Treat an upset tummy with
curd
A probiotic bacterium which is
used to treat irritable bowel syndrome has been found to soothe gut bacterial
infections caused by salmonella, paving the way for potential relieffrom
foodborne illnesses that affect millions of people annually, a new study has
revealed.
Manuela Raffatellu, assistant professor of microbiology and molecular genetics, and colleagues at UC Irvine and the University of Washington identified how a probiotic strain of E. coli reduces salmonella colonization by competing with this pathogen for iron, an essential nutrient that salmonella acquires in the gut in order to replicate at high levels.
In fact, the researchers discovered that the E. coli strain called Nissle 1917 acquires iron more efficiently than does salmonella.
As a result, salmonella counts in the gut decrease when Nissle is administered during infection.
"Although we focused on salmonella, our findings suggest that this approach can be effective against other gut bacterial pathogens that need iron to grow," Raffatellu, who's also a member of UC Irvine's Institute for Immunology, said.
"By understanding how these 'bad bugs' get nutrients, we can further study methods to eradicate them," the researcher said.
The study is published in the journal Cell Host and Microbe.
Source: www.timesofindia.com
13.08.2013
Cancer sufferers
families too at risk
A study has claimed that when kids were diagnosed of
having some kind of cancer at age 18 or younger, the risk to their parents,
siblings, or children for childhood cancer
doubled.
The study, led by Joshua Schiffman, M.D., medical director of Huntsman Cancer Institute's High Risk Pediatric Cancer Clinic and a pediatric hematologist/oncologist in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Utah, examined the family medical history of 4,482 children diagnosed with cancer over a 43-year period to determine the cancer risk in their relatives.
The research team found that if the cancer diagnosis came when the child was age 4 or less, the risk to close relatives for childhood cancer increased almost four times.
The study, led by Joshua Schiffman, M.D., medical director of Huntsman Cancer Institute's High Risk Pediatric Cancer Clinic and a pediatric hematologist/oncologist in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Utah, examined the family medical history of 4,482 children diagnosed with cancer over a 43-year period to determine the cancer risk in their relatives.
The research team found that if the cancer diagnosis came when the child was age 4 or less, the risk to close relatives for childhood cancer increased almost four times.
Lead author Karen Curtin,
Ph.D., a genetic epidemiologist
and UPDB assistant director, said that because the data came from the UPDB, the
assessment of family history in our study does not rely on self- or
family-reported medical history.
She said that self-reporting
of family medical history depends on an individual's memory, while their data
comes from the statewide UtahCancer Registry that records nearly all
cancer cases, which reduces possible errors in reporting family cancers.
The team also assessed known
inherited genetic syndromes in adult relatives of pediatric cancer patients.
They found cancers associated
with Li-Fraumeni Syndrome (LFS) seemed to be driving the increased risk to
relatives in families with a history of cancer.
Schiffman said that not all
children's cancers are hereditary but the numbers in the study suggest that the
proportion of hereditary childhood cancers may be significantly higher than the
5-10 per cent generally cited in adult hereditary cancers, and likely even more
than 20 per cent.
The data analyzed in this
study indicated that outcomes for pediatric cancer patients are worse in
families with a history of cancer.
The findings have been
published online in the International Journal
of Cancer.
Source: www.timesofindia.com
13.08.2013
The only time
you should look down at someone is when you are helping them up
Jesse Jackson
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