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Cardiovascular disease (CVD) often starts with the buildup of lipid deposits or plaques within the blood vessel, setting the stage for atherosclerosis. Rupture of these atherosclerotic plaques clot blood vessels and lead to life-threatening conditions including heart attack or stroke. Dyslipidemia, meaning having too much "bad" or atherogenic lipids in the blood, represents the most common cause of CVDs. Accordingly, doctors often prescribe lipid-lowering medications. In two studies, researchers found a novel approach to achieve intensive lipid lowering, which enabled reversal of atherosclerotic plaques in murine disease models. This potential therapy employs a previously unknown function of the essential element...

Researchers have found that oral administration of rapamycin to an Alzheimer's disease mouse model causes an increase in beta (β)-amyloid protein plaques. β-amyloid buildup is a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease. Rapamycin is approved to treat transplant and cancer patients. Publicly available data suggest that the drug might also improve learning and memory in aged mice. However, the researchers observed that after rapamycin treatment, a protein called Trem2 (triggering receptor expressed on myeloid cells 2) is dramatically diminished. Trem2 is present in microglia, which are immune cells in the brain and spinal cord. "Trem2 is a receptor located on the surface...

AFTER decades of disappointment, we may have a new lead on fighting Alzheimer’s disease. Compelling evidence that the condition is caused by a bacterium involved in gum disease could prove a game-changer... Now researchers from Cortexyme and several universities have reported finding the two toxic enzymes that P. gingivalis uses to feed on human tissue in 99 and 96 per cent of 54 human Alzheimer’s brain samples taken from the hippocampus – a brain area important for memory (Science Advances, doi.org/gftvdt). These protein-degrading enzymes are called gingipains, and they were found in higher levels in brain tissue that also had...

Researchers from George Washington University and the Smithsonian Institution have discovered evidence to debunk the theory that Neandertals' disappearance was caused in part by a deficient diet -- one that lacked variety and was overly reliant on meat. After discovering starch granules from plant food trapped in the dental calculus on 40-thousand-year-old Neandertal teeth, the scientists believe that Neandertals ate a wide variety of plants and included cooked grains as part of a more sophisticated, diverse diet similar to early modern humans... The discovery of starch granules in the calculus on Neandertal teeth provides direct evidence that they made sophisticated,...

Eating like a caveman meant chowing down on woolly rhinos and sheep in Belgium, but munching on mushrooms, pine nuts and moss in Spain. It all depended on where they lived, new research shows. Scientists got a sneak peek into the kitchen of three Neanderthals by scraping off the plaque stuck on their teeth and examining the DNA. What they found smashes a common public misconception that the caveman diet was mostly meat. They also found hints that one sickly teen used primitive versions of penicillin and aspirin to help ease his pain. The dental plaque provides a lifelong record...

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott denied that he favors removing from the Texas Capitol a Confederate plaque that says slavery was not an underlying cause of the Civil War after a black lawmaker who privately met with the Republican governor earlier Friday said Abbott indicated support for taking it down. Democratic state Rep. Eric Johnson, who for months has called for removing a plaque titled “Children of the Confederacy Creed,” which has hung in the Capitol since 1959, initially praised Abbott following an hour-long meeting in Dallas. He said Abbott had agreed the plaque was inaccurate and, according to Johnson, indicated...

9/17/17. Madison, Wisconsin. Leftist mayor Madison Paul Soglin announced today that he will have the informational monument at the city’s Confederate Rest cemetery removed, the northern-most Confederate cemetery in the country. The cemetery holds the remains of southern soldiers who died while imprisoned at civil war Camp Randall, the current site of the Wisconsin Badger football stadium. The cemetery is respectfully tended and maintained, and services are held with graves decorated on Memorial Day. The plaque to be removed explains the origin of the cemetery and who lies buried there.

Tina Hesman SaeyMay 16, 2016 A sugar that freshens air in rooms may also clean cholesterol out of hardened arteries. The sugar, cyclodextrin, removed cholesterol that had built up in the arteries of mice fed a high-fat diet, researchers report April 6 in Science Translational Medicine. The sugar enhances a natural cholesterol-removal process and persuades immune cells to soothe inflammation instead of provoking it, say immunologist Eicke Latz and colleagues. Cyclodextrin, more formally known as 2-hydroxypropyl-beta-cyclodextrin, is the active ingredient in the air freshener Febreze. It is also used in a wide variety of drugs; it helps make hormones, antifungal...

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — An unusual respiratory virus is striking children in the metro in big numbers. Children’s Mercy Hospital is hospitalizing 20 to 30 kids a day with the virus. The hospital is as full now as it is at the height of flu season. This is not the same virus we told you about several weeks ago that can cause meningitis. This one can cause severe breathing trouble. Children’s Mercy has seen more than 300 cases in recent days in kids of all ages.

Think of it as Liquid-Plumr for the circulatory system. Researchers have designed a clump of tiny particles that rides the current of the bloodstream, seeks out life-threatening blood clots, and obliterates them. The approach works in mice and could soon move on to human trials. Blood clots are bad news for the brain, heart, and other organs. These masses of blood cells can grow big enough to choke off veins and arteries, preventing oxygen from flowing to critical organs. One of the chief obstacles to dealing with blood clots is finding where they have lodged in the body. Even if...

Northern Territory Chief Minister Paul Henderson says a commemorative plaque to be placed in Darwin Harbour acknowledges the ongoing military ties between Australia and the United States. The plaque will be lowered to the seabed near the wreck of the USS Peary. It is in memory of more than 90 US servicemen killed on the ship during the first wave of Japanese bombing of Darwin on February 19, 1942. Mr Henderson says, 70 years on, links between the Top End and the US remain strong. "The plaque is a commemoration and a testament to the enduring friendship between the people...

New study reveals molecular mechanism promoting the breakdown of plaque by statinsIn a new study, NYU Langone Medical Center researchers have discovered how cholesterol-lowering drugs called statins promote the breakdown of plaque in the arteries... The findings support a large clinical study that recently showed patients taking high-doses of the cholesterol-lowering medications not only reduced their cholesterol levels but also reduced the amount of plaque in their arteries. However, until now researchers did not fully understand how statins could reduce atherosclerosis, the accumulation of fat and cholesterol that hardens into plaque in arteries, a major cause of mortality in Western...

In a new study performed in humans, researchers from Karolinska Institutet have determined the age of atherosclerotic plaques by taking advantage of Carbon-14 (14C) residues in the atmosphere, prevailing after the extensive atomic bomb tests in the 50ties and 60ties. The findings, published in the scientific online journal PLoS ONE, suggest that in most people plaque formation occurs during a relatively short and late time period in life of 3-5 years. > "We suspected that the plaque would be substantially younger than the patients, who were on average were 68 years old at surgery, but we were surprised when we...

Obamacon 2012 Chairman Andy Martin will hold a Honolulu news conference today, November 13th, to announce a “scavenger hunt” seeking Barack Obama’s physical birthplace in Honolulu. Obamacon 2012/Honolulu 2010 continues through Tuesday, November 16th. Today’s sidewalk news conference will be held at the intersection of Atkinson Drive and Kapiolani Boulevard in front of the Hawai’i Convention Center, Honolulu....Obamacon 2012 conference leader/author/film producer Andy Martin asks “Where’s the plaque” concerning Barack Obama’s unknown birthplace in Hawai’i.Martin notes that although Obama claims Honolulu as his birthplace, nowhere in Honolulu is there any plaque to commemorate the actual presidential “birthplace.” Martin says it...

Watertown, MA—Scientists at Boston Biomedical Research Institute (BBRI) and the University of Pennsylvania have found that combining two chemicals, one of which is the green tea component EGCG, can prevent and destroy a variety of protein structures known as amyloids. Amyloids are the primary culprits in fatal brain disorders such as Alzheimer's, Huntington's, and Parkinson's diseases. Their study, published in the current issue of Nature Chemical Biology (December 2009), may ultimately contribute to future therapies for these diseases. "These findings are significant because it is the first time a combination of specific chemicals has successfully destroyed diverse forms of amyloids...

Though it looks like a tiny purple blowtorch, a pencil-sized plume of plasma on the tip of a small probe remains at room temperature as it swiftly dismantles tough bacterial colonies deep inside a human tooth. It’s not another futuristic product of George Lucas’ imagination—it’s the exciting work of USC School of Dentistry and USC Viterbi School of Engineering researchers looking for new ways to safely fight tenacious biofilm infections in patients. Two of the study’s authors are Chunqi Jiang, a research assistant professor in the Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical Engineering-Electrophysics, and Parish Sedghizadeh, assistant professor of clinical dentistry...

SIERRA VISTA — As an Arizona ash grows at the Southern Arizona Veterans Memorial Cemetery, it eventually will provide shade for people as they sit on a concrete bench. The tree, bench and memorial plaque were dedicated Monday to honor the memory of Army Cpl. Casey Lee Mellen, who was killed-in-action on Sept. 25, while serving in Iraq. Not far from the tree and bench is the final resting place of the 21-year-old Huachuca City soldier. It was noted the tree can grow as high as 40 feet, and its canopy will provide shade for those who may want to...

MONTREAL, Feb. 17 (UPI) -- Canadian researchers said Friday they have uncovered a natural defense mechanism to Alzheimer's disease. Not surprisingly, it involves stem cells -- those derived from bone marrow. In Alzheimer's patients, plaque forms in the brain, but the brain's resident immune cells, called microglia, can't fight off the substance. The plaque can then kill off the brain's neurons, or nerve cells. However, microglia harvested from bone marrow stem cells do appear capable of defeating the plague, said researchers from the Faculty of Medicine at Université Laval and the research centre at Centre hospitalier universitaire de Québec, Canada....

The battle between heritage and hate is erupting again. A state appeals court now says a Confederate heritage group can sue the state over removal of controversial memorial plaques in the Texas Supreme Court. As long as the plaques that barely mention the Confederacy hang in the Texas Supreme Court, Terry Ayers says the state is slighting his and others' ancestors who fought in the Civil War. "I want to take my grandchildren down to the supreme court and show them, 'Look, your great, great grandfather, this building was dedicated to him.' Of course it's personal," Ayers said. The Texas...

The Clay County Commission voted unanimously before an audience of nearly 200 to leave a plaque of the Ten Commandments on the wall of its chamber. The plaque is one of several historical documents -- which include the Bill of Rights -- that are on display, said Commissioner Jimmy Sams. The display has been up for several years. The Commandments went up first and were followed a couple of weeks later by the other documents. "I knew the ACLU would say something, and we just didn't want that to happen," Sams said Wednesday. "But it happened anyway." County resident Jesse...