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The path a cell takes from healthy to metastatic cancer is mostly driven by epigenetic changes, according to a new computational study. Dr. Eduard Porta, group leader of the Cancer Immunogenomics group at the Josep Carreras Leukaemia Research Institute, participated in the new analysis that has been recently published in the journal Nature.
Every cell makes its own proteins by accessing the genetic information on its genes. Changes in this information, called mutations, may ruin the function of the affected proteins. In oncology, this is regarded as the genetics of cancer. The last decades, however, have seen the rise of a new field: the epigenetics of cancer.
Epigenetic modifications do not change the information but transiently modifies the cell’s ability to read some of its own genes and produce the associated proteins instead. There is a vast epigenetic programme controlling in such way the general working of the cell and, when altered, it may put it at the starting line of malignant transformation. Is there a way to track these changes and understand the epigenetics of cancer transition?
An international team of researchers has started to unlocked this long-awaited milestone. In a tour de force, they analysed 1.7 million cells from 225 samples from primary and metastatic origin, from 205 patients of 11 different cancer types. For each cell, the team obtained the full transcriptome, exome and epigenome. This covers virtually all gene mutations, gene accessibility and its consequences. Using vast computational power, they could deduce the whole functional status of each analysed cell and link it to its particular cancer type.
The results of the work, published in the scientific journal Nature, demonstrate that many regions in the DNA are differentially activated or inactivated in a cancer-specific manner, creating a signature for each tumour. These differences are relevant for cancer progression and many correspond to already identified hallmarks of cancer, the steps a cell must undergo to become malignant. Dr. Eduard Porta, group leader at the Josep Carreras Leukaemia Research Institute (IJC-CERCA), is part of the team and contributed with his experience in the analysis of large amounts of biological data.
Epigenetic changes at the DNA level stand out as an underlying cause of cancer, according to the new publication. Particularly, the accessibility of enhancer regions, a kind of master regulator acting upon many genes at once. Taken together, the results converges into a short list of genes that can be used as markers for good or poor prognosis, valuable information for the clinical management of patients.
The analysis has also identified the cellular pathways of these important genes, making it possible to track their distant interactions. Sometimes, the affected genes are so fundamental that is impossible to drug them directly without side effects but, knowing the full pathway, researchers may develop strategies to target the weakest link in the chain, maximising the therapeutic benefits while minimising undesirable effects.

A University of Alberta team has developed a new step to improve the process for creating insulin-producing pancreatic cells from a patient’s own stem cells, bringing the prospect of injection-free treatment closer for people with diabetes.
The researchers take stem cells from a single patient’s blood and chemically wind them back in time, then forward again in a process called “directed differentiation,” to eventually become insulin-producing cells.
In research published this month, the team treated pancreatic progenitor cells with an anti-tumour drug known as AKT/P70 inhibitor AT7867. They report the method produced the desired cells at a rate of 90 per cent, compared with previous methods that produced just 60 per cent target cells. The new cells were less likely to produce unwanted cysts and led to insulin injection-free glucose control in half the time when transplanted into mice. The team believes its efforts will soon be able to eliminate the final five to 10 per cent of cells that do not result in pancreatic cells.
“We need a stem cell solution that provides a potentially limitless source of cells,” says James Shapiro, Canada Research Chair in Transplant Surgery and Regenerative Medicine and head of the Edmonton Protocol, which has allowed 750 transplantations of donated islet cells since it was first developed 21 years ago. “We need a way to make those cells so that they can’t be seen and recognized as foreign by the body’s immune system.”
The researchers suggest this safer and more reliable way to grow insulin-producing cells from a patient’s own blood could eventually allow transplants without the need for anti-rejection drugs. Recipients of donated cells must take anti-rejection drugs for life, and the therapy is limited by the small number of donated organs available.
Shapiro says further safety and efficacy studies will need to be carried out before transplantation of stem-cell-derived islet cells is ready for human trials, but he is excited by the progress.
“What we’re trying to do here is peer over the horizon and try to imagine what diabetes care is going to look like 15, 20, 30 years from now,” he says. “I don’t think people will be injecting insulin anymore. I don’t think they’ll be wearing pumps and sensors.”

Published26 minutes agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingThis video can not be playedTo play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser.By Michelle RobertsDigital health editorA man with advanced Parkinson’s disease has been helped to walk again with a special implant that stimulates nerves in his spine. Marc Gauthier, 63, from Bordeaux, France, the first person to try out the device, says it has given him a second chance in life. He can now walk for miles, when previously he was often housebound and had several falls a day. The medical team treating him describe the advance in Nature Medicine journal. Before the implant, navigating steps or going into a lift posed extra problems for Marc.The treatment appears to have stopped the shuffling and “freezing” or sudden stopping Marc and many Parkinson’s patients struggle with – and now, when the device is switched on, his gait looks almost normal. Image source, WEBER GillesMarc said: “Getting into an elevator… sounds simple. For me, before, it was impossible.”Now, I have no problem.”I turn on the stimulation in the morning and I turn off in the evening. This allows me to walk better and to stabilise. Right now, I’m not even afraid of the stairs anymore. Every Sunday, I go to the lake, and I walk around 6km [four miles]. It’s incredible.”Marc feels “a little tingling sensation”, when the device is on, but is not bothered by it.How it worksThe stimulator sits on the lumbar region of the spinal cord, which sends messages to the leg muscles. Marc is still in control – his brain gives the instructions – but the epidural implant adds electrical signals for a smoother end result. Image source, BBC NewsIt is wired to a small impulse generator with its own power supply, implanted under the skin of Marc’s abdomen.After surgery to fit the device, Marc had weeks of rehabilitation to programme it, using feedback sensors on his legs and shoes. Brain implants help paralysed man to walk againParkinson’s results beyond researchers’ wildest dreamsNeurosurgeon Jocelyne Bloch, who fitted Marc’s device, almost two years ago, said the technology and procedure was similar to that which had helped some spinal-injury patients for many years – but it was a first for Parkinson’s disease, although other teams are exploring different techniques. She said: “It is impressive to see how by electrically stimulating the spinal cord in a targeted manner, in the same way as we have done with paraplegic patients, we can correct walking disorders caused by Parkinson’s disease.”Eduardo Martin Moraud, an expert from NeuroRestore, which made the implant initially tested in animals, said Marc was a pioneer: “He was very courageous to be the first one,” Mr Moraud said. “We were extremely happy to see how it could bring so many benefits to someone.”Brain stimulationThe work is a collaboration between the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, the city’s hospital and university, the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research and the University of Bordeaux. One of the team, Prof Grégoire Courtine, said more work was needed to see whether it could help other Parkinson’s patients. “This is only one participant and we don’t know whether all the individuals with Parkinson’s disease will respond to the therapy,” he said. The team will now try the device in six more Parkinson’s patients, using funding from the Michael J Fox Foundation.For some, a brain implant – deep brain stimulation – might be able to do the job instead. But the medical team told a press briefing that had not been not an option for Marc, who already had an older brain implant that would have been hard to replace.Parkinson’s disease symptoms ‘reversed’ by mini implantThe treatment is not a cure – Parkinson’s is a progressive condition that worsens over time.Those with the disease have too little of the chemical dopamine in their brain because some of the nerve cells that make it have stopped working.Symptoms include:involuntary shaking of parts of the bodyslow movement stiff and inflexible musclesParkinson’s UK research director David Dexter said: “This is quite an invasive procedure but could be a game-changing technology to help restore movement in people with advanced Parkinson’s, where the drugs are no longer working well.”The research is still at a very early stage and requires much more development and testing before it can be made available to people with Parkinson’s. However, this is a significant and exciting step forward and we hope to see this research progress quickly.”More on this storyParkinson’s symptoms ‘reversed’ by mini implantPublished26 April 2022’My NHS hell waiting for surgery and information’Published29 OctoberGut problems may be early warning of Parkinson’sPublished25 AugustBrain implants help paralysed man to walk againPublished24 MayRelated Internet LinksNature MedicineThe BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.

At Kaneshie Polyclinic, a health center in a hardscrabble neighborhood of Accra, the capital of Ghana, there is a rule. Every patient who walks through the door — a woman in labor, a construction worker with an injury, a child with malaria — is screened for tuberculosis.This policy, a national one, is meant to address a tragic problem; two-thirds of the people in this country with tuberculosis don’t know they have it.Tuberculosis, which is preventable and curable, has reclaimed the title of the world’s leading infectious disease killer, after being supplanted from its long reign by Covid-19. But worldwide, 40 percent of people who are living with TB are untreated and undiagnosed, according to the World Health Organization. The disease killed 1.6 million people in 2021.The numbers are all the more troubling because this is a moment of great hope in the fight against TB: Significant innovations in diagnosing and treating it have started to reach developing countries, and clinical trial results show promise for a new vaccine. Infectious disease experts who have battled TB for decades express a new conviction that, with enough money and a commitment to bring those tools to neglected communities, TB could be nearly vanquished.“This is the best news we’ve seen in tuberculosis in decades,” said Puneet Dewan, an epidemiologist with the TB program at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “But there’s a gap between having an exciting pipeline and actually reaching people with those tools.”A recent visit to the Kaneshie clinic revealed both the progress and the remaining barriers. Despite the clinic’s policy of screening everyone for TB, which most often attacks the lungs, by asking a few questions about coughs and other symptoms, patients streamed into the single-story, cement-block building and were sent for care without any such queries. A member of the TB team, it turned out, was on holiday, another was on maternity leave and a third was out sick. That left just two, who were busy processing tests and doling out drugs.So no one was screened, not that day or any other day in the previous week.“It is a good policy, it works well when we can do it, but personnel is a problem,” said Haphsheitu Yahaya, the tuberculosis coordinator at the clinic.Richard Wonu, a radiographer, examined scans at the Kaneshie Polyclinic.A laboratory at the clinic.When the screening policy is working, new medications — the first to come to market since the 1970s — can be taken as just a couple of pills each day, rather than as handfuls of tablets and painful injections, the way TB treatments have been delivered in the past.Those diagnosed with drug-resistant TB receive medication to take for six months — a far shorter time than previously required. For decades, the standard treatment for drug-resistant TB was to take drugs daily for a year and a half, sometimes two years. Inevitably, many patients stopped taking the medicines before they were cured and ended up with more severe disease. The new drugs have far fewer onerous side effects than older medications, which could cause permanent deafness and psychiatric disorders. Such improvements help more people to continue taking the drugs, which is good for patients, and eases the strain on a fragile health system.In Ghana and most other countries with a high prevalence of TB, the drugs are paid for by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, an international partnership that raises money to help countries fight the diseases. But contributions to the agency have been getting smaller with each funding round. Countries fighting TB are concerned about what may happen if that funding ends. Currently, the treatment for adults recommended by the W.H.O. costs at least $150 per patient in low- and middle-income countries.“If our patients had to pay, we would not have one single person taking treatment,” Ms. Yahaya said.Still, there has been progress in recent months in making the medicines more affordable, and prices may soon drop further. After prolonged pressure from patient advocacy groups, the United Nations and even the novelist John Green, who devoted his widely followed TikTok account to the issue, Johnson & Johnson has lowered the price of a key TB drug in developing countries. The company also agreed last month not to enforce a patent, which means generic drug companies in India and elsewhere will be able to make a significantly cheaper version of the medication.Richard Boadi, center, a nurse at the clinic, took notes on a possible tuberculosis case.A patient’s sputum sample was prepared for analysis.And for the first time in more than a hundred years, there is real hope for an effective vaccine: A promising candidate called M72, developed by the pharmaceutical company GSK with financial backing from the Gates Foundation and other philanthropies, is now in the last stage of clinical trials.(However, as ProPublica recently reported, it’s not clear who will have the rights to sell the vaccine, where it will be available and how much it will cost. Taxpayer and philanthropic money has paid for much of the vaccine’s development, but GSK retains control of critical components.)M72 is one of 17 vaccine candidates that are currently being tested in trials, providing a wellspring of possibilities. The only TB vaccine in use today was first given to people in 1921; it is helpful primarily for babies and does little to protect adolescents and adults, who account for more than 90 percent of TB transmission globally.Better technology to diagnose TB is slowly reaching clinics in developing countries. Clinics across South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, including the one in Ghana, now have machinery to use rapid molecular diagnostic tests — equipment that was donated as part of the Covid response. That means that many health centers have finally stopped using an unreliable diagnostic method, developed in the 1800s, of viewing sputum smears under microscopes.Still, in 2021 only 38 percent of people diagnosed with TB were first given a molecular test; the rest were diagnosed with a microscope, or, in many cases, by their clinical symptoms.The molecular diagnosis can also spot drug-resistant TB right away. (The old method involved starting a person on a course of the most common drugs and waiting to see whether the treatment worked; if patients had the drug-resistant form of the disease, they just got sicker.)Joshua Dodoo, a driver, came to Kaneshie clinic in March with a lingering cough. He had been shedding pounds and couldn’t sleep. When he saw a doctor for what he thought was malaria, he was sent for a TB test. The one PCR machine in the clinic’s lab was in heavy use, so it was a few days before he learned from a nurse that he had TB.“I was so frightened,” Mr. Dodoo said, adding that he had not realized people still caught the disease.Mr. Boadi, left, gave instructions on how to use a sputum sample cup to Sadia Ribiro, center, and her husband, Joshua Dodoo, so that they could test their youngest child for TB.Mr. Dodoo’s and Ms. Ribiro’s children both developed coughs since their father was diagnosed with TB this year.His wife, Sadia Ribiro, was calmer and able to hear the nurse, Richard Boadi, explain that there is a cure, and that Mr. Dodoo would be given the treatment for free. Ms. Ribiro was tested; people living in close contact with a person who has TB account for a significant percentage of the 10.6 million new infections each year. She was negative, and was put on a course of preventive drugs for three months. These medications are new, too: Until recently, preventive therapy could take a year or more, and few patients finished it.But then, the system broke down. The couple’s two children, who are 3 and 11, were not screened. Mr. Dodoo said they were in school so it was difficult to bring them to the clinic, and they had seemed healthy. Then, even as he started regaining weight and feeling better, the children started coughing and complaining of fatigue.But they didn’t get a test until months later, when Mr. Boadi tracked then down at home. Only 30 percent of TB infections in children are diagnosed.Ms. Yahaya, the clinic director, said that, while preventive therapy worked remarkably well, the experience of Mr. Dodoo’s family was typical. People who are newly diagnosed don’t want anyone to know that they have the disease, which is associated with poverty and suffering, so they don’t volunteer information about other people who may have been infected. And the understaffed health system struggles to track them.Only 169 health centers across Ghana have the capacity to use the new testing method. Usually, samples must be sent away — up to a three-hour drive in some rural areas. By the time results come in, it can be hard to track down those who were tested.“The equation is simple: If we were putting more resources into testing for TB, we would be finding more TB,” said Dr. Yaw Adusi-Poku, who heads Ghana’s national TB control program.Ms. Gyan, a TB patient, picked up her drugs from the clinic. That will require more molecular testing sites, more staff members trained to spot the disease, more people to ask questions at the clinic door, more nurses like the intrepid Mr. Boadi, who turns up at his patients’ doors to encourage them to have their families tested (and who frequently digs into his own pocket to help patients pay for bus fare to pick up their drugs).Molecular diagnosis is considerably more expensive than the old method. Cepheid, the company that makes cartridges for the testing machines, recently agreed to cut the price of each one to $8 from $10. An analysis commissioned by Doctors Without Borders found that the cartridges could be made for under $5. Cepheid continues to charge $15 per test for the diagnosis of extremely drug-resistant TB, the most lethal form of the disease.Funding for TB services in low- and middle-income countries fell to $5.8 billion in 2022 from $6.4 billion in 2018, which is just half of what the W.H.O. says is needed. About $1 billion is available each year for TB research, half the amount that the United Nations says is required.At a special meeting on TB at the United Nations last month, governments committed to spending at least $22 billion a year on TB by 2027. But at a similar meeting in 2018, the same donors promised to spend $13 billion by 2022, less than half of which materialized.“I’m happy that we have these innovations, but the fact that they exist, that the W.H.O. recommends them, doesn’t mean people have access to them,” said Dr. Madhukar Pai, who leads the McGill International TB Centre at McGill University in Montreal. “The costs are still too high, and you need someone to deliver them.”

Published41 minutes agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingImage source, Zeba Gufran By Cherylann MollanBBC News, MumbaiThe Gufrans are paying a high price to keep their children alive.Affan, seven, and Erhan, five, have Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA) – a rare genetic disorder that causes muscle deterioration and affects breathing. Physiotherapy appointments alone cost the family 40,000 rupees ($480; £395) a month, and their sons need constant care as they cannot sit, stand or walk independently.”We want to try gene therapy for our sons, but one dose alone costs around 175m rupees ($2.1m; £1.7m). We simply can’t afford it,” says Zeba Gufran, their mother. Zolgensma gene therapy, which the Gufrans want to try, is one of the most expensive drugs in the world. It is given as a one-time dose, usually to children under two – but the Gufrans are desperate and hope for a miracle.Like them, many parents in India cannot afford to buy Zolgensma and other SMA drugs. While there is no official data on the number of Indians with the disease, existing literature shows that SMA affects nearly 1 in 10,000 live-born babies – according to one study, one in 38 Indians are carriers of the faulty gene that causes SMA, compared with 1 in 50 people in the West.While treatments for rare diseases are expensive everywhere, the government or health insurers cover the cost in some countries. The UK has made SMA medicines available through the National Health Service; Australia offers eligible patients subsidised access to expensive life-saving drugs.In India, patients often turn to crowdfunding to access these treatments. But as the spotlight grows on rare genetic diseases, patients and their family members are coming together to put pressure on the federal government to bring down the cost of these drugs. Image source, Zeba GufranWhile about 95% of rare diseases have no approved treatments, recent breakthroughs in medicine have made treatments available for genetic conditions like SMA and Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) – which causes muscle weakness and degeneration. So Indians battling these diseases say they want to access the available drugs.In March, over 100 parents whose children have DMD held a rally in capital Delhi to ask the government to bring new treatments to India, and to provide free medication and physiotherapy to all children with the disease. India has a rare diseases policy which aims to provide financial help, but experts say it hasn’t been implemented properly yet.SMA is one of the better-known rare diseases in India because of some recent successful crowdfunding campaigns. The disease is caused by a defect in the SMN1 gene which leads to a deficit in a vital protein necessary for motor neurons to survive. SMA progresses over time, affecting a person’s ability to walk, speak, eat and breathe. According to Dr Sheffali Gulati, a child neurologist at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in Delhi, there are four main types of SMA:Type-1: the most severe and common version, where symptoms show up at birth or by the age of six months. Children have floppy limbs, don’t reach motor milestones and most patients don’t live beyond two years.Type-2:has its onset between three and 15 months of age. Though these children can sit, they can’t stand or walk on their own.Type-3 and Type-4 are less severe, but in these cases too gradual muscle deterioration is imminent, shortening the person’s lifespan.”While SMA can’t be cured, available treatments may slow down or stop the progression of the disease, prolonging a person’s life and improving its quality,” Dr Gulati says. The US Food and Drug Administration has approved three treatments so far:The most expensive is Zolgensma gene therapy at around 175m rupees for a one-time infusion that replaces the faulty SMN1 with a new functional one. Doctors and parents say a dose costs around 175m rupees in India excluding taxes; a spokesperson for Novartis, which makes the drug, said they couldn’t comment on its price.Spinraza costs about 50m rupees for the first four doses; after that the doses cost approximately 30m rupees a year. It has to be taken life-long.A year’s supply of Risdiplam, the cheapest of the lot, costs around 7.2m rupees. It has been approved for use in India and is sold here. This, too, has to be taken life-long.None of these drugs are made in India and all of them are patented – so there are no cheaper generic alternatives available. Image source, Alpana SharmaSome experts have criticised pharma companies for unreasonable pricing of drugs for rare diseases. But others argue that it helps manufacturers recoup the billions spent on research and development and fund future research. Most patients in India access SMA drugs through humanitarian programmes offered by the drug manufacturers. These schemes offer free drugs to a limited number of patients, but parents say this doesn’t always guarantee a lifetime supply. And factors like age or health issues might render a person ineligible for these programmes. Novartis, which manufactures Zolgensma, offers the drug to children under two years through a lottery system.Advocacy groups say there’s scope to make Risdiplam cheaper in India. “We have been asking the government to strike a deal with the manufacturer,” says Alpana Sharma, co-founder of CureSMA India, a parent-led advocacy group.The foundation has also asked for the goods and services tax – 12% – on the drug to be removed and have approached the federal health ministry, finance ministry and top government doctors with these requests.The BBC is awaiting a response to emails sent to the federal health and finance ministries.CureSMA India has also petitioned the Delhi high court. In July, the court directed the National Rare Diseases Committee – an expert panel it set up to implement India’s rare diseases policy – to speak to manufacturers to see if SMA medicines could be procured at lower prices.Image source, AbhinandThese advocacy groups are looking to Brazil for hope – in December, the government said it would cover the cost of Zolgensma for infants with the most severe cases of SMA after dozens of families fought and won court cases. The Brazilian government has struck a confidential deal with Novartis to buy the drug at a reduced price and pay for it in instalments, the New York Times reported.But the article adds that the policy has strained an already-struggling public health system and consumed a disproportionate share of resources.Public policy experts such as Dr Chandrakant Lahariya say India may also face similar challenges. “Governments always have to think of the good of many over the good of a few. It’s an ethically and economically difficult decision to make,” he says.Ms Sharma says that some parents and patients may be able to pull together funds to pay for SMA treatment, but not at the current prices. Meanwhile, a lack of access to these life-saving drugs is putting people’s lives on hold.Abhinand, 35, an assistant professor of bioinformatics in Chennai city, was diagnosed with SMA type-3 at the age of two. He stopped walking at the age of 12 and his muscles have degenerated over time. He uses a wheelchair and has severe scoliosis which makes it difficult for him to breathe.The recent availability of new treatments has given him some hope after years of struggle. In 2021, he raised enough money to afford a year’s supply of Risdiplam – 30 bottles – through crowdfunding, and a relative agreed to sponsor his treatment for the next year. But after his medicines run out, Abhinand doesn’t know what he will do as his health conditions make him ineligible for compassionate programs.”I’ve been in a relationship with an amazing woman for the past seven years,” he says. “But I don’t have the heart to ask her to marry me unless I’m sure I’ll be able to get medication to survive. I just can’t do that to her.”BBC News India is now on YouTube. Click here to subscribe and watch our documentaries, explainers and features.Read more India stories from the BBC:Delhi leader skips questioning in corruption caseIndia opposition MP questioned over bribery chargePunjabi rapper faces heat over concert hoodieWhy Indians are debating a 70-hour work weekSpeeding led to 70% of India road crash deathsMore on this storyIndia teen who died but raised millions to save brotherPublished4 August 2022India HIV patients in ‘drugs shortage’ painPublished13 August 2022

Tyson said it had received complaints from consumers about finding small metal pieces in the product. Federal regulators said one “minor oral injury” had been reported.Tyson Foods is recalling nearly 30,000 pounds of its dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets after some consumers said they found small metal pieces in them, federal officials said.The recall, which was announced on Saturday, involves 29-ounce plastic bags of the product, which is called “Fully Cooked Fun Nuggets Breaded Shaped Chicken Patties,” the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service said in a statement.The recall affects approximately 29,819 pounds of the dinosaur-shaped nuggets, which were produced on Sept. 5 by the Arkansas-based food processing company.The bags affected have a “best if used by” date of Sept. 4, 2024, and lot codes 2483BRV0207, 2483BRV0208, 2483BRV0209 and 2483BRV0210, the statement said. The packaging features cartoon dinosaurs, one green and one red, looking over a plate of the breaded nuggets.On its website, the company said it was voluntarily recalling the product “out of an abundance of caution.” It added that no other products were affected.The products were shipped to distributors in Alabama, California, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia and Wisconsin, according to the Food Safety and Inspection Service statement.Tyson said the problem was discovered after it received complaints from consumers who said they found small metal pieces in the product, the federal agency said.There was one report of a “minor oral injury” associated with the consumption of the product but no additional reports of injury or illness, officials said.“Anyone concerned about an injury or illness should contact a health care provider,” the federal statement said.The Food Safety and Inspection Service urged consumers not to eat the nuggets and advised that any product left in the freezer “should be thrown away or returned to the place of purchase.”This is not the first recall involving Tyson chicken products. In 2019, the company recalled 69,093 pounds of frozen chicken strips after two people reported finding pieces of metal in the product, the Department of Agriculture said at the time.

The connection between exercise and inflammation has captivated the imagination of researchers ever since an early 20th-century study showed a spike of white cells in the blood of Boston marathon runners following the race.
Now, a new Harvard Medical School study published Nov. 3 in Science Immunology may offer a molecular explanation behind this century-old observation.
The study, done in mice, suggests that the beneficial effects of exercise may be driven, at least partly, by the immune system. It shows that muscle inflammation caused by exertion mobilizes inflammation-countering T cells, or Tregs, which enhance the muscles’ ability to use energy as fuel and improve overall exercise endurance.
Long known for their role in countering the aberrant inflammation linked to autoimmune diseases, Tregs now also emerge as key players in the body’s immune responses during exercise, the research team said.
“The immune system, and the T cell arm in particular, has a broad impact on tissue health that goes beyond protection against pathogens and controlling cancer. Our study demonstrates that the immune system exerts powerful effects inside the muscle during exercise,” said study senior investigator Diane Mathis, Morton Grove-Rasmussen Professor of Immunology in the Blavatnik Institute at HMS.
Mice are not people, and the findings remain to be replicated in further studies, the researchers cautioned. However, the study is an important step toward detailing the cellular and molecular changes that occur during exercise and confer health benefits.
Understanding the molecular underpinnings of exercise
Protecting from cardiovascular disease, reducing the risk of diabetes, shielding against dementia. The salutary effects of exercise are well established. But exactly how does exercise make us healthy? The question has intrigued researchers for a long time.

There are many creatures on our planet with more advanced senses than humans. Turtles can sense Earth’s magnetic field. Mantis shrimp can detect polarized light. Elephants can hear much lower frequencies than humans can. Butterflies can perceive a broader range of colors, including ultraviolet (UV) light.
Inspired by the enhanced visual system of the Papilio xuthus butterfly, a team of researchers have developed an imaging sensor capable of “seeing” into the UV range inaccessible to human eyes. The design of the sensor uses stacked photodiodes and perovskite nanocrystals (PNCs) capable of imaging different wavelengths in the UV range. Using the spectral signatures of biomedical markers, such as amino acids, this new imaging technology is even capable of differentiating between cancer cells and normal cells with 99% confidence.
This new research, led by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign electrical and computer engineering professor Viktor Gruev and bioengineering professor Shuming Nie, was recently published in the journal Science Advances.
Small Variations
“We’ve taken inspiration from the visual system of butterflies, who are able to perceive multiple regions in the UV spectrum, and designed a camera that replicates that functionality,” Gruev says. “We did this by using novel perovskite nanocrystals, combined with silicon imaging technology, and this new camera technology can detect multiple UV regions.”
UV light is electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths shorter than that of visible light (but longer than x-rays). We are most familiar with UV radiation from the sun and the dangers it poses to human health. UV light is categorized into three different regions — UVA, UVB and UVC — based on different wavelength ranges. Because humans cannot see UV light, it is challenging to capture UV information, especially discerning the small differences between each region.
Butterflies, however, can see these small variations in the UV spectrum, like humans can see shades of blue and green. Gruev notes, “It is intriguing to me how they are able to see those small variations. UV light is incredibly difficult to capture, it just gets absorbed by everything, and butterflies have managed to do it extremely well.”
The Imitation Game

The U.S. remains one of the few countries without federally mandated paid parental leave, despite its major potential health benefits.
A new Northwestern Medicine study has found postpartum individuals living in states with generous mandated paid family and medical leave (PFML) are more likely to breastfeed and less likely to experience postpartum depression symptoms compared to those living in states with little or no mandated state-paid leave. The findings were even more pronounced among lower-income populations covered by Medicaid.
“By increasing mothers’ ability to breastfeed and reducing postpartum-depressive symptoms, strong state paid family and medical leave laws provide a major boost to the health of postpartum women and infants,” said senior author Joe Feinglass, a research professor of general internal medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “The differential generosity of these laws is one reason states differ so widely in health status and life expectancy across the U.S.”
The study will be published Nov. 2 in Obstetrics and Gynecology (i.e. the “Green Journal”).
Previous studies have largely looked at pregnancy outcomes in a single state before and after they implemented PFML. This study captured a more national picture by examining states included in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS) database (43 states and the District of Columbia).
“Mental health conditions are the leading cause of maternal mortality in the U.S., with perinatal depression symptoms affecting about one in eight new mothers,” said corresponding study author Dr. Madeline Perry, a fourth-year resident in obstetrics and gynecology at Feinberg. “Our study adds to previous research that has also found paid leave reduces the rates of postpartum depression symptoms.”
State-by-state breakdown
Newly postpartum women living in the eight states with the most generous PFML coverage had a 9% greater likelihood of breastfeeding at six months postpartum compared to the 26 states with little or no PFML legislation, the study found.