible. For the first time, the ETH researcher’s discovery permits a single cell or group of molecules located within a desirable part of a living organism to be highlighted with one colour, while all the other cells or molecules remain visible with another colour.

The research group showed that when used individually, two different laser beams cannot change a chameleon protein’s colour. But when the two beams are combined and directed in a way that they meet at a certain point on the object, then the proteins in focus change colour. In contrast, the proteins that are not activated at the same time by the two lasers retain their original colour.
The researchers have developed a simple and inexpensive colour filter, which can be used with the conventional confocal laser microscopes that are found in many biomedical research institutes. When mounted between the laser source and object, the filter divides the laser light into separate blue and red beams that are directed on to a small focal point on the object.

In the case of the zebrafish larva, which is transparent and therefore well suited for microscopy, the ETH researchers used Dendra 2 to colour neurons. They then focused the combined laser beam’s focal point on the cell body of a single neuron in a live, anesthetized zebrafish. The local Dendra 2 molecules became red, spread throughout the entire cell and dyed the cell extensions. All other cells, even in the immediate vicinity of the targeted cell, remained green.
The ability to make individual neurons visible could be of great importance, for example, in the precise mapping of the brain, according to Pantazis. Since the method is suitable for individual cell targeting in living organisms, it could also be used to examine dynamic processes; for example, what happens to individual cells or a group of molecules when researchers treat an organism with active pharmaceutical ingredients. Embryo development could also be examined in more detail. “Our method allows for a three-dimensional analysis in an elegant manner,” explains Pantazis. “This is a very nice example of how you can take a result from basic research and use it to provide a solution for a technically challenging issue.” Pantazis hopes the technique will be used more broadly in biomedical research in the future and is in talks with microscope manufacturers to implement this technology.
wavelength of light. ETH Zurich

New research by an international team including Keck Medicine of USC scientists is bringing the origins of ovarian cancer into sharper focus.

The study highlights the discovery of three genetic variants associated with mucinous ovarian carcinomas (MOCs), offering the first evidence of genetic susceptibility in this type of ovarian cancer. The research also suggests a link between common pathways of development between MOCs and colorectal cancer and for the first time identifies a gene called HOXD9, which turns genes on and off, and provides clues about the development of MOCs.

‘It remains a mystery where these cancers come from,’ said Simon Gayther, Ph.D., professor in preventive medicine, Keck School of Medicine of USC, corresponding author of the international genome-wide association study (GWAS). ‘By finding these genetic markers, we begin to understand more about the biology of the disease itself. This study tells us more about the biology of ovarian cancer from the early development stage than most research has.’

Ovarian cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer in American women and seventh most common cancer in women throughout the world (World Health Organization). In 2015, more than 14,000 American women will die of ovarian cancer, according to the American Cancer Society.

Most ovarian cancers have low survival rates, typically because of the misunderstanding of symptoms and discovery of the cancer in later, less treatable stages. ‘Although MOCs are a less common type of ovarian cancer with generally good prognosis when diagnosed in early stages, they are twice as likely to be resistant to treatment at later stages,’ said Andrew Berchuck, M.D., director of gynecologic oncology at Duke University Cancer Institute, and senior author of the study. ‘Our results will contribute to the identification of women at greatest risk of developing the disease with the long-term goal of prevention.’

The association analysis was based on 1,644 women diagnosed with MOC and more than 21,000 women without ovarian cancer. The research was conducted as part of the Collaborative Oncological Gene-environment Study (COGS), launched in 2009 with the goal of determining risks of breast, ovarian and prostate cancer. EurekAlert