Featured series 
Tag: Massachusetts General Hospital
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Nation & World
New genetic links for Crohn’s, colitis
Researchers find that they have the necessary starting material to understand the pathways that contribute to Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, and they also have a framework to better appreciate that these may not be two distinct diseases, but rather collections of many different diseases.
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Nation & World
The narrative of cancer
Medical experts are coming to see cancer not as a disease of cells or even of genes, but as an “organismal disease,” Siddhartha Mukherjee, author of the Pulitzer Prize–winning cancer history “The Emperor of All Maladies,” told a Harvard Medical School audience on Oct. 11.
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Nation & World
Sports head injuries need definitions
A Harvard study of sports programs at Brown University, Dartmouth College, and Virginia Tech finds that the way the head injury commonly called concussion is usually diagnosed varies greatly and may not be the best way to determine who is at risk for future problems.
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Nation & World
The early days of discovery
A recipient of this year’s Nobel Prize in chemistry investigated the workings of cell receptors, the basis of his groundbreaking research involving the complex process of how the body’s cells communicate and interact, while a young medical resident at Harvard.
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Nation & World
Stem cells need recovery time, too
A new study describes the mechanism behind impaired muscle repair during aging and a strategy that may help rejuvenate aging tissue by manipulating the environment in which muscle stem cells reside.
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Nation & World
Health in the balance
In research, treatment, and outreach, researchers from Harvard Medical School are taking on the childhood obesity epidemic in the United States. This is the first in a three-part series.
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Nation & World
Mapping a genetic world beyond genes
Most of the DNA alterations that are tied to disease do not alter protein-coding genes, but rather the “switches” that control them. Characterizing these switches is one of many goals of the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) project.
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Nation & World
Tapping the body to fight disease
Researcher Biju Parekkadan is developing devices that employ cell therapy to help people with organ failure.
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Nation & World
Vitamin D’s impact on infection
A study led by Harvard researchers of Mongolian schoolchildren supports the possibility that daily vitamin D supplementation can reduce the risk of respiratory infections in winter.
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Nation & World
Estrogen and female anxiety
Some women’s vulnerability to anxiety and mood disorders may be explained by their estrogen levels, according to new research by Harvard and Emory University neuroscientists.
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Nation & World
Alcohol abuse after weight loss surgery?
Experts on the use of bariatric surgery for the treatment of obesity gathered at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study earlier this month for a two-day seminar examining new evidence that stomach surgery for the treatment of obesity has unexpected side effects, including an increased incidence of alcohol abuse among patients.
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Nation & World
When skin cancer cells resist drug treatment
Harvard researchers have found that although tailored drugs can eradicate melanoma cells in the lab, they often produce only partial, temporary responses in patients. Researchers have now learned that normal cells that reside within the tumor, part of the tumor microenvironment, may supply factors that help cancer cells grow and survive despite the presence of…
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Nation & World
Heart attack worsens atherosclerosis
Researchers at Harvard Medical School and Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital have found that the body’s immune response to heart attacks actually worsens atherosclerosis, increasing future heart attack risk, according to a study published in the journal Nature.
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Nation & World
Jain receives 2012 Science of Oncology Award
Rakesh Jain received the 2012 Science of Oncology award from the American Society of Clinical Oncology, recognizing his three decades of pioneering work in the field of oncology.
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Nation & World
What makes a worm say ‘yuck’
Researchers at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital have uncovered a new way that animals detect pathogens, by detecting disruptions of critical cellular processes.
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Nation & World
Ragon study is honored
A study by researchers at the Ragon Institute of Massachusetts General Hospital, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Harvard is among those chosen to receive Top 10 Clinical Research Achievement Awards from the Clinical Research Foundation.
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Nation & World
Size matters in drug delivery
A new study led by researchers at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and Massachusetts General Hospital has found that normalizing blood vessels within tumors, which improves the delivery of standard chemotherapy drugs, can actually block the delivery of larger nanotherapy molecules.
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Nation & World
Big advance against cystic fibrosis
Harvard stem cell researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital have taken a critical step toward discovering in the relatively near future a drug to control cystic fibrosis, a fatal lung disease that claims about 500 lives each year, with 1,000 new cases diagnosed annually.
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Nation & World
Writing the book of cancer knowledge
The Cancer Cell Line Encyclopedia is an academic-industry collaboration resource that marries deeply detailed cancer genome data with predictors of drug response, information that could lead to refinements in cancer clinical trials and future treatments.
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Nation & World
Experimental drug improves Cushing’s disease
A new investigational drug significantly reduced urinary cortisol levels and improved symptoms of Cushing’s disease in the largest clinical study of this endocrine disorder ever conducted.
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Nation & World
Alzheimer’s-like changes in the brain
A study by researchers at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital indicates that the inhaled anesthetic isoflurane impairs learning and memory in mammalian brains by damaging mitochondria, a finding that suggests the anesthetic desflurane may be a better choice for Alzheimer’s patients and others susceptible to cognitive dysfunction.
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Nation & World
Cells that kill HIV-infected cells
Harvard researchers find that a subpopulation of the immune cells targeted by HIV may play an important role in controlling viral loads after initial infection, potentially helping to determine how quickly infection will progress.
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Nation & World
Pain relief for patients in Uganda
A collaboration between anesthesiologists at Massachusetts General Hospital and overworked doctors at an African hospital provides training in a technique that can soothe patients during surgical recoveries.
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Nation & World
Hyman to lead Broad research center
Steven E. Hyman, a Harvard-trained neuroscientist, University provost for a decade, and the former director of the National Institute of Mental Health, has been named director of the Broad Institute’s Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, effective Feb. 15.
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Nation & World
Secrets of ancient Chinese remedy revealed
For roughly 2,000 years, Chinese herbalists have treated malaria using a root extract, commonly known as chang shan, from a type of hydrangea that grows in Tibet and Nepal. More recent studies suggest that halofuginone, a compound derived from this extract’s bioactive ingredient, could be used to treat many autoimmune disorders as well. Now, researchers…
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Nation & World
The search for life’s stirrings
As science wrestles with the problem of how life arose on Earth, hindsight shows that seemingly intractable obstacles can have simple, even elegant solutions, said Nobel laureate Jack Szostak.
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Nation & World
Blood test for depression?
The initial assessment of a blood test to help diagnose major depressive disorder indicates it may become a useful clinical tool.
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Nation & World
Triumphs against smallpox, polio, AIDS
Harvard researchers have been at the forefront of many battles against devastating diseases, leading pivotal breakthroughs against scourges from 1800 to the present.
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Nation & World
Decoding keys to a healthy life
Now 74 years young, the Harvard Study of Adult Development continues to yield a treasure trove of data about how people behave, and change — including predictions of strong indicators to a happy life.
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Nation & World
Enlightened eating
Color-coded food labeling and adjusting the way food items are positioned in display cases encouraged healthy choices in a large hospital cafeteria in a study by MGH researchers.
