The deadly malaria parasite uses its own messenger RNA to keep the host’s immune system jammed while it multiplies and spreads, researchers have discovered. RNA technology is regarded as one of the newest frontiers in medicine, but in fact a primordial innovator got...
A new Weizmann Institute of Science study has found that the genetic contribution to human lifespan is about 50 percent – more than double previous estimates. What determines how long we live – and to what extent is our lifespan shaped by our genes? Surprisingly, for...
Three resistance mutations identified in the Weizmann Institute of Science laboratory of Professor Yardena Samuels may become targets for powerful new immunotherapies. One of the most challenging moments in cancer treatment comes when a therapy stops working. In many...
Weizmann Institute of Science researchers have solved a 50-year-old mystery, uncovering the molecular mechanism that enables tissue regeneration after extensive damage. The findings may pave the way for treatments that help prevent cancer from returning. Like a...
New research at the Weizmann Institute of science shows a new class of immune-activating molecules can awaken anti-tumour immunity by targeting the tumour’s own defences. Immunotherapy, which harnesses our body’s own immune system to fight cancer, has revolutionised...
Weizmann researchers, together with Beilinson and Rambam physicians, have revealed that diverse bacteria reside within brain tumours, potentially affecting treatment efficacy and even patients’ survival. Like a bouncer guarding the entrance to an exclusive nightclub,...
Just days after their laboratories were damaged in the Iranian attack of the Weizmann Institute of Science, Professors Liran Shlush and Amos Tanay today publish a study expected to advance the field of blood cell medicine. What if a blood test could reveal the pace of...
Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science have revealed how breast cancer cells enter a state of dormancy, remaining undetected for years, and why they suddenly wake up and metastasize. Breast cancer is becoming increasingly treatable, but in some cases the...
Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science have identified a gene that reprograms macrophages into cancer-promoting cells — and show how to switch it off. To grow, cancer tumours must hijack the immune system for their needs. One of the main tricks that most...
Researchers from Professor Yardena Samuels’s lab at the Weizmann Institute of Science have manipulated cancer cells into making themselves visible to the immune system, creating a new approach that gives hope to patients with previously untreatable disease. When your...
A newly developed antibody-based treatment for the most aggressive type of breast cancer could also be used to treat many other cancers new Weizmann Institute of Science research shows. “Build your enemy a golden bridge to retreat across” is a piece of advice said by...
Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science have identified a biomarker that may one day enable a subgroup of lung cancer patients to benefit from relapse-free treatment. Non-smokers who develop lung cancer can be treated effectively with new drugs, but their...
Sometimes anticancer antibodies press on the gas and the brakes at the same time. New research from the Weizmann Institute of Research in Israel might help them accelerate better. When driving, putting a foot on the gas or brake pedal controls the car’s speed. This...
Cancer tumours contain multiple species of fungi that differ per tumour type, according to a large study led by researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science and the University of California, San Diego. The study, published today in Cell, potentially has...
Blood tests – simple, noninvasive and economically feasible – promise to become the next major milestone in cancer diagnosis. However, most of these tests, dubbed liquid biopsies, are currently not reliable enough for widespread use. A new, multi-parameter approach...
Of all the fungi that live in the human body, the most infamous is probably the yeast Candida. This distant cousin of baker’s yeast is notorious for causing various types of thrush that can be a major nuisance, but it can also lead to an invasive infection that may,...
Immunotherapies for cancer rely on recruiting the patient’s immune system, but they still fall far short of tapping into the entire arsenal of the body’s natural defences. In fact, most such therapies draw on one type of immune defines: the ability of T cells to...
Immunotherapy has sparked new hope for people with cancer, but for it to work, the patient’s immune system must be able to 'see' the tumour. There are ways of enhancing this recognition in individual cases, yet such solutions are, by definition, personalised, which...
Cancer immunotherapy may get a boost from an unexpected direction: bacteria residing within tumour cells. In a new study published in Nature, researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science and their collaborators have discovered that the immune system ‘sees’ these...
Multiple myeloma patients live much longer today than in the past, thanks to new targeted anti-myeloma drugs, but ultimately most develop resistance to the medications, and in some the disease is resistant to therapy from the start. Weizmann Institute of Science...
A study of melanoma cells explains a puzzling response they exhibit to ward off T cell attacks. Cancers like melanoma are hard to treat, not least because they have a varied bag of tricks for defeating or evading treatments. A combined research effort by scientists...
A new technology developed at the Weizmann Institute of Science may help answer outstanding questions about the immune system, cancer, Alzheimer’s, and more. Invading cells’ private space – prying into their internal functions, decisions and communications – could be...
Choosing the right drug for each cancer patient is key to successful treatment, but currently physicians have few reliable pointers to guide them in designing treatment protocols. Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science and Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard...
New Weizmann Institute of Science research shows heterogeneity in melanoma tumours prevents effective immune responses. Diversity – at least among cancer cells – is not a good thing. Weizmann research shows that in melanoma, tumours with cells that have differentiated...