Health

A team of researchers led by Harvard University scientists has improved the laboratory process of converting stem cells into insulin-producing beta cells from 30 percent to 80 percent.

Researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School have linked a common dietary element to breast cancer drug resistance, raising the prospect of a new way to attack a major cause of breast cancer death.

About 250 faculty, students, and volunteers descended on Massachusetts’ Harold Parker State Forest last weekend for a disaster simulation aimed to prepare students studying humanitarian disaster response for the real thing.

New research from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health has examined 75 popular e-cigarette brands and found that 27 percent contained traces of bacterial and fungal toxins associated with myriad health problems.

Based on new research, a randomized placebo-controlled trial in humans indicates that a popular food ingredient called propionate may raise the risk of diabetes and obesity.

Environmental protection is not a goal to achieve but a task to be undertaken by one generation and handed to the next, Gina McCarthy, the former EPA administrator and current director of Harvard’s Center for Climate, Health, and the Global Environment, told the Gazette in an Earth Day interview.

A “polygenic score” for obesity, a quantitative tool that predicts an individual’s inherited risk for becoming overweight, may identify an opportunity for early intervention.

Researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital, King’s College London, and other institutions have developed a technique for measuring brain activity that’s 60 times faster than traditional fMRI.

Advocates and opponents of medical-aid-in-dying laws, also called physician-assisted death, gathered at Harvard Medical School for a two-day conference organized by the HMS Center for Bioethics.

In the first major multisite randomized controlled trial of workplace wellness programs, researchers found that while they may help people change certain behaviors, they do little to improve overall health or lower health care spending.

A new algorithm designed by HMS scientists can be incorporated into standard genetic tests to successfully identify patients harboring a tumor-fueling DNA repair defect found in multiple cancers treatable with existing drugs.

The first randomized clinical trial of vitamin D in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer found that high doses of supplements combined with chemotherapy delayed disease progression.

A new study shows that older men who maintain healthier diets are 25 percent less likely to develop physical impairment with aging.

Health and policy expert Sara Bleich has found that when trying to change the way people eat, being prescriptive isn’t always the answer.

A new survey by Harvard researchers shows that trust in leaders and institutions are at a low ebb in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, highlighting the importance of gaining trust as part of the response to the growing Ebola epidemic there.

Humanitarian workers from around the globe will visit Harvard to discuss how best to treat the increasing number of diabetics among refugee populations. Symposium organizers talk about the problem and what they hope the symposium will accomplish.

During her Radcliffe fellowship, pediatric oncologist Lisa Diller is studying the implications of genetic testing in newborns, and planning research that focuses on testing babies for gene changes associated with cancers known to strike the very young.

A panel of experts at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health discussed how the globe might feed an estimated human population of 10 billion by midcentury and suggested a diet high in plant foods, low in red meat, as well as a host of reforms to how food is produced and distributed today.

Study in mice reveals that adult tissues retain a memory of which genes are activated during very early development, and that that memory can be recovered. Under certain conditions, adult cells play their developmental “movie” in a slow rewind, reactivating fetal genes. These findings have important implications for regenerative medicine and cancer research.

A treatment previously shown to clear the precancerous skin lesions called actinic keratosis now appears to reduce the chance that the treated skin will develop squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs), the second-most-common form of skin cancer.

New research from Massachusetts General Hospital traces a previously unknown pathway from poor sleep to an increase in the fatty plaques that line blood vessels in atherosclerosis, a key feature of cardiovascular disease.

A long-term study, led by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, found that the more sugar-sweetened beverages people consumed, the greater their risk of premature death — particularly death from cardiovascular disease, and to a lesser extent from cancer.

Harvard Medical School researchers have found that impaired insulin signaling in the brain negatively affects cognition, mood, and metabolism, all components of Alzheimer’s disease.

Author Paul Greenberg said eating more and different seafood, emphasizing species that are less energy-intensive to harvest and high in omega-3 fats, can help answer the world’s food challenges in the coming decades.

Based on a Harvard study, the monthly rate of first-time opioid prescriptions dropped by more than half between 2012 and 2017. A new concern now is whether some patients are getting less-than-adequate treatment for their pain.

Research into extending humanity’s healthy lifespan has been progressing rapidly in recent years. In February, a group of aging and longevity scientists founded a nonprofit to foster the work and serve as a resource for governments and businesses looking to understand the potentially far-reaching implications of a population that lives significantly longer, healthier lives.

Scientists from Massachusetts General Hospital and the University of Exeter Medical School have identified another 76 gene regions associated with sleep duration. Their findings may underpin future investigations into disordered sleep and understanding individual set points for how much is enough.

Harvard panel discusses doubling of maternal mortality rates in U.S. caused by inadequate hospital facilities, lack of access, insurance gaps, and systemic racism.

Eradicating the remaining pockets of HIV transmission in the U.S. by 2030 will be a challenge for the Trump administration, and depend on local cooperation in reaching high-risk groups with surveillance, prevention, and treatment, according to Harvard HIV/AIDS researcher Max Essex.

Every year, more than 18 million people around the world are told, “You have cancer.” In the U.S., nearly half of all men and more than one-third of women will…