|
Science & Medicine News
Promising Advance in MS Fight
A new study has pointed researchers toward a promising treatment for
multiple sclerosis, which affects about one in 1,000 people in the United States.
The research suggests that a single agent may halt the immune system’s
attack on nerve cells that leads to multiple sclerosis, and that clinicians can
clear patients’ brains of destructive T cells by treating the patients with
a single peptide. Until now, researchers had suspected that a complex mixture of
many compounds might be necessary to halt the symptoms of the disease. The
finding is based on studies of mice with a disease that researchers believe
models multiple sclerosis. The results were published in the Jan. 25 issue of
Nature.
Terman Fellowships
Frederick E. Terman Fellowships, which provide recipients with up to
$100,000 annually for three years, have been awarded to six young science and
engineering faculty members. The new fellows, who all hold the rank of assistant
professor, are Barbara Block, Hopkins Marine Station; Kenneth E. Goodson,
mechanical engineering; John H. Griffin, chemistry; Jun Liu, statistics; Alfred
M. Spormann, civil engineering; and Jennifer Widom, computer science and
electrical engineering. Their research topics range from developing more
effective antibiotics to investigating how bacteria move. The fellows program was
launched in 1994 with a $25 million gift from William Hewlett and David Packard.
The two alumni of the Electrical Engineering Department and founders of the
Hewlett-Packard Co. endowed the fellowships as a tribute to the late provost
Terman. The fellowships are designed to help young scientists, who face
increasing competition for federal grants that enable them to establish their own
laboratories and recruit graduate students and postdoctoral fellows.
Lymphoma
Treatment Radiation therapy targeted
at
the cellular level can halt the advance of lymphoma while avoiding major
drawbacks of chemotherapy, researchers have reported. A Stanford team treated 18
patients who had relapses of low- or medium-grade non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma
after chemotherapy. “Not only did [the treatment] work better for most of the
|
|
