Researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) have mapped the conformational changes that occur in a protein “notorious” for pumping chemotherapeutic drugs out of cancer cells and blocking medications from reaching the central nervous system.

New findings that reveal complex interactions in esophageal adenocarcinoma could lead to diagnostic, prognostic or therapeutic biomarkers.

With the help of a drug formerly used to treat HIV/AIDS, researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) have found a way to make melanoma cells more vulnerable to targeted anti-cancer therapy.

Vanderbilt researchers hope their new method to describe cells will be widely adopted and used to generate a “Who’s Who” database of cell types.

DNA replication is an extraordinarily complex multi-step process that makes copies of the body’s genetic blueprint. It is necessary for growth and essential to life. Now researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and Vanderbilt University have found evidence that one of those steps may involve the telephone-like transmission of electrical signals regulated by a chemical “switch.”

The protein beta-catenin may be a good target for therapies to treat lung disease that is a common complication of preterm birth.

Although nitrous oxide was less effective than epidural anesthesia for pain management during labor, mothers who used nitrous oxide were equally satisfied with their childbirth experience.