Apoptosis in the news

A press release from Ohio State, today suggests another way to trigger apoptosis to get rid of troublesome cells that refuse to die. The Ohio State researchers have created a drug that triggers apoptosis by knocking out a ‘survival protein.’ Apparently some of us are sick because we have too much of this survival protein in certain malfunctioning cells that are slated for termination but refuse to die. The Ohio researchers are experimenting on cancer cells, but the drug should work just as well for autoimmune disease.

Some of us have immune cells that should die but don’t. I think of these cells as the “undead” staggering around in our bodies triggering all kinds of problems including some cases of autoimmunity. Make the “zombie” cells die and the autoimmune disease cascade ends.

Here’s the URL of the Ohio State article:

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/mcl1rel.htm

Here is another apoptosis drug in the news. This one was created by researchers at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center at the University of Texas.

When will it be tried on misbehaving immune cells? That is up to you. What are you willing to do? When will you demand that apoptosis drugs be used in autoimmune disease challenges? How loud will you yell?

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070419155119.htm

Sorry no B cell posting until I can type longer. I am still having carpal tunnel issues.