Patients with type 2 diabetes who have high levels of blood sugar are at greater risk of serious complications such as chronic kidney disease, heart disease and blindness. While lifestyle changes and medications can help some patients better control their blood sugar levels, type 2 diabetes tends to progress, and patients typically need more intense treatment to continue to maintain…
In a new study published today in JAMA Cardiology, a team of researchers led by Rishi Wadhera, MD, MPP, MPhil, an investigator in the Smith Center for Outcomes Research in Cardiology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), found that hospitals that received awards from the American Heart Association (AHA) and American College of Cardiology (ACC) for the delivery of high-quality…
Since its introduction, the reward prediction error theory of dopamine has explained a wealth of empirical phenomena, providing a unifying framework for understanding the representation of reward and value in the brain1,2,3. According to the now canonical theory, reward predictions are represented as a single scalar quantity, which supports learning about the expectation, or mean, of stochastic outcomes. Here we…
The brain is a ravenous organ. A three-pound adult human brain consumes about a fifth of the body’s energy, yet it cannot store energy on its own and requires constant nourishment from the cardiovascular system. The organ’s energy needs fluctuate greatly depending on neural activity, and sufficient blood must be delivered to the right place at precisely the right time…
As competitors narrow in, a blood disorder-focused Cambridge startup is planning to raise more funds through an IPO. Imara Inc. hopes to raise $86M in its stock market launch, according to paperwork filed with the SEC. The company plans to trade on Nasdaq using the ticker “IMRA”. The company’s filing comes a few weeks after Beam Therapeutics (Nasdaq: BEAM) raised $180 million and Black…
Abbott (NYSE: ABT) and Insulet Corporation (NASDAQ: PODD), the global leader in tubeless insulin pump technology with its Omnipod® Insulin Management System (Omnipod System), announced today they are partnering to integrate Abbott’s world-leading1 glucose sensing technology with Insulet’s next-generation tubeless system, the Omnipod Horizon™ Automated Insulin Delivery (AID) System (Omnipod Horizon System), to offer personalized automated insulin delivery and care for people living with…
Catechol dehydroxylation is a central chemical transformation in the gut microbial metabolism of plant- and host-derived small molecules. However, the molecular basis for this transformation and its distribution among gut microorganisms are poorly understood. Here, we characterize a molybdenum-dependent enzyme from the human gut bacterium Eggerthella lenta that dehydroxylates catecholamine neurotransmitters. Our findings suggest that this activity enables E. lenta to use dopamine as…
New agent utilizes findings of Nobel Prize-winning research Scientists report promising activity of a novel drug that targets a key molecular driver of clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) in patients with metastatic disease. Researchers from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute report a response rate of 24 percent across all risk categories of patients given an oral first-in-class agent that targets hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF)…
Hormone receptor-positive breast cancer can spread throughout the body via the bloodstream as circulating tumor cells, or CTCs, which eventually reach remote body sites to form metastatic tumors. The potential for these cells to form metastases rises with increased production of ribosomes, the protein-making machinery found in every living cell, according to Harvard Medical School investigators based at Massachusetts General…
Dr. Abha Agarwal is a Research Fellow in Surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. Her research focuses on drug testing using bio-markers and metabolic inhibitors to develop adjuvant therapies for anaplastic thyroid cancer. We sat down with Dr. Aggarwal to discuss her research and general developments in the field. How would you describe your current role and…
