news 2024

Researchers have discovered molecules capable of limiting the side effects of opioids by blocking the receptor responsible for their action. Opioid drugs are highly effective at relieving pain but come with severe drawbacks. Their side effects range from dizziness to potentially fatal respiratory depression.

A research team led by Inselspital, Bern University Hospital, and the University of Bern has shown that a high percentage of kidney stones are excreted without symptoms. This finding should be incorporated into the future treatment of patients with recurrent kidney stones. Kidney stones are caused by the deposition of minerals and salts in the kidneys and can lead to severe pain when passing through the urinary tract.

Results from a preclinical study in mice, led by EPFL, and a collaborative clinical study in patients show that the type 2 immune response - associated with parasitic infection and thought to play a negative role in cancer immunity - is positively correlated with long-term cancer remission. In 2012, 7-year-old Emily Whitehead became the first pediatric patient to receive pioneering chimeric antigen receptor (CAR-T) therapy to fight the recurrence of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL).

Antonio Landi, PhD assistant at the Faculty of Biomedical Sciences and winner of USI Equal Opportunities Award 2024 for scientific contributions on topics of equality and diversity , presented his research to us, providing a comprehensive examination of gender medicine. Antonio Landi, could you please explain the research you conducted and the results it led to? "The study, published in JAMA Cardiology, aimed to analyse the impact of gender on optimal drug therapy in patients with coronary atherosclerotic disease undergoing angioplasty with coronary stent placement.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have used a drug screening platform they developed to show that an antidepressant, currently on the market, kills tumour cells in the dreaded glioblastoma - at least in the cell-culture dish. Glioblastoma is a particularly aggressive brain tumour that at present is incurable.

The Molecular Oncology research group, led by Prof. Andrea Alimonti at the Institute of Oncology Research (IOR, affiliated to USI and member of Bios+) has recently discovered that a factor involved in blood coagulation, Factor X, directly promotes resistance to hormonal therapies in preclinical models and is associated with poor survival in  metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) patients.

A recent study led by Inselspital, Bern University Hospital and the University of Bern shows that stents with a degradable polymer coating offer no long-term advantage over conventional stents. However, patients who consistently take their cholesterol-lowering medication have a lower risk of complications following stent implantation.

Pharmaceutical researchers often find new pharmaceutically active substances only by sifting through large collections of chemical compounds. Chemists at ETH Zurich have now made critical progress on a specific process for generating and searching these collections. Nowadays, there's lots of buzz about spectacular new medical treatments such as personalised cancer therapy with modified immune cells or antibodies.

The Institute of oncology research (IOR), affiliated to USI, is pleased to announce the publication of a study describing a new compound designed at IOR, targeting the Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome protein (WASp) with anti-cancer activity in various hematological cancers. The research, led by Dr Eugenio Gaudio (former IOR senior investigator) and Prof. Francesco Bertoni (IOR group leader and deputy director, USI adjunct professor), involved prominent institutions, including the Institute for research in biomedicine (IRB) and various European and North-American institutions.

Researchers at Swiss TPH have demonstrated that the novel drug candidate, emodepside, is highly effective in treating parasitic worm infections in humans, particularly hookworms. The results of a Phase 2b trial, published today in The Lancet, confirmed the drug's strong efficacy and safety profile, building on the promising outcomes of an earlier Phase 2a study.

Globally, around 2.6 million children and adolescents are currently living with HIV, the majority of them in Africa. These young people are much more likely to experience treatment failure than adults. Experts long assumed that testing for viral drug resistance could improve treatment in cases where treatment has failed.

A distinct signaling pathway called TNF- drives the transformation of epithelial cells into aggressive tumor cells. During cancer progression, cells activate their own TNF- program and become invasive. This finding could help to improve early detection and treatment of patients with cancers in skin, esophagus, bladder or colon, as researchers state.

Scientists from USI in collaboration with italian scientists have made a significant discovery by identifying a novel anti-aging therapeutic. The study is published in the prestigious journal "Nature Aging". Aging is a primary risk factor for the development of numerous chronic diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, arthritis, chronic kidney disease and cancer.

Oncologists use biopsy and imaging techniques to diagnose and monitor tumor diseases and assess treatment success. UZH and USZ researchers have now further developed an advanced method to analyze liquid biopsies of DNA fragments in the blood. It is fast and practical, without putting much of a strain on patients.

Cancer treatments often cause nerve damage that can lead to long-lasting symptoms. Medication has proven ineffective in these cases. A sports scientist at the University of Basel, together with an interdisciplinary team from Germany, has now shown that simple exercises can prevent nerve damage. Cancer therapies have improved over the years.

In many cases of malignant melanoma, the effect of targeted treatment is lost over time. A research team from UZH and USZ has now discovered that a factor secreted by tumor cells is responsible for the resistance. These findings could pave the way for more effective therapies. Malignant melanoma is one of the most aggressive types of cancer.

Surgery carries the risk of infection at the surgical site. Proper skin disinfection before the incision minimizes this risk. Two disinfectants are used worldwide for this purpose, one of which was previously considered to be better. A joint study by Inselspital, Bern University Hospital and the University of Bern in collaboration with the University Hospitals of Basel and Zurich now shows that both agents are equally effective.

Researchers have created a deep learning pipeline for designing soluble analogues of key protein structures used in pharmaceutical development, sidestepping the prohibitive cost of extracting these proteins from cell membranes. Many drug and antibody discovery pathways focus on intricately folded cell membrane proteins: when molecules of a drug candidate bind to these proteins, like a key going into a lock, they trigger chemical cascades that alter cellular behavior.

Focusing on enterobacteria, two studies by the University of Geneva and the HUG highlight the alarming situation in this region of the world in terms of antibiotic resistance. Enterobacteriaceae are commensal bacteria of the digestive flora that can be responsible for serious infections. HUG Two meta-analysis undertaken by the Geneva University Hospital (HUG) and the University of Geneva have revealed very worrying numbers of children in Sub-Saharan Africa who are carriers of multi-resistant bacterial strains.

Cancer treatments often struggle with balancing efficacy and side effects. A new study by scientists offers a promising solution using antibody-peptide inhibitor conjugates to target specific cell types and block the activity of cancer-promoting enzymes called cathepsins. Tumor cells often hijack normal physiological processes to support their growth, exploiting proteins that are in charge of essential cell functions.