Bacteria may be the next frontier in cancer treatment, according to a team led by researchers at Penn State that devised a new approach of creating bacteria-derived mixtures — or cocktails — to help fight bladder cancer. They tested their mixtures of good and bad bacteria on patient tumor samples and in mice, finding that the cocktails significantly boost the immune system’s ability to fight cancer. 

Three recently published studies by Medical University of South Carolina researchers each adopted a unique approach to improving our understanding of hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (hEDS), one taking a clinical, one a genetic and the most recent a proteomics approach. All three studies suggested a potential immune component for the disease, challenging long-held assumptions that hEDS is primarily a connective tissue disease. This new conceptualization of the disease better reflects the lived experience of patients.

A new eGastroenterology study reports that ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA), known as the bear bile salt and a long-considered farnesoid X receptor (FXR) antagonist, instead functions to activate gut FXR. Using liver-specific FXR knockout and control mice in a diet-induced model of metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH), UDCA preferentially activated gut FXR-FGF15 signaling, altered bile acid profiles, and modestly improved steatosis and fibrosis markers. Effects were markedly sex-specific, with male mice showing stronger biochemical and transcriptional responses.

Researchers have uncovered how and why traumatic brain injury raises the risk for Alzheimer’s disease, and the discovery suggests a potential way to prevent that increased risk.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have released Observer, the first multimodal dataset of anonymized, real-world clinical encounters, combining video, audio, transcripts and health records. By capturing how care actually unfolds in the exam room, the dataset enables new research into communication, clinical practice and the responsible development of AI for health care.