(Photo courtesy www.leukemia101.com) 
Researchers at the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center may have discovered a better way to distinguish acute leukemia patients who require aggressive treatment to prevent recurrence from those who need only standard therapy for cure.
About 13,300 new cases of AML and 8,200 deaths from the disease are expected this year in the United States.
In about half of cases, patients’ leukemia cells have chromosome changes that help doctors determine whether standard therapy will suffice to prevent recurrence, or whether the individual needs aggressive treatment such as a stem-cell transplant or an experimental therapy.
The remaining patients have leukemia cells …read more

 
Papers published in Nature and Science this week support the previously held theory that humans originated in East Africa, migrating outward until they reached all parts of the globe. But the genetic work from these studies brings a new level of precision to human migration studies, with each group finding subtle and intriguing details that shed light on different aspects of human genetic variation and ancestry.
Study 1 – University of Michigan:This study was based on the analysis of more than 500,000 SNPs and nearly 400 copy number variants — sections of DNA that are repeated or duplicated in the genome — for 485 individuals. These samples, …read more

Look what I picked up at the London Science Museum a few weeks ago – bookmarks, postcards, and cards.
Pairs of human chromosomes [repeated pattern]
Detail view of the wall surrounding the Live Science area of the Who am I? gallery.
Who am I? looks at contemporary brain science and genetics and asks whether we can be defined by science.

Two clusters of genes on chromosome 17 have been linked to opioid addiction – heroin, morphine and oxycontin. A linkage analysis of 393 families, most with at least two individuals with opioid dependence, scanned the genome for genetic markers that appear to be inherited more frequently between affected family members.
Dr. Joel Gelernter of Yale University:
These results provide a first basis to identify genes for opioid dependence from a genome-wide investigation. Research in the laboratory now is focused on finding specific genes that modify risk for opioid dependence.
Previously, the mu-opioid receptor OPRM1 gene located on chromosome six was associated …read more