Proof Positive

UTMB professor of neurology Claudio Soto announced in a paper published in the journal Cell that his team, using a method they call “protein misfolding cyclic amplification” (PMCA), had completely confirmed Stanley Prusiner's prion hypothesis by causing a degenerative brain disease in normal lab animals with prions created entirely in a test tube. Read more...

Muscle Bind

When it comes to muscle metabolism, the phrase “use it or lose it” is more than a cliché. Unused muscles don’t stick around; the body breaks them down and uses their proteins for other purposes. For an astronaut encountering weightlessness for months at a time—the loss of muscle mass can become a major problem. UTMB metabolism researchers have been working to find a way to fight this predicament. Read More...

A Cure Worse than the Disease?

To treat men with prostate cancer, physicians often employ “androgen-deprivation therapy,” which decreases bone density and increases the chance of bone fracture. That may change, though, thanks to a study by a group of UTMB researchers with the Sealy Center for Aging. Read more...

Children, mice, rats, and Ritalin

Although methylphenidate—the generic name for drugs including Ritalin, Concerta, and Metadate CD—has been prescribed for more than fifty years, surprisingly few studies have examined its possible side effects. The first study addressing the potential chromosome-breaking effects associated with methylphenidate prescribed to children was organized by UTMB researchers. Read more...

Cyclops and cancer

Last fall, UTMB assistant professor Jingwu Xie (pronounced “see”) showed that cyclopamine can interfere with the sonic hedgehog pathway’s ability to cause cancer. In an experiment that marked the first successful drug treatment in experimental animals of the most common cancer to afflict human beings—the skin cancer known as basal cell carcinoma (BCC)—Xie used orally administered cyclopamine to dramatically retard tumor development in mice. Read more...