The Institute for Research in Immunology and Cancer (IRIC) at the Université de Montréal (UdeM), in collaboration with the Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital's Quebec Leukemia Cell Bank, recently achieved a significant breakthrough thanks to the laboratory growth of leukemic stem cells, which will speed up the development of new cancer drugs.

Honey, that delectable condiment for breads and fruits, could be one sweet solution to the serious, ever-growing problem of bacterial resistance to antibiotics, researchers said. Medical professionals sometimes use honey successfully as a topical dressing, but it could play a larger role in fighting infections, the researchers predicted. Their study was part of the 247th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world's largest scientific society.

Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have developed a method for modifying organic molecules that significantly expands the possibilities for developing new pharmaceuticals and improving old ones. The innovation makes it easier to modify existing organic compounds by attaching biologically active "functional group" to drug molecules.

During a one year period, among clinical trials published in high-impact journals that reported results on a public clinical trial registry (ClinicalTrials.gov), nearly all had at least 1 discrepancy in the study group, intervention, or results reported between the 2 sources, including discrepancies in the designated primary end points for the studies, according to a study in the March 12 issue of JAMA.

Melbourne scientists are a step closer to creating a new drug to stop a heart attack in its tracks and reduce the damage caused, without any side effects. The Monash University research, published today in the journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA (PNAS), offers new hope to thousands of people who experience heart attacks and heart failure - one of the major causes of death worldwide.

An experimental drug aimed at restoring the immune system's ability to spot and attack cancer halted cancer progression or shrank tumors in patients with advanced melanoma, according to a multisite, early-phase clinical trial at Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center and 11 other institutions. All patients had experienced disease progression despite prior systemic therapies, and most had received two or more prior treatments.

University of Pennsylvania researchers have successfully genetically engineered the immune cells of 12 HIV positive patients to resist infection, and decreased the viral loads of some patients taken off antiretroviral drug therapy (ADT) entirely - including one patient whose levels became undetectable. The study, appearing in the New England Journal of Medicine, is the first published report of any gene editing approach in humans.