A father's stress can change his sperm

Children of stressed fathers are at greater risk of developing PTSD and depression, according to a new study.

Researchers found life's pressures can change the DNA of a man's sperm - leading to brain development changes in his yet unborn baby, a media reports.

It's widely known that a mother's environment during pregnancy, including factors such as poor diet, stress and infection, can negatively impact the offspring.

Learning how a father's behaviour and environment can impact his child's development could lead to the detection and prevention of many mental health disorders.

"Researchers have known for years that stress can increase the risk of mental disorders," a Professor of neuroscience told an online media. "What's interesting here is that we are finding inter-generational effects."

Researchers conducted a mice experiment to examine how a father's lifestyle impacts his children.

Previously, the team has found male mice experiencing chronic periods of mild stress passed down genetic coding for a less effective hormonal response to stress in children.

Three major hormones are released by the nervous system when the body is under stress. These are adrenaline, cortisol and norepinephrine. Collectively, these hormones send our bodies into 'fight or flight' mode, which is important to the body's ability to cope with the effects of stress.

Stress resulted in changes in sperms genetic material known as microRNA, which plays a key role in which genes become functional proteins.

These changes in stress reactivity have been linked to some mental disorders, including depression and PTSD.

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Finger Prick Blood Test May Help Detect Cancer

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 A simple finger prick blood test may be used to diagnose cancer, say scientists who have developed a new technology to detect disease biomarkers in the form of nucleic acids, the building blocks of all living organisms.

Nucleic acids consist of chains or sequences of bases stretching from just a few to millions of elements long. The exact order in which these bases are found, even over short distances, is strongly tied to their functions, and therefore can be used as direct indicators of what is going on inside cells and tissue.

For example, one family of these nucleic acids known as microRNAs are only about 20 bases long, but can signal a wide range of diseases, including cancer.

In the new technique, nanotechnology is used to determine whether a specific target nucleic acid sequence exists within a mixture, and to quantify it if it does through a simple electronic signature.

"If the sequence you are looking for is there, it forms a double helix with a probe we provide and you see a clear signal. If the sequence is not there, then there is not any signal," said Adam R Hall from Wake Forest Baptist Medical Centre in US.

"By simply counting the number of signals, you can determine how much of the target is around," said Mr Hall. In the study, researchers first demonstrated that the technology could effectively identify a specific sequence among a background of competing nucleic acids, and then applied their technique to one particular microRNA (mi-R155) known to indicate lung cancer in humans.

They showed that the approach could resolve the minute amount of microRNAs that can be found in patients. "We envision this as a potential first-line, noninvasive diagnostic to detect anything from cancer to the Ebola virus," said Hall.

"Although we are certainly at the early stages of the technology, eventually we could perform the test using a few drops of blood from a simple finger prick," Hall said.

The findings were published in the journal Nano Letters.

New way to regenerate heart tissue found.

In a discovery that may pave the way for regeneration of damaged heart tissue, scientists have successfully stimulated the mouse heart to grow new cells.

Researchers have shown that a subset of RNA molecules, called microRNAs, is important for cardiomyocyte cell proliferation during development and is sufficient to induce proliferation in cardiomyocytes in the adult heart.

The team found that the loss of the microRNA cluster miR302-367 in mice led to decreased cardiomyocyte cell proliferation during development.

In contrast, increased expression of the microRNA cluster in adult hearts led to a reactivation of proliferation in the normally non-reproducing adult cardiomyocytes.

This reactivation occurred, in part, through repression of a pathway called Hippo that governs cell proliferation and organ size.

“The Hippo pathway normally represses cell proliferation when it is turned on,” said Ed Morrisey, from the University of Pennsylvania.

“The cluster miR302-367 targets three of the major kinase components in the Hippo pathway, reducing pathway activity, which allows cardiomyocytes to re-enter the cell cycle and begin to regrow heart muscle. This is a case of repressing a repressor,” he said.

In adult mice, re-expression of the microRNA cluster reactivated the cell cycle in cardiomyocytes, resulting in reduced scar formation after an experimental myocardial infarction injury was induced in the mice.

There was also an increase in the number of heart muscle cells in these same mice.

However, long-term expression of more than several months of the microRNA cluster caused heart muscle cells to de-differentiation and become less functional.

“This suggested to us that persistent reactivation of the cell cycle in adult cardiomyocytes could be harmful and causes the heart to fail,” he said.

The investigators surmised that cardiomyocytes likely need to de-differentiate to divide, but they may lose their ability to contract over time.

“We overcame this limitation by injecting synthetic microRNAs with a short half-life called mimics into the mice,” he says.

Mimic treatment for seven days after cardiac infarction led to the desired increase in cardiomyocyte proliferation and re-growth of new heart muscle, which resulted in decreased fibrosis and improved heart function after injury.

Importantly, the team found that the transient seven-day treatment did not lead to the progressive loss of cardiac function as seen in the genetic models of increased microRNA expression.

The findings appear in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

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Cancer cell fingerprints in blood may speed up diagnosis

Scientists have identified cancer cell fingerprints in the blood that could one day help doctors diagnose a range of children's cancers faster and more accurately.

Researchers, from the University of Cambridge and Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, have found unique molecular fingerprints for 11 types of children's tumours, which could be used to develop blood tests to diagnose the cancers.

This may eventually lead to a quicker, more accurate way to diagnose tumours, and could also reduce the need for children to undergo surgery to get a diagnosis one day.

The researchers uncovered the fingerprints left by the tumours by analysing blood samples from children when they were diagnosed with cancer.

They were looking for molecules that turn genes on and off, called microRNAs, to find common changes linked to different tumours.

In particular they found a very specific fingerprint which identifies different types of neuroblastoma, a form of childhood cancer which develops from a type of nerve cell.

Lead researchers Dr Matthew Murray and Professor Nicholas Coleman, both from the University of Cambridge and Addenbrooke's Hospital said the research suggested that different types of tumour could be identified using a blood test which recognises the unique fingerprints produced by tumours.

"We hope that this early research could eventually lead to the development of non-invasive tests which are faster, more accurate and gentler, transforming the way we make a cancer diagnosis in the future," said Murray.

"Using a blood test instead of surgery to remove a tumour sample could improve diagnosis - such that results take a matter of hours rather than days or weeks.

"However, before such a test can be incorporated into clinical practice, it will now be important for these findings to be validated in other, larger independent studies," Murray said.

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Blood test to detect pancreatic cancer early?

A novel blood test that has the ability to distinguish – to some degree – patients with and without pancreatic cancer may be available soon, shows research.

“The test involving MicroRNAs – that regulate gene expression and play important roles in the development of tumours – could diagnose more patients with pancreatic cancer, some of them at an early stage,” said the researchers.

They, however, caution that the findings are preliminary and further research is necessary to understand whether these microRNAs have clinical implications as a screening test for early detection of pancreatic cancer.

A research team led by Nicolai A. Schultz, of Copenhagen University Hospital in Denmark examined differences in microRNA in blood between patients with pancreatic cancer and healthy participants.

The researchers identified 2 novel panels with the potential for diagnosing pancreatic cancer. MicroRNA panels are a combination of several microRNAs.

The test has a potential to increase the number of patients that can be operated on and possibly cured of pancreatic cancer, said the study published in the Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA).

Further research is necessary to understand whether these have clinical implications for early detection of pancreatic cancer, the study added.

Although there are no specific studies about causes of pancreatic cancer, doctors blame it on sedentary lifestyle, smoking and high alcohol intake.

People suffering from diabetes and chronic pancreatic inflammation are also at risk. 

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New test enables early diagnosis of liver cancer

Scientists  have developed a new test that can distinguish early liver cancer cells from nearly identical normal liver cells by giving them a distinctive red-brown hue.

The inability to definitively tell the difference between them often means the disease is detected late when treatment options are less effective.

There is no definitive test for early diagnosis of liver cancer. Our test adds a level of comfort for making the diagnosis," said the lead author of the study. Early liver cancer is mostly silent. By the time it's large enough to cause classic symptoms such as abdominal pain and weight loss, the cancer cells look distinctive but the liver is failing.

The myriad of treatment options - from removing the diseased portion of the liver to liver transplants to freezing or heating cancer cells - have a high chance of failing as well, he said.

He began collaborating with expertise in cell and tissue testing, to develop a probe that gives cancer cells the distinctive red-brown hue.

The probe detects and stains a microRNA called mir-21, which is found in liver cancer but not healthy liver cells,he said. Unlike RNA, microRNA doesn't make proteins rather helps control proteins that are expressed by RNA. That means it's more stable and can survive harsh chemicals normally used to prepare the biopsy for microscopic evaluation.

For the study, they used their probe on biopsies of 10 healthy livers and 10 livers with early cancers. In every case of liver cancer, the biopsy took on the red-brown hue. The probe was not detected in normal cells. The studies were done retrospectively, so they already knew which patients ultimately were diagnosed with cancer. They are now using the test on 200 similar cases of liver cancer.

The group also is exploring this approach in other hard-to-detect-early cancers. This Dr. worked with a pathology resident to identify microRNAs selectively expressed in melanoma. Under the microscope, the potentially deadly skin cancer cells look a lot like common mole cells. 

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