Monthly Archives: May 2007

An international team, led by researchers at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard and supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), today announced the publication of the first genome sequence of a marsupial, belonging to a South American species of opossum.
Continue reading →

People infected with the hepatitis C virus (HCV) are at an increased risk of developing certain lymphomas (cancers of the lymphatic system), according to a study published in the May 8, 2007, issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. Researchers from the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health, and Baylor College of Medicine, found that HCV infection increased the risk of developing non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma by 20 percent to 30 percent.
Continue reading →

U.S. and Indian health officials have renewed the Indo-U.S. Vaccine Action Program (VAP), a 20-year-old bilateral collaboration supporting research on vaccines, immunology and related biomedical issues. The VAP aims to reduce the burden of vaccine-preventable diseases of public health significance in India, the United States and other parts of the world, and to promote vaccines as one of the most cost-effective health technologies.
Continue reading →

In the most comprehensive look at genetic risk factors for type 2 diabetes to date, a U.S.-Finnish team, working in close collaboration with two other groups, has identified at least four new genetic variants associated with increased risk of diabetes and confirmed existence of another six.
Continue reading →

More than 500 scientists, clinicians and public health specialists met today at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to discuss the latest research on drug abuse and the evolving epidemic of HIV/AIDS. This is the first-ever two-day public meeting at NIH to include a focus on non-injection drug use and HIV transmission. The meeting was being held in collaboration with the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), the National Institute on Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).
Continue reading →

Drug Abuse and addition continue to fule the spread of HIV/AIDS in the United States and abroad. The issue of NewsScan highlights NIDA-supported studies that address the multifaceted issues relating to HIV/AIDS
Continue reading →

The likelihood of developing bipolar disorder depends in part on the combined, small effects of variations in many different genes in the brain, none of which is powerful enough to cause the disease by itself, a new study shows. However, targeting the enzyme produced by one of these genes could lead to development of new, more effective medications. The research was conducted by scientists at the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), with others from the Universities of Heidelberg and Bonn and a number of U.S. facilities collaborating in a major project called the NIMH Genetics Initiative.
Continue reading →

Only 8 percent of people identified as drug abusers, and fewer than 40 percent of those diagnosed with drug dependence, have ever gotten any kind of intervention or treatment, according to the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC). The study was conducted by scientists from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), components of the National Institutes of Health.
Continue reading →

Only 8 percent of people identified as drug abusers, and fewer than 40 percent of those diagnosed with drug dependence, have ever gotten any kind of intervention or treatment, according to the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC). The study was conducted by scientists from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), components of the National Institutes of Health.
Continue reading →

A new study supports earlier estimates of the prevalence of bipolar disorder in the U.S. population, and suggests the illness may be more accurately characterized as a spectrum disorder.
Continue reading →