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New nanoparticle could provide simple early diagnosis of many diseases

Georgia Tech and Emory University researchers have created a new nanoparticle that could someday act as a virtually all-purpose diagnostic tool to detect many inflammatory diseases in their earliest stages, including heart disease, Alzheimer's, heart disease and arthritis. The specially-designed nanoparticles seek out hydrogen peroxide (thought to be overproduced in trace amounts in the early stages of most diseases that involve some sort of chronic inflammation in the body), and emit light when they encounter it.

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Keywords: nanoparticle, provide, simple, diagnosis, many, diseases, diagnosi, disease

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1. Advance in understanding of blood pressure gene could lead to new treatments
   02-04-2007 · EurekAlert!
   Research by scientists at UCL (University College London) has clearly demonstrated for the first time the structure and function of a gene crucial to the regulation of blood pressure. The discovery could be important in the search for new treatments for illnesses such as heart disease, the UK's biggest killer. In a paper published online today in Nature Medicine, the team, led by Professor Patrick Vallance and Dr James Leiper, UCL Department of Medicine, reveal the role of the human gene dimethylarginine dimethylaminohydrolase (DDAH), showing that loss of DDAH activity disrupts nitric oxide (NO) production. NO is critical in the regulation of blood pressure, nervous system functions and the immune system. The role of DDAH is to break down modified amino acids (Asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA) and monomethyl arginine (L-NMMA)) that are produced by the body and have been shown to inhibit NO synthase. These molecules accumulate in various disease states including diabetes, renal failure and pulmonary and systemic hypertension, and their concentration in plasma (the fluid component of blood) is strongly predicative of cardiovascular disease and death. In a healthy human body, the majority of ADMA is eliminated through active metabolism by DDAH. Scientists have hypothesised that if DDAH function is impaired, NO production is reduced, and that this could be an important feature of increased cardiovascular risk. To examine this pathway in more detail, the researchers deleted the DDAH gene in mice. These mice went on to develop hypertension, or high blood pressure. They also designed specific inhibitors (small molecules) which bind to the active site of human DDAH. These small molecule inhibitors also induced hypertension in mice, confirming the importance of DDAH in the regulation of blood pressure. Dr Leiper, UCL Medicine, said: “These genetic and chemical approaches to disrupt DDAH showed remarkably consistent results, and provide compelling evidence that loss of DDAH function increases the concentration of ADMA and thereby disrupts vascular NO signalling. “There has been considerable scientific interest in this pathway and the role of ADMA as a novel risk factor, but so far there's been little evidence to support the idea that it's a cause of disease, rather than just a marker. Genes and their pathways are crucial to our understanding of cardiovascular disease and a better understanding of DDAH-1 could lead to important new treatments. “It could help us to establish if genetic variation predisposes certain people to these diseases, or whether environmental factors exert some of their effects through modulation of DDAH activity. “Our research also shows that this pathway could be harnessed therapeutically to limit production of NO in certain situations where too much nitric oxide is a bad thing; for example, hypotension and septic shock. These are some of the biggest problems in intensive care medicine and there is a huge unmet need for drug treatments.” The study, which was carried out at UCL's Rayne Institute, was funded by grants from the British Heart Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the Medical Research Council. Professor Jeremy Pearson, Associate Medical Director of the British Heart Foundation, said: "The unexpected finding in the 1980s that a simple gas, nitric oxide (NO), is made by cells in the blood vessel wall and is a powerful control of blood vessel relaxation led to the award of the Nobel Prize in 1998 to its discoverers. "More recently, there has been increasing evidence that impairment of NO production is likely to be an important factor in the development of heart and circulatory disease, but the mechanisms responsible are not fully understood. "This study suggests for the first time that the loss of the activity of the enzyme DDAH-1 leads to reduced NO production and may cause heart and circulatory disease. These findings are likely to be important in the search for new ways to optimise the health of our blood vessels." ### Notes for Editors 1. For more information, please contact Ruth Metcalfe in the UCL Media Relations Office on tel: +44 (0)20 7679 9739, mobile: +44 (0)7990 675 947, out of hours: +44 (0)7917 271 364, e-mail: r.metcalfe@ucl.ac.uk2. 'Disruption of methylarginine metabolism impairs vascular homeostasis' is published in the February issue of the journal Nature Medicine. Advance online publication is embargoed to 18.00 GMT (13.00 US Eastern) Sunday 4 February 2007. Journalists can obtain copies of the paper by contacting the UCL Media Relations Office.3. The study was funded by the British Heart Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the Medical Research Council. About UCL Founded in 1826, UCL was the first English university established after Oxford and Cambridge, the first to admit students regardless of race, class, religion or gender, and the first to provide systematic teaching of law, architecture and medicine. In the government's most recent Research Assessment Exercise, 59 UCL departments achieved top ratings of 5* and 5, indicating research quality of international excellence. UCL is the fourth-ranked UK university in the 2006 league table of the top 500 world universities produced by the Shanghai Jiao Tong University. UCL alumni include Mahatma Gandhi (Laws 1889, Indian political and spiritual leader); Jonathan Dimbleby (Philosophy 1969, writer and television presenter); Junichiro Koizumi (Economics 1969, Prime Minister of Japan); Lord Woolf (Laws 1954, Lord Chief Justice of England & Wales); Alexander Graham Bell (Phonetics 1860s, inventor of the telephone), and members of the band Coldplay.
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2. 'GreeneChip' -- New diagnostic tool that rapidly and accurately identifies multiple pathogens
   12-06-2006 · EurekAlert!
   Researchers in the Greene Infectious Disease Laboratory at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health and their colleagues in the WHO Global Laboratory Network have developed a new tool for pathogen surveillance and discovery -- the GreeneChip System. The GreeneChip is the first tool to provide comprehensive, differential diagnosis of infectious diseases, including those caused by viruses, bacteria, fungi or parasites.
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3. Scientists use nanoparticle to discover disease-causing proteins
   02-12-2007 · EurekAlert!
   A complex molecule and snake venom may provide researchers with a more reliable method of diagnosing human diseases and developing new drugs.
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4. New Mayo Clinic MRI technology enables noninvasive liver diagnoses
   05-22-2007 · EurekAlert!
   Two recent Mayo Clinic studies have found that magnetic resonance elastography (MRE), a new imaging technique invented at Mayo Clinic, is an accurate tool for non-invasive diagnosis of liver diseases. The findings will be presented this week at the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine Annual Meeting in Berlin, Germany, and Digestive Disease Week 2007 in Washington, D.C.
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5. Geriatric health conditions have major effect on half of all seniors
   08-07-2007 · EurekAlert!
   While much of the medical world focuses on the diagnosis and treatment of diseases, a new study from the University of Michigan Health System finds that half of all seniors have a geriatric condition that can affect their ability to engage in activities of daily living as much as diseases can. Yet these conditions often aren't recognized or treated because they don't fall into the category of a disease.
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6. New research may lead to earlier diagnosis and treatment of primary biliary cirrhosis in families
   09-10-2007 · EurekAlert!
   Mayo Clinic researchers have found that first-degree relatives (i.e., parents, siblings, children) of patients with primary biliary cirrhosis are more likely to have the biomarker of the disease in their blood. Armed with this new information, physicians could screen and assess first-degree relatives of PBC patients with a simple blood test, enabling them to diagnose and treat more patients before the disease causes irreversible liver damage. These findings were published in this month's issue of Hepatology.
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7. New research demonstrates potential diagnosis, treatment benefits
   01-10-2008 · EurekAlert!
   Studies published in the Jan. 10 edition of the New England Journal of Medicine are providing clues into the treatment and diagnosis of LAM, or lymphangioleiomyomatosis, a progressive and deadly lung disease that affects women in their childbearing years. There currently are no treatments for LAM and scientists estimate as many as 250,000 women may be going misdiagnosed or undiagnosed.
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8. Potent possibilities for parasite attack
   06-17-2007 · EurekAlert!
   A comparison of three parasite species that cause Leishmaniasis has identified a small number of genes, many new to biology, that will provide a framework to target the search for new treatments. Leishmaniasis is a devastating disease that affects about two million people each year and threatens one-fifth of the world's population and new treatments are desperately needed.
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9. Study finds young Africans suffering advanced HIV disease from delayed diagnosis
   02-08-2007 · EurekAlert!
   A new study suggests the effects of long-standing, undiagnosed HIV infection are hanging over a generation of adolescents in Zimbabwe, causing organ damage, chronic ill health, stunted growth, and other problems. The research demonstrates the need to reduce barriers to early testing and admission to care for these adolescents. It appears in the March 15 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases, currently available online.
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10. Model for predicting survival in liver patients has many applications but could be refined further
    03-01-2007 · EurekAlert!
    A review of the studies on the Model for End-Stage Liver Disease (MELD) found that it is an accurate predictor of survival of patients with a variety of liver diseases, is particularly useful in allocating organs for liver transplants, and can also be used to help determine the course of treatment in certain cases. However, it is possible to improve the accuracy of the model and efforts at refining will continue.
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