Health

The squishiness of cancer cells

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Cells are tiny, but what they can reveal about our health is profound.

A misshapen nucleus is bad news. For any given cell, the nucleus — the home of most of a cell’s genetic material — generally takes a fairly consistent shape. But when things go wrong and disease takes hold, the nucleus can become deformed.

UCLA’s Amy Rowat explains how an enlarged nucleus is a telltale sign of something gone awry. Corrupted cells with cancerous leanings take on a different texture to healthy cells. They are softer and more malleable, or, as Amy puts it, more “squishy.”

Her research investigates the texture and squishiness of cells in our body, which can have a huge impact on treatments for cancer and genetic disorders. Using tiny instruments, this change in cellular flexibility can be used to diagnose disease, and could one day help determine which treatments might be most suitable for each patient.

While the minutia of a nucleus may initially seem too tiny to focus on if we’re seeking to understand something as complex as cancer, the ‘squishiness’ of a cell may open up a vast array of innovations and breakthroughs. The significance of basic research is just as consequential as applied research. It seeks to answer larger, fundamental questions and offers the possibility of finding answers with wide ranging effects. Sometimes starting with a broader set of questions can lead to a variety of discoveries whose full impact cannot be known at the outset. A collaboration with the UCLA medical school means Rowat’s work could have a meaningful clinical impact on the study and treatment of cancer and other diseases.

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The Next Frontier of Medicine

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Following your gut takes on a whole new meaning as scientists find relationships between the brain and gut bacteria.

The next frontier of medicine isn’t in the depths of an Amazon jungle or in an air-conditioned lab; it’s in the rich and mysterious bacterial swamp of your gut. Long viewed as an enemy within, bacteria in the body have been subjected to a century-long war in which antibiotics have been the medical weapon of choice. But today, the scientific consensus about our body’s relationship with the trillions of microbes that call it home—collectively known as the microbiome—is changing dramatically. From potentially shaping our personalities to fighting obesity, the bacteria in our bellies play a much stronger role in our overall health than we once thought.

Developments in sequencing technology in the last decade have allowed scientists to better understand gut bacteria, and recent studies have shed light on how our digestive systems may mold brain structure when we’re young and influence our moods, feelings, and behavior when we’re adults. Scientists experimenting on mice have found links between gut bacteria and conditions similar to autism and anxiety in humans.

While it’s still early, the implications of better understanding how gut bacteria impacts our minds and bodies could change the way doctors treat myriad conditions, says Michael A. Fischbach, a microbiologist at UC San Francisco (UCSF). “If we use history as a guide, a lot of ideas probably won’t work out,” Fischbach says. “But even if one of them does, it’s a huge deal.”

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A (super cute) defender against asthma and allergies

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A UCSF-led study found that a child’s risk for developing allergies and asthma is reduced when they are exposed in early infancy to a dog in the household. It has to do with the type of dust indoor/outdoor dogs carry in.

The results were obtained in studies of mice challenged with allergens after earlier exposure to dust from homes with dogs, but the results also are likely to explain the reduced allergy risk among children raised with dogs from birth.

The scientists also identified a specific bacterial species (Lactobacillus johnsonii) within the gut that is critical to protecting the airways against both allergens and viral respiratory infection. When they fed this bacteria alone to mice, they found it could prevent airway inflammation due to allergens or even respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection. Severe RSV infection in infancy is associated with elevated asthma risk.

[Image: Tasuku and his BFF, a french bulldog named Muu.]

Herding cells…with electricity!

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Herding cells
Herding cells

Researchers at UC Berkeley have managed to use an electric field to herd a flock of cells.

At the moment, It’s still a very blunt tool, but the scientists hope it can be refined and used to help wounds heal. This is an exciting step in the direction of “smart bandages” — using an electrical stimulation to help heal wounds. (The researchers used the epithelial cells, the same cells that bind together to form skin, kidneys and other organs.)

Electricity has been used before to direct individual cells (the technical term for this is galvanotaxis), but how it influences the collective motion of cells was still unclear.

“The ability to govern the movement of a mass of cells has great utility as a scientific tool in tissue engineering,” said study senior author Michel Maharbiz, UC Berkeley associate professor of electrical engineering and computer sciences. “Instead of manipulating one cell at a time, we could develop a few simple design rules that would provide a global cue to control a collection of cells.”

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Experiments in Happiness

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Being happy isn’t always easy.  Humans are complicated creatures and although our brains might be capable of performing wildly complex tasks, they can also sabotage our well-being.

“Not everyone is going to be naturally happy all the time,” Sonja Lyubomirsky suggests. As a professor of psychology at UC Riverside, she has devoted her career to the study of happiness: what is it, what it does, and why does it exist.

Her studies have investigated two components of happiness: cognitive (a sense of satisfaction with life) and emotional (the raw experience of joy). For many of us, experiencing these two components simultaneously is rare, but according to Lyubomirsky, “there are certain strategies we can all use to maximize our happiness.”

To uncover these strategies, Lyubomirsky and her team designed a series of experiments called “happiness interventions.”

In one of these studies, one set of volunteers was asked to keep a gratitude journal once a week, while another set was asked to do so three times a week. Those who counted their blessings once a week exhibited a marked increase in happiness – but those who did so three times a week displayed no such uptick. Lyubomirsky speculates that for the latter group, gratitude became a chore or, worse, they ran out of things to be grateful for. The initial burst of happiness was thus deflated by monotony and irritation.

In fact, much of Lyubomirsky’s work explodes common myths and misunderstandings about happiness.

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Fake olive oil? To get the benefits of olive oil, it’s got to be fresh

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Olive Oil - Olive Oyl

The Mediterranean diet has become a darling of medical researchers.  It’s known for its veggies and grains, limited amounts of meat, and a good helping of olive oil.

Researchers believe that olive oil is the key to the superior health benefits of the Mediterranean diet.

“The health benefits of olive oil are 99% related to the presence of the phenolic compounds, not the oil itself,” explains Nasir Malik, a researcher at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. [1]

Polyphenols decrease heart disease risk factors by lowering blood pressure and cholesterol, reducing blood clotting and improving the health of artery linings. They also reduce cancer risk by lowering inflammation and cellular proliferation. They even reduce microbial activity and infections.

Sounds great, right? But here’s the catch…

When tested, polyphenols were surprisingly low in most commercially available olive oils.

It turns out that 69% of the “extra-virgin” olive oil imported into the U.S. has been shown to be substandard, according to a study out of UC Davis.

Often, the oil is just too old. It’s shipped from place to place before it’s imported and usually isn’t stored well.  By the time it arrives in the U.S., Many of the heart-health compounds have degraded and fizzled out.

Here’s what to look for:

  • Harvest date on the label: The bottle should have a “harvest date” instead of a “sell by” label. The olives should be harvested within the past year.
  • The container: Buy olive oil in a container that protects it from the light (dark glass or tin).
  • The taste & smell: If the oil stings the back of your throat a little that tells you the beneficial polyphenols really are there. High-quality olive oil is pungent and often described as “grassy” or “peppery.”

The brands that failed to meet the extra virgin olive oil standards, according to this study: Bertolli, Carapelli, Colavita, Star, Pompeian. [2]

The real deal: California Olive Ranch, Cobram Estate, Lucini. (Kirkland Organic, Lucero (Ascolano), McEvoy Ranch Organic are also noted by Eat Grown Local.)

Scientists Call for Screening Mammography Every Two Years for Most Women

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Adoption of new guidelines recommending screening mammography every two years for women ages 50 to 74 would result in breast cancer screening that is equally effective, while saving the United States $4.3 billion a year in health care costs, according to a study led by UC San Francisco.

The study compares three possible mammography screening strategies with a model of current U.S. screening practices.

The article appears in the Feb. 4 edition of Annals of Internal Medicine.

The authors call for the adoption of guidelines developed in 2009 by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF). Under those guidelines, in addition to biennial screening for women age 50 to 74, women age 40 to 49 would be screened according to other risk factors, and women 75 and older would be screened depending on the presence or absence of other diseases.

The study was led by Laura J. Esserman, MD, MBA, professor of surgery and radiology at UCSF and an internationally known leader in the field of breast cancer.

“The USPSTF guidelines are based on the best scientific evidence to date,” said Esserman, director of the Carol Franc Buck Breast Care Center at the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Care Center. “What we need now is a better way to assess breast cancer risk and implement a more risk-based approach to screening. We have demonstrated that the resources for doing this are already in the system. We should redirect them to learning, enabling change and improving outcomes.”

$7.8 Billion in Breast Cancer Screenings

According to the authors’ estimate, approximately 70 percent of women in the U.S. were screened for breast cancer in 2010, at a cost of $7.8 billion. Some women are screened annually, some biennially, and some are screened on an irregular basis.

 

The scientists compared this current picture of breast cancer screening with three simulated models:

1. Annual screening of 85 percent of women age 40 to 84, in accordance with recommendations from the American Cancer Society and many other policymaking organizations, at an annual estimated cost of $10.1 billion;

2. Biennial screening of 85 percent of women age 50 to 70, in line with guidelines used in many European countries, at an annual estimated cost of $2.6 billion; and

3. Screening in accordance with USPSTF recommendations, which the authors estimate would cost $3.5 billion per year at a screening rate of 85 percent.

“Over the last decade, in study after study, it has become very clear that – apart from limited, specific high-risk groups – biennial screening is as effective as annual screening mammography,” said Esserman. “At the same time, annual screening is associated with a greater likelihood of false positive results, which have an adverse impact on women’s well-being and quality of life. From the viewpoint of women’s health, the USPSTF screening recommendations make sense.

“We can go one step further and learn who is at risk for what kind of breast cancer, and over time, further tailor screening by adjusting the age to start and frequency as well as include recommendations for prevention,” Esserman said.

Lead author Cristina O’Donoghue, MD, currently at the University of Illinois at Chicago but with UCSF at the time of the study, noted that the billions of dollars saved from avoiding less-effective mammography screening could be used to improve women’s health.

“We could increase women’s participation in screening, improve routine assessment of breast cancer risk and referral services for women at high risk, offer better genetic counseling for women with a family history of breast cancer and work on improving the quality of screening, with an emphasis on higher-quality mammography read by specialized mammographers,” said O’Donoghue. “These would be only some of the potential benefits of using our health care resources more intelligently.”

Co-authors of the study are Martin Eklund, PhD, of UCSF and Elissa Ozanne, PhD, of Dartmouth College.

The study was supported by the University of California and the Safeway Foundation.

UCSF is a leading university dedicated to promoting health worldwide through advanced biomedical research, graduate-level education in the life sciences and health professions, and excellence in patient care.

A whole new meaning to “Deadhead”

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Above is a representation of former Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart’s brain.  It will be used on his upcoming tour as both a visual and as a way for his mind to power the stage’s lighting.  Hart explains:

“I was just looking at it and watching it fire, and you see the colors moving and the different rhythm patterns and realizing, that’s me!”

We specify “representation” because the visuals are part of a collaboration between Hart and UCSF researcher Adam Gazzaley.  Gazzaley is quick to say that the images are stylized for the sake of special effects, but the method in which to read Hart’s brain in real time has much larger scientific and medical implications.

Read more here →

Can a video game rejuvenate an elderly brain?

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Although there are a lot of video games out there that claim to help your brain, most have not been evaluated for this purpose.  A new study at UCSF finds that playing a brain training game for one month can rejuvenate cognitive control for people in their 60s, 70s and 80s.

Neuroscientist Adam Gazzaley worked with video game developers to create NeuroRacer, a game which has users perform two task simultaneously (using a joystick to navigate a car and hitting a button whenever the player sees a particular road sign).

After training, their multitasking ability improved beyond the levels of 20-year-olds.  They also got better at remembering information and paying attention.

As people get older, they tend to adopt “more conservative strategies” when it comes to evaluating information and taking action (according to David Meyer, University of Michigan). But they haven’t necessarily lost the ability to act quickly: the video game may help in part because it simply encourages older people to adopt a less conservative strategy.

Read more on NPR →

Eat. Think. And be wary.

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Bologna dropped on a kitchen floor can bear an unsettling resemblance to Petri dishes containing Salmonella bacteria.

Eat. Think. And be wary.

Most folks know the “five-second rule,” an unwritten convention that says if you drop a food item on the floor it may be picked up, dusted off and safely consumed within that designated amount of time.

Apparently this assumes microbes need at least six seconds to make the jump.

In recent years, the scientific integrity of the five-second rule has come under occasional empirical scrutiny.

Read more about the research here →