Researchers supported by the NIH Common Fund have discovered that genetic differences linked to a wide variety of diseases, including many adult-onset diseases, influence how genes are turned on, or activated, during fetal development. These findings may help to explain why some environmental exposures in utero or during early childhood are known to increase risk of diseases that produce symptoms years or even decades later.
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- Researchers Identify Gene Mutations Underlying Risk for Most Common Form of Parkinson’s Disease Parkinson's disease, which affects about 1.5 million Americans, is a progressive neurologic disorder caused by the degeneration of nerve cells in the portion of the brain that controls movement....
- Medicare: Scientists discover link among spectrum of childhood diseases An international collaboration of scientists, including researchers at the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS), a part of the National Institutes of Health, has identified a genetic mutation that causes a rare childhood disease characterized predominantly by inflammation and fat loss....
- Common Fund announces new programs New programs exploring novel approaches to cell-to-cell communication and understanding undiagnosed diseases, which represent challenges or scientific opportunities for a wide array of health research, are the latest priorities for the National Institutes of Health Common Fund. The funding was announced today by NIH Director Francis S. Collins, M.D., Ph.D., after he received broad community […]...
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- Spontaneous gene glitches linked to autism risk with older dads Researchers have turned up a new clue to the workings of a possible environmental factor in: fathers were four times more likely than mothers to transmit tiny, spontaneous mutations to their children with the disorders. Moreover, the number of such transmitted genetic glitches increased with paternal age. The discovery may help to explain earlier evidence […]...
- Therapeutics for Rare and Neglected Diseases Program announces next round of drug development projects Researchers will begin drug development projects for rare and neglected diseases that include potential treatments for a musculoskeletal disorder, a cognitive dysfunction disorder, a virus that affects the central nervous system of newborns, a parasitic worm infection, a form of muscular dystrophy and a rare lung disease....
- Researchers identify genetic cause of new vascular disease Clinical researchers at the National Institutes of Health’s Undiagnosed Diseases Program (UDP) have identified the genetic cause of a rare and debilitating vascular disorder not previously explained in the medical literature. The adult-onset condition is associated with progressive and painful arterial calcification affecting the lower extremities, yet spares patients’ coronary arteries. The new disease finding […]...
- Scientists show how gene variant linked to ADHD could operate A study using mice provides insight into how a specific receptor subtype in the brain could play a role in increasing a person’s risk for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The research, conducted by the Intramural Research Program (IRP) at the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health, could also […]...
- Scientists identify gene that could hold the key to muscle repair Researchers have long questioned why patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) tend to manage well through childhood and adolescence, yet succumb to their disease in early adulthood, or why elderly people who lose muscle strength following bed rest find it difficult or impossible to regain. Now, researchers at the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal […]...
- Study Finds Link Between Preeclampsia and Reduced Thyroid Function Women who experience preeclampsia, a serious complication of pregnancy, may have an increased risk for reduced thyroid functioning later in life, report a team of researchers from the National Institutes of Health and other institutions. The analysis combined two separate studies which each suggested a link between preeclampsia and reduced thyroid function....
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- Researchers identify gene variant in Proteus syndrome A team of researchers has identified the genetic mutation that causes Proteus syndrome, a rare disorder in which tissue and bone grows massively out of proportion. The discovery, which has implications for potential drug therapies and even cancer, appears in the July 27, 2011, early online edition of the New England Journal of Medicine. The […]...
- Medicare, Gene regulator in brain’s executive hub tracked across lifespan For the first time, scientists have tracked the activity, across the lifespan, of an environmentally responsive regulatory mechanism that turns genes on and off in the brain’s executive hub. Among key findings of the study by National Institutes of Health scientists: genes implicated in schizophrenia and autism turn out to be members of a select […]...
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