Health

Geneticist Elaine Ostrander runs a comparative-genomics lab that examines dog DNA to understand better the traits that might aid understanding of human diseases.

Harvard researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute find that aspirin therapy can extend the life of colorectal cancer patients whose tumors carry a mutation in a key gene, but it has no effect on patients who lack the mutation.

HMS Professor John Mekalanos, an expert on cholera, suggested Oct. 22 that relief workers and peacekeepers from cholera-endemic countries be treated with antibiotics before serving in cholera-free countries, as a way to avoid a repeat of the post-earthquake cholera epidemic in Haiti, which has killed thousands.

In a critical breakthrough in unraveling how molecular “motors” ferry proteins and nutrients through cells, Harvard scientists have produced high-resolution images that show how the chemical “foot” of dynein — one of the most complex, but least understood such motors — binds to microtubules, the cellular structures it travels on.

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.

Researchers at Harvard University and the SETI Institute are proposing a new spin on the giant-impact model to match the observed composition of the moon and its relationship to Earth.

In his new book, I. Glenn Cohen, a Harvard Law School assistant professor and a Radcliffe Fellow, explores the lucrative and legal dimensions of the growing practice of traveling to another country for health care.

In recent years Harvard investigators have discovered that breast tumors are influenced by more than just the cancer cells within them.

Models of low-cost, high-quality health care are cause for hope that disparities in treatment between U.S. whites and minorities can be closed, said speakers at a University-wide symposium on Oct. 11.

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.

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.

Every 90 seconds, a mother dies in pregnancy or of childbirth complications — a tragic statistic, but one that may drive efforts to improve health care in developing countries, said public health specialists in a Harvard talk.

Arnold Arboretum Director William “Ned” Friedman and freshmen from his “Getting to Know Darwin” seminar went to the home of a pigeon fancier. “Darwin not only wrote about pigeons, he bred them himself,” Friedman said.

Scientists have long known the main proteins that lead to the development of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), respectively. Now research shows that these two motor neuron diseases likely share a pathway that leads to the development of disease.

Flipping a newly discovered molecular switch in white fat cells enabled mice to eat a high-calorie diet without becoming obese or developing the inflammation that causes insulin resistance, report Harvard scientists from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Professor Charles Langmuir worked for 10 years on an update of “How to Build a Habitable Planet,” a textbook published in 1985 by famed geoscientist Wallace Broecker.

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.

Sugary cereals, oversized soft drinks, and quarter-pound cheeseburgers are among the unhealthy food choices kids face daily. Junk food, most of it highly processed, and sugar-sweetened beverages are major contributors to the childhood obesity epidemic.

Researchers have been able to take control of tiny, transparent worms by manipulating neurons in their brains, using precisely targeted pulses of laser light.

Elizabeth Spelke, a professor of psychology, discussed research on how humans develop navigational skills in an event at the Barker Center.

Harvard researchers have found that a new investigation of tissues and signaling pathways in finches’ beaks reveals surprising flexibility in the birds’ evolutionary tool kit.

Scholars and public health experts gathered at the Harvard School of Public Health to examine Brazil’s progress toward meeting the United Nations’ Millennium Development goals, and to see if there are lessons that can be applied to other countries.

In a series of experiments, Harvard researchers found that people who make quick decisions act less selfishly than those who deliberate.

With childhood obesity now affecting 17 percent of American children, the nation is rallying around the concept that serious action is required. Harvard researchers have identified some key triggers for obesity in early childhood.

Researchers at Harvard Medical School and Harvard-affiliated Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center have found that a type of immune cell plays a role in guarding against obesity, diabetes, and metabolic disease.

Researchers at Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital have pinpointed when seemingly innocuous skin pigment cells mutate into melanoma.

According to a study by researchers at Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital, women who took ibuprofen or acetaminophen two or more days per week had an increased risk of hearing loss.

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.

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.

A research team led by Martin Nowak has developed a technique for modeling the effects of various HIV treatments and for predicting whether the treatments will cause the virus to develop resistance.