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About us
Body and mind
Disease and treatment
Diet and lifestyle
Environment and sustainability
Diet and lifestyle
The same genes determine fitness and fatness
Tuesday, 27th December 2016
Being fit is healthy and being fat is not. No news there. Nevertheless, science shows that genes, and sometimes even the same genes, can predict both fitness and fatness. New Danish research suggests that our percentage of body fat – and ...
Body and mind
Antibodies for treating Parkinson's on the way
Tuesday, 20th December 2016
Muhammed Ali was battling with Parkinson’s disease when he died in 2016. Other famous people with Parkinson’s disease include actors Michael J. Fox and Robin Williams. Williams appears to have died from a particular form of the disease, Dementia ...
Disease and treatment
New cell research aims to reduce medicine prices
Wednesday, 14th December 2016
Cancer drugs, vaccines and blood proteins can nowadays be produced in Chinese hamster ovary cells. The researchers’ knowledge of the complex metabolic processes of the cells has so far been fragmented and inadequate. An international research team with Danish participation ...
Environment and sustainability
Antibiotic resistance may develop in the sea
Monday, 12th December 2016
We mostly associate the development of antibiotic resistance with herds of pigs or hospitals. However, the genes that create the resistance originate in many diverse habitats in which there are microorganisms – including the world’s oceans and seas, which have ...
Body and mind
Life and death struggle in dreamland
Thursday, 8th December 2016
You can take two paths. One is a tunnel with a light at the end. A voice whispers: stop breathing and you can end up there. The other path leads to your daughter. She is pregnant. If you choose this ...
Disease and treatment
Micromolecules undermine the battle against cancer
Wednesday, 30th November 2016
Only half the people diagnosed with colorectal cancer survive for more than 5 years. Once the cancer cells become resistant to one type of chemotherapy drug, other types also become less effective. Researchers have now discovered a mechanism for the resistance ...
Environment and sustainability
Thinking less green
Wednesday, 23rd November 2016
Green is often seen as the colour of nature, a healthy colour that triggers powerful emotions. This is why many people choose to use green to elicit sympathy for a cause, ranging from economics and biotechnology to food. But painting ...
Environment and sustainability
Milestone enables medicine to be produced in plants
Thursday, 17th November 2016
Plants comprise a pharmaceutical treasure chest containing 50,000 natural substances that can potentially relieve pain and save people’s lives. Nevertheless, getting plants to produce these substances in usable quantities has not been possible so far. Fortunately, a Danish-led research team ...
Disease and treatment
Danish researchers discover why brain cancer is so devastating
Tuesday, 15th November 2016
Despite surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy, most people with brain cancer die a mere 1 year after being diagnosed. Doctors must give up, since the cancer returns again and again. Now researchers have discovered that the cancer cells that disseminate are similar ...
Diet and lifestyle
Lack of sleep and exercise may give you a high like cannabis
Friday, 11th November 2016
Insufficient sleep is common in modern societies. Lack of sleep can have long-lasting effects on a person’s health. New research shows that lack of sleep increases blood concentrations of a chemical that affects the same pathways as cannabis. Exercise ...
Body and mind
More women than expected are genetically men
Tuesday, 25th October 2016
Sex chromosomes usually determine whether you are female or male. Women are XX. Men are XY. However, genetically, a few women are actually men. They grow up as women with a woman’s body, and most only discover well into ...
Diet and lifestyle
Overeating changes our DNA
Wednesday, 5th October 2016
The number of overweight people has increased drastically in recent years in an epidemic of obesity. By measuring the minute chemical changes on the surface of people’s DNA, researchers can predict whether a person is at risk of developing ...
Body and mind
Genetic link between tonsillitis and inflammatory bowel diseases
Tuesday, 24th January 2017
The tonsils, along with the appendix and spleen appear to be unnecessary. Now Danish researchers have not only mapped out a genetic link from inflamed tonsils to the human genome. They have also shown that this genetic link protects against ...
Disease and treatment
New way of treating deadly teenage cancer
Wednesday, 25th January 2017
Ewing sarcoma is a life-threatening tumour growing in bones that especially affects teenagers. In contrast to many other types of cancer, only modest advances have been made in treating Ewing sarcoma in the past two decades because it resists chemotherapy. ...
Disease and treatment
Adults with Down's Syndrome rarely develop cancer
Thursday, 22nd December 2016
For decades, children with Down’s syndrome have been known to have a much greater risk of developing leukaemia than other children. In contrast, new Danish research shows that adults with Down’s syndrome are considerably less likely to develop ...
Diet and lifestyle
Lack of sleep can make you fat
Friday, 30th December 2016
Not being able to get a decent night’s sleep is bad enough, but now Swedish-German research collaboration has added a new misery to the list of illnesses you risk developing by not sleeping enough. In addition to harmful effects ...
Body and mind
Splicing ourselves to a longer life
Monday, 5th December 2016
As we age, we move more slowly and think less clearly. This slow decline stems from reduced efficiency and precision in our cells. Today, research collaboration between the United States and Denmark reveals that the ageing process can be slowed ...
Disease and treatment
A revolution in the code of life
Thursday, 26th January 2017
Jason Chin has accomplished in a few years what many researchers have been anticipating for decades. His research group has restructured the production system of cells so that they can use completely new building blocks. The goal is to transform ...
Body and mind
Ill people have to overcome their good health
Friday, 2nd September 2016
A disease rarely occurs alone. Nature has endowed the human body with a robustness that can keep people healthy despite unhealthy lifestyles or toxic environments. New research shows, however, that when people become ill, they have to fight this very ...
Body and mind
Flaw in our internal clock can make us depressed
Monday, 30th January 2017
Of all the clocks we humans surround ourselves with, our internal clock is probably the most important. This helps to synchronize our biological functions with the astronomical day. Researchers have now studied the molecular mechanics of our internal clock and ...
Environment and sustainability
Sterile men with bone-like testicles
Wednesday, 14th September 2016
Semen quality around the world remains at a low point, and this situation seems especially serious in Denmark and the other countries in northern Europe. Experts point to chemicals and poor lifestyles as causes. New Danish-American research shows that vitamin ...
Environment and sustainability
Your children suffer as a result of excessive packaging
Monday, 26th September 2016
Perfluorinated compounds are fat- and water-repelling chemicals that are used in many ordinary household products ranging from pizza boxes to raincoats. For many years, researchers have been warning that these compounds can weaken the human immune system. A research group ...
Disease and treatment
Molecular cause of type 2 diabetes can also cause Parkinson’
Monday, 9th January 2017
They arrive like a thief at night. Slowly, insidiously – catching a person unawares. Type 2 diabetes and Parkinson’s disease both, in their own way, slowly incapacitate the people affected. Researchers have now found a molecular mechanism behind the development of ...
Body and mind
Women can write themselves out of a fertility crisis
Thursday, 5th January 2017
Men and women undergoing fertility treatment often experience stress and depression. Nearly one in six women and one in five men experience severe symptoms of depression after 1 year of treatment. In particular, the stress level increases in the time between ...
Disease and treatment
In pursuit of lost beta cells
Wednesday, 28th September 2016
Up to 500 million people have diabetes. Although the symptoms can be treated increasingly effectively, no actual cure has been discovered. But a research group in Sweden is now on the trail of several proteins and molecules that can stimulate the ...
Disease and treatment
Hope for people with a genetic disorder
Monday, 17th October 2016
Mutations in our DNA can make us ill. But some of these illnesses result from defects in DNA sequences that were previously thought to be unimportant. A Danish research group has now explained why the defective sequences can cause illness ...
Diet and lifestyle
Mom’s sugar intake can make her children fat
Friday, 3rd February 2017
They say you are what you eat. New research shows, however, that you can also become what your mother eats. The researchers fed pregnant rats chocolate and sugary drinks, and their offspring became fat. Luckily, one can apparently end the ...
Body and mind
Solving a mystery in the brain's plumbing system
Wednesday, 12th October 2016
Acute liver failure affects several processes in the brain, and there is a risk that water accumulates in the brain to an extent which may have fatal consequences for the patient. One reason why fluid accumulates is that ammonia, a ...
Diet and lifestyle
Twice as many young men as young women die from heart attacks
Monday, 6th February 2017
A new Danish study investigated young people who died suddenly from heart attacks and concluded that men die much more frequently after physical activity, whereas women die more often in their sleep. (Photo: Shutterstock).
Environment and sustainability
Researchers fighting famine
Friday, 23rd December 2016
The United Nations estimates that almost 800 million people do not have enough to eat. One key factor in fighting famine is food security. A major related challenge is the filamentous fungus Fusarium, which destroys colossal quantities of cereal crops such ...
Diet and lifestyle
Suicide more likely among people undergoing bariatric surgery
Friday, 16th December 2016
As the obesity epidemic grows throughout high-income countries, the number of possible cures and treatments is also increasing. One of the more radical and also most effective cures is gastric bypass: removing part of the stomach surgically to reduce its ...
Body and mind
Beating epileptic heart attacks
Thursday, 29th December 2016
Epilepsy is one of the most common diseases of the nervous system. One in 10 people has an epileptic seizure sometime during their life that causes them to lose consciousness or lose control of all or part of their body. Luckily, ...
Disease and treatment
More and more people need hospital treatment for tattoos
Friday, 10th February 2017
For the first time globally, Danish researchers have clinically classified the allergies, infections and lump growths resulting from the tattooing trend. The numbers are considered the tip of the iceberg and suggest that the tattoo trade today is an unregulated ...
Diet and lifestyle
Computers will help us to be healthier as we age
Tuesday, 3rd January 2017
One hundred years. That is how old you are predicted to become if you were born in about 2000 and have a relatively healthy and active lifestyle. The prospect of a longer life has intensified research on healthy ageing. New research ...
Disease and treatment
Childhood vaccination provides a growth bonus
Monday, 19th December 2016
The early vaccination of children in low-income countries has proved to be a really good idea. Since the 1970s, when mass vaccination campaigns began in Africa, the number of deaths caused by measles has declined by 40%. Danish researchers – led by ...
Disease and treatment
A hunt for bacterial treasures
Friday, 17th March 2017
Emmanuelle Charpentier has been one of the driving forces behind harnessing a bacterial immune system into the transformative CRISPR-Cas technology that has the potential to cure genetic diseases. Nevertheless, she asserts that she still has not achieved her goal, since ...
Disease and treatment
One in three people globally harbour a ticking bacteria bomb
Monday, 20th March 2017
Tuberculosis (TB) once belonged to a bygone era. However, this bacterial disease is now one of the three most deadly infectious diseases globally. The bacteria can hide for years in the human immune system, but research reveals that they are ...
Body and mind
Structure is the key
Thursday, 30th March 2017
All life is based on structures. And knowing these structure is the foundation for understanding life. Poul Nissen, the recipient of the 2017 Novo Nordisk Prize, has studied the basic structures that create coherence in living organisms his whole life.
Disease and treatment
The man with the golden DNA scissors
Wednesday, 5th April 2017
A tiny bacterium has upended the world as we thought we knew it just a few years ago. It has taken 25 years for researchers to understand what the bacterium was hiding. Virginijus Siksnys, a biochemist in Lithuania, cracked the code. ...
Disease and treatment
Miniscule particles could cure cancer
Wednesday, 19th April 2017
A common problem with chemotherapy is that it works too well: in fact, so well that it kills not only cancer cells but also the body’s other cells. Nanoparticles have turned out to be fantastic guides in the quest ...
Diet and lifestyle
Missing link found between stress and mental illness
Friday, 7th April 2017
Anxiety and depression annually cause 1.6 million to 1.9 million days of sick leave in Denmark. Now Swedish researchers have found a possible link between the stress hormone cortisol and these two mental disorders. The individual sensitivity for developing these conditions appears ...
Disease and treatment
Blood test identifies life-threatening shortness of breath
Wednesday, 3rd May 2017
Struggling to breathe is a sign that the heart and lungs are having difficulty keeping up. When this happens for no apparent reason, it may be a sign of serious illness. By measuring four biomarkers in a blood test, researchers ...
Disease and treatment
Depressed people sleep better when they stay awake
Monday, 1st May 2017
Depressed people need to be treated rapidly and effectively because pharmaceutical treatment does not start to work for 5–7 weeks. New research shows that therapy in which people stay awake for 36 hours and then sleep helps to reduce depression in the ...
Disease and treatment
Lipids boost the immune system in combating multidrug-resistant bacteria and cancer
Wednesday, 26th April 2017
Health systems worldwide are increasingly losing the battle against multidrug-resistant bacteria. New antibiotics are scarcely developed before they become unusable. Now researchers have discovered special lipids that can boost the immune system to combat multidrug-resistant infections. The method can possibly ...
Diet and lifestyle
Slower metabolism may help people live longer
Friday, 5th May 2017
Throughout life, the human body is constantly struggling: errors arise and are then corrected. As we get older, the balance appears to change, with an increasing risk that errors are not corrected. Now a Danish-German research collaboration has found evidence ...
Diet and lifestyle
Many drugs in the blood of young people dying from heart attacks
Wednesday, 10th May 2017
An analysis of nearly 500 post-mortem reports of unexpected deaths among young people shows that most had a high blood concentration of at least one and often several drugs. The results suggest a possible connection between unexpected heart attacks and that ...
Environment and sustainability
Tar-eating bacterial duo may transform toxic compounds into new usable materials
Tuesday, 16th May 2017
Danish researchers have sequenced and analyzed the genome of a bacterium that can feed off coal tar. It lives in symbiosis with another bacterium that can recycle its partner’s waste. Researchers hope that this sustainable bacterial duo can transform ...
Disease and treatment
Chemical fingerprinting can benefit severely ill people
Wednesday, 14th June 2017
In the future, medicine will not just be tailored so that it matches the genetic profile of an individual. In the not-too-distant future, in the comfort of our homes, we will be able to test such things as our saliva, ...
Disease and treatment
Busy doctors prescribe more antibiotics
Friday, 2nd June 2017
Avoiding a post-antibiotic era in which antibiotics become ineffective against common infections requires that doctors prescribe fewer antibiotics. New research shows that using too few or too many diagnostic tests and being busy are the main reasons why doctors prescribe ...
Disease and treatment
New practices could prevent seniors from being unnecessarily hospitalized
Wednesday, 31st May 2017
Frail older people who are admitted to hospitals for acute care are often sent home again without being adequately assessed because their symptoms are unclear. This benefits neither seniors nor the public finances as a whole. New research shows that ...
Diet and lifestyle
Sugar-sweetened beverages did not directly lead to diabetes
Tuesday, 6th June 2017
High intake of sugar-sweetened beverages is often highlighted as a main cause of obesity and type 2 diabetes. To find conclusive evidence, researchers therefore gave 66 overweight men without diabetes large quantities of fructose drinks each day for 12 weeks. However, this did ...
Body and mind
Predicting whether genetic mutations will lead to cancer
Friday, 9th June 2017
In a few years, everyone will routinely be able to have their genes tested to determine how they differ from the norm. Nevertheless, scientists do not yet always have the ability to determine whether a mutation in a gene is ...
Disease and treatment
Doctors in Denmark refreeze transplanted ovary after woman gives birth
Friday, 16th June 2017
Women with ovarian cancer can now have an ovary removed and then have it transplanted when they decide to have children. However, because of the increased risk of cancer recurring in the transplanted ovary, doctors from Denmark have become the ...
Diet and lifestyle
High-fat marine diet has altered Greenlanders’ genes
Tuesday, 20th June 2017
For thousands of years, Greenlanders have lived in isolation and have eaten a diet high in fat and low in carbohydrate. Researchers have discovered a gene variant carried by every person with solely Greenlandic ancestors. This gene variant has helped ...
Body and mind
Autism and educational attainment are genetically linked
Friday, 23rd June 2017
A major international study of 6454 families with autistic children shows that autism is not caused by mutations in a single gene but by several genetic mutations. Overall, the genetic variants that increase the likelihood of autism and schizophrenia significantly overlap ...
Disease and treatment
Eternal youth could start in 20 years
Friday, 30th June 2017
Most people accept that the ageing of body and mind is unavoidable. According to biomedical gerontologist Aubrey de Grey, however, not believing that we can win the struggle against ageing is the reason why life expectancy has not increased substantially. ...
Disease and treatment
Traditional Chinese anti-cancer medicine in a new fungal recipe
Thursday, 6th July 2017
Herbal and other natural medicine can often not be tested and approved as drugs because it cannot be produced in sufficient quantity or purity. Researchers have now developed a yeast strain that produces much more of a compound – known from ...
Body and mind
Our genes start to make sense when we share them
Thursday, 20th July 2017
Of every 100 base pairs in the human genome, 99 are in identical positions in all human beings. Nevertheless, people are incredibly different. We get sick from different things and need different types of medicine to get healthy. Taking us on a ...
Disease and treatment
Children with leukaemia may avoid permanent damage from chemotherapy
Tuesday, 18th July 2017
More and more children with leukaemia are surviving. Unfortunately, the side-effects of chemotherapy often affect children for the rest of their life. Danish researchers can now measure how children react to chemotherapy, thereby potentially minimizing permanent damage to organs and ...
Body and mind
Our cells develop through dramatic changes in the 3D structure of the genome
Wednesday, 2nd August 2017
All human cells contain the same genomic manual. Different types of cells, however, decode the DNA strands in the manual differently and therefore function very differently. A Danish researcher has now shown that the folding of the DNA strands changes ...
Body and mind
Weight-regulating hormone weakens the bones of obese people
Wednesday, 26th July 2017
People’s bones are automatically strengthened when they are subjected to weight-bearing loads. Researchers have therefore been puzzled as to why obese people are still twice as likely to experience bone fractures as people with normal weight. A new study ...
Diet and lifestyle
Increasing numbers of children develop severe liver disease
Tuesday, 8th August 2017
Increasing numbers of children develop non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, which can end in liver cirrhosis. Doctors in Denmark are now warning about this neglected disease because the long-term effects and prevalence are unknown. New methods of investigating this are needed ...
Body and mind
Four simple rules explain the first 5 days of human life
Tuesday, 22nd August 2017
Five days elapse from the time a sperm fertilizes an egg until it is implanted in the secure environment of the uterus. During this time, the egg develops from one cell into a cell cluster surrounded by a layer of ...
Disease and treatment
Bacteria poison themselves to survive antibiotics
Thursday, 10th August 2017
Cystic fibrosis is a debilitating and inherited lung disease. Most people with the disease have a permanent bacterial lung infection – often deadly. Researchers have now revealed one of the bacteria’s possible defence systems. Bacteria can potentially poison themselves to ...
Body and mind
Cells hack their own genome
Wednesday, 23rd August 2017
All living organisms are in a constant arms race against viruses and other genetic parasites that want us to propagate their genes. Just as bacteria have developed CRISPR-Cas as a counter weapon, animals and humans have developed similar defence mechanisms. ...
Disease and treatment
Reduced oxygen may result in migraine
Tuesday, 29th August 2017
One in ten people worldwide experience migraine and thus occasional debilitating headaches. Despite the prevalence of the disease, little is known about the cause and triggers. Danish researchers have now shown for the first time that reduced oxygen can cause ...
Disease and treatment
Recent quadrupling of diagnoses of an incurable type of arthritis
Friday, 1st September 2017
The risk of psoriatic arthritis, a serious joint disorder, is greater than previously thought, with the annual number of people diagnosed increasing fourfold from 1997 to 2011. Researchers believe that doctors have become better at detecting the disease among people with psoriasis. ...
Diet and lifestyle
Find the right fuel for the bacteria in your body
Friday, 29th September 2017
In a discussion with chef Thomas Rode at this year’s Heartland Festival, metabolism researcher Oluf Borbye Pedersen explained that humans are 90% bacteria. These bacteria break down food into energy in the gut, strengthen the immune system and probably alter ...
Disease and treatment
Using sleep to treat type 2 diabetes: a dream come true?
Tuesday, 12th September 2017
Type 2 diabetes is mainly driven by poor lifestyle habits, including physical inactivity and unhealthy food choices. Lifestyle interventions to improve dietary habits and increase exercise have been proven to be promising in treating type 2 diabetes. New research shows that easing ...
Diet and lifestyle
Danish treatment model works: 3 of 4 children lose weight and keep it off
Tuesday, 19th September 2017
Dieting has a reputation for only working briefly; many people regain all the weight they have lost once the focus declines. Now researchers have monitored 1001 overweight children for 18 months who followed what has been dubbed the The Childrens Obesity Clinics ...
Body and mind
The many shades of fat
Wednesday, 13th September 2017
Fat is not what it used to be, but in fact it never was. Only a few years ago, fatty tissue was simply considered a storage site for fat. Philipp E. Scherer has provided some of the most important contributions ...
Disease and treatment
Alzheimer’s risk among diabetics provides key to cure
Friday, 22nd September 2017
Why people with type 2 diabetes develop Alzheimer’s disease more often has been a mystery. The reason lies in the energy conversion in the brains of people with diabetes, but only in the hippocampus, which is where Alzheimer’s is ...
Disease and treatment
Micromolecules may keep the aorta intact
Wednesday, 4th October 2017
When the wall of an aortic blood vessel is weakened, small balloon-like bulges called aneurysms are created. If these burst, they result in death in 8 of 10 cases. Researchers are seeking the mechanisms behind this weakening, which is regulated by microscopic ...
Diet and lifestyle
Natural sleep hormone increases the risk of diabetes
Wednesday, 11th October 2017
Melatonin has been called the “hormone of darkness” and adjusts people’s internal clock. Many people with sleep problems take this wonder hormone to improve their sleep–wake cycle. New research, however, suggests that this entails risk. Melatonin also affects ...
Body and mind
Only half lose weight on a high-fibre diet
Friday, 6th October 2017
Diets sometimes promise more than they can deliver. Sometimes they even contradict each other. Confusion about contradictory and ineffective diets can sometimes make people give up trying to improve their health. Now Danish researchers may have revealed some of the ...
Disease and treatment
New method can resuscitate discarded drugs
Wednesday, 18th October 2017
Drugs that are therapeutically effective are often scrapped because they cause harmful side-effects. Arrhythmia, which means an inappropriate rate or irregular rhythm of the heartbeat, results in more drugs being scrapped than any other side-effect. A computer algorithm developed by ...
Body and mind
Stem cell mystery solved: sense of direction determines their destiny
Monday, 23rd October 2017
If researchers can control the maturation of stem cells into fully developed cells, they may be able to cure such diseases as diabetes and blindness. By discovering the signals that control these processes in the developing organism, scientists can now ...
Body and mind
A malfunctioning body clock makes us ill
Wednesday, 25th October 2017
Every cell in our body contains a clock that helps the cell to adapt to the 24-hour circadian rhythm and changes in the environment. If the clocks go haywire and get out of sync, this can strongly affect our health. ...
Body and mind
Surprised organ researchers: some cells remain single – others create families
Monday, 30th October 2017
In the future, artificial organs can be created to replace a damaged organ or to produce vital hormones in a laboratory. Researchers do not yet understand how organs develop from a few stem cells into complete organs of many types. ...
Disease and treatment
Virus researchers discover why chickenpox can be fatal
Friday, 3rd November 2017
Nearly every Dane has chickenpox as a child, and most have no long-term problems. However, one person in 10,000 develops encephalitis, resulting in serious complications, including death. Researchers have now discovered that the immune system of these children fails to recognize ...
Diet and lifestyle
Genes that make you fat but keep you fit
Tuesday, 7th November 2017
You might think that obesity is always linked to poor health. Although this may often be true, new research suggests that obesity does not always make people unhealthy. Genetic epidemiologist Ruth Loos has discovered a set of genes that protects ...
Disease and treatment
One in four should call their GP instead of out-of-hours primary care
Friday, 17th November 2017
Out-of-hours primary care in Denmark is designed to help acutely ill people outside the usual opening hours of their designated general practitioners (GPs). Nevertheless, the telephone-based gatekeepers of the service are often overloaded with trivial questions and minor illnesses that ...
Body and mind
Rare autoimmune disease not so rare after all
Monday, 20th November 2017
Very few people are diagnosed with the autoimmune disease APECED. New research, however, suggests that it is more common than originally thought. Simple tests can now detect whether people have this inheritable form of autoimmunity, which has implications for diagnosis ...
Disease and treatment
Struggle between good and bad bacteria reveals antibiotics of the future
Friday, 24th November 2017
The world is about to run out of antibiotics that are effective against the most resistant bacteria. This has led a Danish research group to adopt alternative methods in the search for new antibiotics. They have ...
Disease and treatment
A Trojan horse can sneak medicine through the gut wall
Friday, 1st December 2017
Even using the most advanced types of pills, only 1 in 100 biomedicine molecules passes through the body and arrives at the intended target. Of all the obstacles medicine meets on the way, the gut wall is the most insurmountable. Danish researchers ...
Body and mind
Women with previous pregnancy-induced diabetes may show how diabetes develops
Wednesday, 6th December 2017
Diabetes is difficult to study. Once it is diagnosed, the chances of elucidating the causes are limited. Because about 3% of pregnant women in Denmark develop gestational diabetes, Danish researchers now monitor women with previous gestational diabetes and then follow how ...
Disease and treatment
Sneaking antibiotics into multidrug-resistant bacteria
Wednesday, 13th December 2017
The increasing resistance of bacteria to multiple antibiotics has triggered a new phase in humanity’s never-ending battle against bacterial infections. The excessive use of otherwise effective antibiotics has required developing new weapons. Peptide nucleic acids that are DNA mimics ...
Body and mind
New strategy to battle cancer: get the cancer cells to drive so fast that they crash
Tuesday, 19th December 2017
When cancer strikes, this disturbs the normal and well-controlled mechanisms of cells. To compensate for the many changes, the cancer cells need to slow down the cellular processes. Researchers have a new strategy for treating cancer based on the fact ...
Body and mind
Malfunctioning cellular antennae lead to cancer
Monday, 25th December 2017
Cancer may arise when cells in our body stop operating normally. In healthy cells, several regulatory mechanisms counteract potential malfunctions, and an imbalance in these mechanisms may therefore have severe consequences. Danish researchers have revealed a previously unknown mechanism by ...
Diet and lifestyle
Vitamin D affects fertility, but do women or men need to take it?
Wednesday, 27th December 2017
Men’s sperm quality has fallen drastically in high-income countries in the past 50 years. Intensive research is therefore underway to find ways to revitalize these lethargic sperm. Now, Danish researchers have measurably increased the chances of men with low sperm ...
Disease and treatment
Researchers track the origins of breast cancer
Friday, 29th December 2017
Avoiding cancer requires preventing it before it develops. The challenge is to identify the cells in which cancer typically originates and to understand how it develops. Researchers have now succeeded in monitoring the development of breast cells outside the human ...
Body and mind
Researchers pursue the molecular elixir of exercise
Wednesday, 3rd January 2018
Exercise is healthy, is good for the body and helps us to live longer. Nevertheless, many people do not exercise in their busy and sedentary daily lives. This has caused the numbers of people who are overweight and who have ...
Environment and sustainability
Bacteria use parasitic open-source weapons against people
Friday, 5th January 2018
The human body contains more bacteria than human cells. Between 500 and 1000 species of bacteria live in the gut alone and, like humans, they both compete and cooperate – including sharing genes that enable antibiotic resistance. Danish researchers used samples from the ...
Body and mind
No more snapshots: now we can film cell processes
Tuesday, 9th January 2018
Before a sperm can fertilize an egg, a woman’s body needs to release a large volume of calcium all at once. This is just one of many cell processes in which transporting and regulating calcium are essential. Previously, researchers ...
Disease and treatment
Time to cure type 1 diabetes: Danish researchers among the leaders
Thursday, 11th January 2018
People with type 1 diabetes strongly depend on injecting synthetically produced insulin. However, this situation may change within a few years. Today, researchers can already recreate insulin-producing beta cells from stem cells, which can be implanted in people with diabetes. The ...
Body and mind
You probably have more than one brain
Tuesday, 16th January 2018
Our bodies contain more bacteria than human cells, and these bacteria not only affect us physically but also influence our mood. This will not simply affect how we eat and the lifestyles we choose to optimize our microbiome but will ...
Body and mind
Severe maternal thyroid dysfunction in early pregnancy may adversely affect child IQ
Thursday, 18th January 2018
The fetal thyroid gland is increasingly able to synthesize thyroid hormones from the second trimester of pregnancy. Abnormal maternal thyroid function in early pregnancy may disturb fetal brain development. A recent large study from Denmark indicates that severe maternal thyroid ...
Diet and lifestyle
"The pill is not more dangerous than most other things in life"
Tuesday, 23rd January 2018
You can quickly become worried by reading about the studies on how oral contraceptives affects the body and brain. A new Danish study shows that the pill increases the risk of breast cancer but reduces the risk of ovarian cancer. ...
Disease and treatment
Heartwarming micromolecules save lives
Friday, 26th January 2018
Acute heart attacks are the most frequent cause of death and subsequent illness. Danish researchers have developed a method using a simple blood pressure cuff in the ambulance on the way to the hospital that can prevent permanent damage to ...
Disease and treatment
Surprising discovery may pave the way for a Danish Ebola cure
Wednesday, 31st January 2018
In 2013–2016, an epidemic of Ebola virus disease swept through western Africa, killing more than 11,000 people. While the world trembles at the thought of the next outbreak, researchers worldwide are struggling to find a cure, but there is no effective treatment ...
Body and mind
On your marks; get set ... how the brain’s excitatory neurons start us walking – or running
Thursday, 8th February 2018
Although both a sprint to catch a bus and a leisurely jaunt in the forest require movement, the initiating neuronal signals sent by the brain differ completely. A Danish-Swedish research group has investigated which parts of the brain control walking ...
Disease and treatment
More effective ways to treat skin cancer being developed
Wednesday, 14th February 2018
Nonmelanoma skin cancer is the most common type of cancer. Although it is rarely fatal, it can be extremely incapacitating because it often returns repeatedly. Skin cancer is usually removed surgically, since the side-effects of anticancer drugs are more severe ...
Disease and treatment
Fluorescent tumours will vastly improve survival for people with cancer
Thursday, 12th April 2018
Surgeons removing tumours must assess where the tumour ends and where the healthy tissue begins. This often means leaving individual cancer cells behind, enabling the cancer to return. Danish researchers can now make the cancer cells fluorescent, enabling surgeons and ...
Diet and lifestyle
Pregnant women miscarry more often if they smoke or drink too much coffee
Friday, 23rd February 2018
Pregnant women are inundated by advice, much of which is well founded. But some of it is based on fads and supposition. A Danish-led research project has now attempted to quantify the dangers of smoking and of drinking coffee during ...
Diet and lifestyle
Central regulator discovered: researchers now striving to tune metabolism
Friday, 2nd March 2018
Obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and other diseases resulting from imbalanced metabolism are hitting record highs worldwide. Our changing diet and sedentary lifestyles warn of the increasing challenges ahead. Researchers have recently discovered a protein that is present throughout the body ...
Body and mind
Researchers rock the foundations of biology
Friday, 9th March 2018
Medicine is today produced to geometrically match the targeted biological molecules. Knowledge about how these molecules are structured is therefore essential for drug design and in getting the body’s molecules to communicate. In any case, this is what most ...
Diet and lifestyle
Hope for overweight people: one hunger signal stands out
Wednesday, 21st March 2018
Signals from our stomach and intestines control how hungry we feel. Incorrect signals can lead to overeating and eventually overweight. Blood levels of appetite-regulating hormones usually increase when we eat, but one hormone stands out. Blood levels of ghrelin, a ...
Body and mind
Tall children experience stroke less often later in life
Friday, 16th March 2018
Childhood can strongly influence the rest of a person’s life. This is clear in a new Danish study showing that the taller a child is at 7–13 years old, the lower the risk of stroke – a blocked or ruptured blood ...
Disease and treatment
The circles of life
Wednesday, 28th March 2018
The circles of life: birth and childhood; adulthood and reproduction; then old age and death. By day and by season; tide and tempest. People’s cells are also propelled by this regularity. Our genes – DNA – is transcribed to RNA, which ...
Disease and treatment
How life (un)folds
Friday, 16th March 2018
Life seems to be ruled by chance: where we are born, what we become, who we meet, how we die. Novozymes Prize winner Gunnar von Heijne has devoted his life to bringing order into the chaos life constantly seems to ...
Environment and sustainability
Extreme microbes battle against radioactive contamination
Friday, 6th April 2018
Radioactive material lies underground in old rusting nuclear waste containers like a ticking time bomb throughout the world. In other places, radioactive material from mining operations and other activities contaminates groundwater. New research on ancient microorganisms shows that they can ...
Disease and treatment
Gener fra isolerede folkeslag røber fedmens akilleshæl
Monday, 1st July 2019
Forskere har i årevis forgæves søgt i høstakken af menneskelige gener efter den nål, der har ført til verdens fedmeepidemi. Kigger man på verdens befolkningers samlede pulje af gener, er der ingen tydelig sammenhæng ...
Disease and treatment
Vulnerable population groups participate less often in screening for cervical cancer
Monday, 30th April 2018
When cervical cancer screening was introduced in Denmark in the 1960s, about 900 women were diagnosed with the disease each year. Since then, this number has declined to about 380. However, about one fourth of women are not screened in accordance with ...
Disease and treatment
Viruses help humans in fighting bacteria
Friday, 20th April 2018
Humans are constantly battling microorganisms. We barely manage to develop an antibiotic before bacteria start to develop resistance. Similarly, microorganisms such as bacteria and viruses battle each other. Now researchers have revealed how viruses evade the immune system of bacteria-like ...
Diet and lifestyle
Sugar mystery: gene variant is associated with increased sugar intake but a lower body-fat percentage
Tuesday, 10th April 2018
Danish researchers recently published a study showing that a variation in a gene can increase the craving to eat more sugar. The researchers hoped that this would turn out to be a way to treat obesity and diabetes. Now the ...
Disease and treatment
Major breakthrough in understanding resistance to cancer therapy
Monday, 16th April 2018
The introduction of PARP inhibitors was a major breakthrough in treating breast and ovarian cancer. Unfortunately, some types of cancer develop resistance, so the disease returns. An international research team, led by Danish researchers, has made a groundbreaking discovery of ...
Disease and treatment
Researchers now ready for final strike against Zika virus
Thursday, 26th April 2018
In 2015–2016, the Zika virus ravaged South America, with major effects on pregnant women and their unborn children because the virus can harm the fetus. Researchers have difficulty in studying Zika in classical animal models because mice are less receptive to ...
Disease and treatment
DNA fingerprinting helps to heal brain cancer
Tuesday, 8th May 2018
At least 100 types of tumours can strike the brain and central nervous system. Some need to be treated immediately. Others are benign, and chemotherapy may therefore be harmful. Until now, the diagnostic process has relied on imprecise microscopic samples, but ...
Diet and lifestyle
Tall people: more cancer but less heart disease
Wednesday, 16th May 2018
Whether people are tall or short strongly influences their performance in sports and career. Research shows that height is also associated with the types of diseases that develop later in life. Genetic differences largely determine the height differences in a ...
Body and mind
Genetic needle found in obesity’s enormous haystack
Friday, 25th May 2018
For decades, researchers have been combing the haystack of human genes for reasons that can explain the global obesity epidemic. By examining the total gene pool of the world’s large populations, researchers have discovered more than 700 genetic variants, each ...
Environment and sustainability
Tiny medicine sponges may prevent the need for daily injections
Thursday, 31st May 2018
Most people prefer to take their medicine in the form of a tablet rather than by injection. However, the increasing complexity of novel drugs over the past century means that they have become less soluble and therefore more difficult to ...
Body and mind
Enzymatic barcode reader switches our genes on or off
Monday, 11th June 2018
Identical twins are born with the same genes but never develop fully identically. The reason is that environment and events affect our genes. Tiny chemical groups mark our genes, causing them to switch on or off. Researchers have now discovered ...
Diet and lifestyle
Oral bacteria differ between vegans and meat-eaters
Wednesday, 6th June 2018
Bacteria play a greater role in people’s lives than was previously thought. They do not simply cause serious infections or help us to achieve a healthy gut. New research suggests that oral bacteria can affect our health in the ...
Environment and sustainability
Electrical partnership between microbes may contribute to global warming
Thursday, 21st June 2018
Intensive farming combined with global warming significantly increases land erosion, resulting in major environmental effects. Danish researchers have discovered that electrically conductive particles usually washed away through erosion may have an unexpected effect. The particles enable an unusual partnership between ...
Body and mind
Stored tissue samples can show how people age
Friday, 13th July 2018
Hospitals use samples of cells and tissue to determine whether people have diseases such as cancer. In Denmark, hospitals have taken thousands of samples every day, some of which are stored under high security at the Danish Pathology Databank. A ...
Disease and treatment
Synthetic embryos created in the lab could help manage pregnancy more effectively
Thursday, 28th June 2018
Human pregnancies fail two thirds of the time because the very early embryo does not attach to the lining of the uterus. Nevertheless, very little is known about why this happens. Now a group of researchers has successfully created synthetic ...
Body and mind
Pioneering research finds missing pieces in the genomic puzzle
Friday, 6th July 2018
Today, we can get our genome sequenced for less than DKK 4000 and find out how the small changes in our genome might affect the risk of various diseases. The way computer programs compare genomes has primarily focused on these small ...
Disease and treatment
New technology could save millions from addiction to painkillers
Wednesday, 18th July 2018
More than 50,000 people die per year in the United States from pain relief medication. The misuse of opioids, which are very addictive, costs Americans many billions of dollars in health-care costs, combating crime and loss of working income. Researchers have ...
Disease and treatment
Researchers stimulate the body to combat diabetes and obesity
Monday, 30th July 2018
Diabetes and obesity are currently treated with the substances the body cannot produce in sufficient amounts. The dream of enabling the body to restore the production of insulin has now moved a step forward. Danish researchers have successfully modulated the ...
Body and mind
Female hormones make men’s bones strong
Wednesday, 8th August 2018
Every schoolchild knows that women produce estrogen and men testosterone. So it caused quite a stir when Sundeep Khosla claimed that the female sex hormone prevents men’s bones from weakening as they age. Nevertheless, this theory turned out to ...
Body and mind
Ducts in the pancreas form similar to river beds
Thursday, 23rd August 2018
When people digest food, the flow of fluids and digestive enzymes to the gut is critical. Until recently, researchers had marvelled at the incredibly complex system of ducts that transports a stream of enzymes and mucus from the pancreas to ...
Environment and sustainability
Personal trackers will measure how the environment affects health across the life course
Tuesday, 4th September 2018
According to the World Health Organization, 7 of 10 people die from noncommunicable diseases, such as cardiovascular diseases and cancer. Nevertheless, we know surprisingly little about the relationship between people’s personal environment throughout their lives and health. A major research project ...
Disease and treatment
More women screened for cancer with self-sampling
Wednesday, 12th September 2018
Screening significantly reduces the risk of cervical cancer. Nevertheless, one fourth of women in Denmark are not screened as recommended by the Danish Health Authority. Now the Capital Region of Denmark is one of the world’s first screening programmes ...
Diet and lifestyle
Surprise: smoking reduces blood sugar levels but still leads to diabetes
Thursday, 20th September 2018
Many smokers believe that smoking reduces appetite and keeps them slim, but not much is known about how cigarettes affect glucose metabolism. Now researchers have mapped more precisely how heavy smokers metabolize carbohydrates – with surprising results. Smoking blunts the blood ...
Disease and treatment
In the future, we will use living medicine
Thursday, 18th October 2018
Microorganisms do not always make us ill. The correct composition of bacteria in our intestines can make us healthier and even heal illness. Scientists will now programme bacteria in our intestines to produce medicines that can make us healthy when ...
Disease and treatment
Discovery: antibiotic-resistant bacteria can hide for years
Friday, 28th September 2018
Research on antibiotic-resistant bacteria has intensified to determine how they survive exposure to antibiotics. Antibiotic-resistant infections frequently return with increasing and deadly strength among patients with chronic bacterial infections. Now a Danish research group has shown that bacteria develop antimicrobial ...
Body and mind
Researchers discover a link between genes and sudden cardiac arrest
Wednesday, 10th October 2018
Doctors know many lifestyle factors that increase the risk of sudden cardiac arrest. Nevertheless, many people at high risk live long without problems, whereas others die young. Researchers believe that genetic differences are the reason. Now a major research project ...
Disease and treatment
Unexpected solutions for the greatest calamities in the human body
Thursday, 4th October 2018
Chronic metabolic diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cancer and chronic respiratory illness affect billions of people. The recipient of the 2018 EASD–Novo Nordisk Foundation Diabetes Prize for Excellence Professor Gökhan Hotamisligil has devoted his life and career ...
Disease and treatment
After 60 years: “Now we finally understand how this medicine works”
Wednesday, 24th October 2018
For 60 years, metformin has been doctors’ first-line drug for treating people with type 2 diabetes. However, no one has known precisely how it works. An international research team with Danish participation has now discovered how metformin works. This pioneering discovery will ...
Disease and treatment
Molecular trap can help young children avoid painful bone surgery
Wednesday, 31st October 2018
A single mutation of one gene can greatly influence a person’s life. One such mutation causes achondroplasia, characterized by disproportionate short stature, reduced space for the brain and debilitating respiratory complications. Currently, it has only been possible to treat ...
Body and mind
Immature cells zap around before settling down
Wednesday, 28th November 2018
Stem cells are already being used in combating previously untreatable diseases. Nevertheless, stem cells are not delivering their full potential because the production of specific cell types from stem cells cannot yet be managed. Researchers have now discovered the signals ...
Disease and treatment
New method reveals which cells resist chemotherapy
Friday, 9th November 2018
When cancer attacks the body, the body needs to combat the cancer cells while sparing the healthy ones. Conversely, cancer cells develop mechanisms to escape both the body’s response to cancer and chemotherapy. The natural differences between humans and ...
Diet and lifestyle
Childhood obesity associated with a higher risk of colon cancer in adults
Thursday, 15th November 2018
A Danish study has shown that adults who were overweight as children have an increased risk of developing colon cancer, but not rectal cancer. However, losing weight can prevent this. Similarly, overweight young adults have a lower risk of developing ...
Disease and treatment
Breast cancer defies new medicine and keeps spreading
Wednesday, 21st November 2018
One of the greatest challenges in the battle against cancer is preventing the cells from the primary tumour from spreading. For decades, researchers have investigated how to inhibit the chemical capacity of cancer cells to break down and squeeze through ...
Disease and treatment
Gold brings the dream of more targeted cancer drugs closer to realization
Friday, 30th November 2018
Danish researchers have shown that they can use gold nanoparticles to precisely target the delivery of medicine directly to where it is needed. In the future, gold nanoparticles may help in delivering more potent chemotherapy, for example.
Disease and treatment
Inpatients’ health suffers if they sleep poorly
Tuesday, 4th December 2018
Anxiety, light, physical inactivity, noise and many other factors can cause patients to sleep poorly in hospitals. This negatively affects patients’ immune systems and recovery processes, which can result in longer hospital stays.
Body and mind
A father’s overweight can influence his children’s risk of disease
Tuesday, 11th December 2018
Epigenetics plays a major role in a child’s risk of developing such diseases as obesity, type 2 diabetes, schizophrenia and autism. Danish research suggests that, if a father has an unhealthy lifestyle before a child is conceived, the epigenetics not ...
Disease and treatment
Drugs used to treat diabetes and obesity can reduce the urge to drink alcohol
Friday, 14th December 2018
Alcohol misuse is a massive social problem, causing 6% of deaths globally according to the World Health Organization. Pharmaceutical treatment of alcohol use disorder has scarcely changed in the past 25 years because developing and approving new treatments is both difficult and ...
Disease and treatment
Recently mapped protein may help to solve the global obesity epidemic
Tuesday, 18th December 2018
Membrane protein aquaglyceroporin 10 (AQP10) plays a major role in developing obesity. Researchers from the University of Copenhagen have now mapped the protein’s structure and how it functions in controlling fat levels in the body’s cells. The next step ...
Body and mind
Genetic test can detect men at greatest risk of developing prostate cancer
Thursday, 20th December 2018
Prostate cancer is the most heritable type of cancer. However, little is known about which genes cause some men to have a high risk of developing prostate cancer. A total of 130 research groups worldwide have now joined forces to analyse ...
Body and mind
Researchers search for the tremors that stop the heart
Thursday, 6th December 2018
Cardiovascular diseases cause more deaths than any other in Denmark. Narrowing of the coronary artery can lead to a blood clot blocking the blood flowing to the heart. Balloon angioplasty saves many people’s lives, but 1 in 10 have fibrillation inside ...
Diet and lifestyle
Intestinal disorder may increase the risk of depression and bipolar disorder
Tuesday, 25th December 2018
A Danish study of twins shows that the composition of their intestinal bacteria may strongly influence the risk of developing affective mental disorders such as depression and bipolar disorder. The research also shows that people with depression appear to have ...
Disease and treatment
Gastric surgery works: let’s turn it into a pill
Friday, 1st March 2019
The obesity epidemic rages. Every sixth person is extremely obese today. One of the few effective ways of fighting obesity is surgery. Previously it was thought that the people lose weight after surgery because the stomach has less room for ...
Environment and sustainability
Researchers can finally control the viscosity of cell membranes
Tuesday, 1st January 2019
Researchers have discovered how they can very precisely control the viscosity of microorganisms’ cell membranes. This means that they may be able to create custom cell membranes in the future. They can also improve the understanding of the causes of ...
Body and mind
Researchers find a key to understanding how cells remember what type they are
Friday, 28th December 2018
When cells divide, they do not merely replicate the genome. The molecules bound to the genome define the cell’s function and must also be replicated; otherwise, diseases such as cancer can develop. This extremely complex mechanism has been almost ...
Diet and lifestyle
Why drinking coffee may counteract type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases
Friday, 4th January 2019
Danish research has identified substances in coffee that may explain why Denmark’s favourite hot beverage can counteract several major noncommunicable diseases. Coffee contains 1500 identified substances, but Danish researchers have discovered one that is especially promising for reducing the risk ...
Disease and treatment
Small molecule can potentially combat many diseases
Wednesday, 9th January 2019
Many diseases and disorders are associated with inflammation in the body. Researchers have developed a small molecule that may counteract inflammatory conditions and can potentially be used for treating diseases ranging from heart disease and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease to ...
Disease and treatment
How patients perceive mechanical restraint in forensic psychiatry
Wednesday, 16th January 2019
Denmark has committed to limiting the mechanical restraint of patients in forensic psychiatry. Fulfilling this ambition also requires understanding how these patients perceive the use of mechanical restraint in forensic psychiatry. Researchers have now asked patients about this.
Body and mind
Researchers can now test blood to measure how healthy organs are
Friday, 11th January 2019
Blood has many biomarkers that can reveal the health of most organs in the body. Now Danish researchers have developed a new method to interpret the messages of these microscopic biomarkers. Among other things, researchers can see how weight-loss surgery ...
Body and mind
Understanding how fetuses develop may cure diabetes
Wednesday, 23rd January 2019
Researchers have mapped how the pancreas is formed at the fetal stage. This is a step on the way to being able to create a pancreas from scratch to help to cure diabetes.
Disease and treatment
Curing brain cancer by heating the tumours
Friday, 18th January 2019
For years, doctors have unsuccessfully battled the most malignant form of brain cancer: glioblastoma. A major problem is that the tumours can be hidden and the immune system detects them too late. Researchers have now succeeded in “heating” these immunologically “...
Body and mind
New discovery: how the ear deciphers speech
Friday, 25th January 2019
New research shows how the inner ear transforms acoustic pressure waves and frequencies so that the brain can understand them as speech. The discovery paves the way for new diagnostic opportunities, which may also eventually help people to restore lost ...
Diet and lifestyle
Why eating whole-grain products is so healthy
Wednesday, 30th January 2019
New Danish research shows how healthy eating whole grains is. Compared with refined grains, whole grains lower the risk of cardiovascular disease and diabetes and cause people to lose weight. The probable reason is that, when people eat whole grains, ...
Environment and sustainability
Waterproofing and non-stick pans may lead to earlier puberty among girls
Friday, 1st February 2019
Waterproof raincoats and non-stick pans make our everyday lives more practical. Unfortunately, some of the perfluoroalkyl substances that provide the practical benefits end up in the water and air and may harm our health. A new study appears to show ...
Disease and treatment
Researchers investigate how best to treat sepsis
Wednesday, 6th February 2019
In 2012, Danish researchers revolutionized the treatment of sepsis. Now they have begun another major clinical trial to investigate whether the way people with sepsis are most frequently treated is optimal.
Body and mind
Infections are associated with a greatly increased risk of epilepsy
Friday, 8th February 2019
An epileptic seizure can be a disturbing experience. Globally, about 50 million people have epilepsy, but only half of them know why. A new research project shows that the risk of developing epilepsy increases by 78% if a person has been hospitalized ...
Diet and lifestyle
The myth of "good" cholesterol
Wednesday, 13th February 2019
HDL being “good” cholesterol is a myth. New research shows that both high and low concentrations of HDL in the blood are associated with an increased risk of both infectious disease and death.
Body and mind
Danish health data: people develop certain diseases before getting cancer
Friday, 15th February 2019
Cancer often seems to appear out of the blue. Now the first study of its type shows the patterns of the other diseases people get before developing cancer. Cardiovascular diseases, obesity and genitourinary diseases are most common. The results can ...
Disease and treatment
Whole-genome sequencing may revolutionize healthcare systems in Africa
Wednesday, 20th February 2019
For many years, researchers have subscribed to the dogma that bacteria cannot be whole-genome sequenced in Africa. Danish researchers have overturned this dogma and propose a new direction in healthcare that may significantly improve public health in African countries.
Environment and sustainability
Getting mould to make anticancer drugs
Friday, 22nd February 2019
Most people want to avoid mould. These filamentous fungi can pose a real health hazard in water-damaged houses but they also produce several substances that can potentially combat diseases. Laboratory tests have shown that one such substance, calbistrin, can kill ...
Environment and sustainability
Researchers vastly reduce the cost of cell experiments
Wednesday, 27th February 2019
The cost of experiments on cells in laboratories around the world can be vastly reduced based on a system researchers have developed for storing and working with cells during experiments. The system is one hundredth as large as today’s ...
Body and mind
Pregnancy associated with protection against breast cancer
Thursday, 7th March 2019
New Danish research shows that giving birth to children can significantly reduce women’s risk of breast cancer. However, the stage in the pregnancy at which the woman gives birth matters. If the baby is born before week 34 of the ...
Diet and lifestyle
The link between sweetened beverages and the risk of diabetes: a possible explanation
Friday, 8th March 2019
New research shows that sweetened beverages do not solely increase the risk of various types of diabetes by making people gain weight. Differences in genetic variants appear to determine how people react to drinking sweetened beverages and how this affects ...
Diet and lifestyle
What people ate 8000 years ago
Wednesday, 13th March 2019
Analysis of protein residues in fragments of ancient ceramic bowls and jars reveals what was for dinner 8000 years ago at the dawn of agriculture. The analysis confirms in unprecedented detail that early farmers in Anatolia ate a mixed diet of ...
Body and mind
Certain genes ensure that exercise benefits health
Friday, 15th March 2019
The health benefits of exercise are hardly breaking news. However, we still know very little about whether physical activity benefits everyone’s health equally. Previous research has suggested more than 100 genes in the human genome that could link exercise to ...
Diet and lifestyle
Major study links parasite in cat excrement to schizophrenia
Wednesday, 20th March 2019
A large-scale study has linked infection with the
Toxoplasma gondii
parasite (toxoplasmosis) to an increased risk of developing schizophrenia. The study is the first to examine the relationship between when people develop toxoplasmosis and when they develop schizophrenia.
Disease and treatment
Asthma prevention begins before birth
Friday, 22nd March 2019
Asthma is the most common chronic disease in childhood and the most common reason children are hospitalized. The 2019 Novo Nordisk Prize recipient, Hans Bisgaard, found that giving fish oil to women during pregnancy reduces the risk of their children getting ...
Body and mind
What happens when proteins are defective?
Wednesday, 27th March 2019
Danish researchers have linked changes in DNA to defects in proteins. This is a way to understand precisely how tiny variations in the body’s DNA can result in diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, cystic fibrosis and phenylketonuria.
Body and mind
The body’s final line of defence on the route to cancer
Friday, 29th March 2019
Each of the body's millions of cells contains an exact copy of our DNA. This places great demands on the machinery that replicates the DNA when cells divide. If things go wrong serious diseases such as cancer can emerge. Now ...
Diet and lifestyle
Vigorous exercise can suppress appetite
Wednesday, 3rd April 2019
A Danish study indicates that vigorous-intensity exercise suppresses appetite, but the effect only lasts for a few months. The study is the first of its type to examine how long-term exercise affects appetite among individuals with overweight or obesity.
Body and mind
New study sorts out how the destiny of cells is determined
Friday, 12th April 2019
Both inheritance and environment determine a person’s fate, but what determines the fate of a cell? Does inheritance predetermine the fate of a cell at birth or does its fate depend on the environment in which a cell develops? ...
Disease and treatment
How life’s building blocks got their freedom of movement
Friday, 5th April 2019
The myriad processes that take place in our body’s cells are the basis of life as we know it. Since cells are filled with fluid, British chemist Carol Robinson created a lot of attention by setting out to investigate ...
Body and mind
Researchers find link between male sex hormones and ovarian disease
Wednesday, 10th April 2019
Polycystic ovary syndrome is the most common disorder among women of reproductive age and often leads to problems in becoming pregnant. Now scientists have found a link between polycystic ovary syndrome, elevated levels of male sex hormones, obesity and effects ...
Disease and treatment
Genetic testing can prevent sudden cardiac arrest
Tuesday, 16th April 2019
When a person collapses with sudden cardiac arrest, genetic testing may determine whether family members are also at risk. Danish research shows how genetic testing and preventive treatment can save people’s lives.
Body and mind
Unexpected chain reaction leads to mass destruction of bad bacteria
Friday, 19th April 2019
The human intestinal system is a battlefield between the “good” bacteria that, for example, help with digestion and the “bad” bacteria that can make us sick. One weapon the body uses to kill the bad bacteria is antimicrobial peptides, which ...
Environment and sustainability
Technology from the physics laboratory can make yoghurt more palatable
Wednesday, 1st May 2019
Scientists have used advanced laser technology to analyse the viscosity of dairy products. This technology can make it easier for food scientists and the food industry to analyse such properties as keeping dairy products from spoiling and optimally maintaining consumer ...
Body and mind
Premature birth can cause heart problems later in life
Wednesday, 24th April 2019
The part of the nervous system that regulates the heart rate and other autonomic functions develops in late pregnancy. Now new research shows that premature birth may weaken this regulation. This may also explain why individuals born preterm may have ...
Diet and lifestyle
Natural hormone can get you to choose salad instead of candy
Friday, 26th April 2019
Researchers made a startling discovery a few years ago: the liver, which secretes a hormone called FGF21, controls people’s sweet tooth. FGF21 strongly suppresses our desire to consume sugar and alcohol. However, translating this knowledge into medicine that can ...
Disease and treatment
Researchers map the unique proteins secreted by cancer cells
Friday, 3rd May 2019
Cancer cells in various tissues secrete various proteins. Researchers have now identified many of the proteins that cancer cells secrete. The discovery enables researchers to start creating diagnostic tools using a blood test that can identify almost any type of ...
Disease and treatment
Blood supply may be the Achilles heel of tumours
Wednesday, 8th May 2019
Danish research shows that the arteries supplying blood to cancerous tissue act differently than other arteries in the body. Tumours may be targeted with medicine that alters blood flow thereby effectively killing them or making them more susceptible to radiation ...
Diet and lifestyle
Pregnant women becoming increasingly overweight
Friday, 10th May 2019
New Danish research shows that the body mass index (BMI) of pregnant women is increasing over the years. Their newborn babies are also becoming larger, which increases the child’s risk of becoming overweight. A researcher is concerned.
Environment and sustainability
Researchers produce cannabinoids by using yeast
Tuesday, 14th May 2019
The market for cannabis has taken off in recent years, and it will definitely grow in the future. Researchers have finally discovered how they can synthesize the relevant cannabinoid compounds in cannabis by using yeast, opening up new pharmaceutical applications.
Body and mind
Surprising breakthrough: all immature cells in the intestine can become stem cells
Wednesday, 15th May 2019
Stem cells have an unresolved potential for treating disease. One problem is that the cells must mature from the early fetal stage so they correspond to those in developed organs. New research – contradicting theories and textbooks – shows that specialized cells ...
Body and mind
People with ADHD have restless legs syndrome more often
Tuesday, 21st May 2019
Restless legs syndrome is a neglected and very common condition that has not garnered much attention from doctors so far. However, it should, because it is associated with poorer quality of life and an increased risk of many diseases. Researchers ...
Disease and treatment
Surgery can counteract genetically determined obesity
Friday, 24th May 2019
For decades, there has been debate on whether expensive gastric bypass surgery is worthwhile for people who are genetically predisposed to being severely obese. However, the evidence does not support the concern that these people eventually regain the weight after ...
Disease and treatment
How researchers plan to design better medicine
Tuesday, 28th May 2019
Medicine often has difficulty in penetrating the barrier between the gut and the bloodstream, and many types of medicine therefore need to be injected subcutaneously or intravenously. Researchers from the Technical University of Denmark are working on developing new methods ...
Body and mind
The brain’s fear centre also controls hunger
Friday, 31st May 2019
The amygdala is the area of our brain that plays a key role in processing emotions, including fear. New research shows that it also regulates our appetite through interaction between a vital signalling substance in the immune system and one ...
Body and mind
How stem cells end up as fat cells or bone cells
Tuesday, 4th June 2019
New Danish research shows that stem cells deactivate many genes related to bone cells when they are on their way to becoming fat cells. This research is a masterpiece in basic science that can also eventually be used to improve ...
Disease and treatment
Migraine medicine: we only buy it if it is effective
Friday, 7th June 2019
More than one in seven people have migraine in Denmark, costing billions of kroner in treatment and lost earnings. Nevertheless, little is known about which types of migraine medicine are effective for each individual. By linking data from the Danish ...
Body and mind
Different regions of the brain do not produce the same amount of energy
Tuesday, 11th June 2019
Researchers have determined how much energy is produced in two regions of the brain, each of which plays important roles in the development of diseases, including Alzheimer’s disease, Huntington’s disease and Parkinson’s disease. The results show that ...
Body and mind
DNA techniques unravel a prehistoric mass murder
Friday, 14th June 2019
Fifteen women, children and young men, each killed by blows to the head. Presumably in a massacre. But who were they? Many questions needed to be answered when archaeologists and genetic researchers collaborated in trying to understand the origins of ...
Body and mind
Epigenetics and children’s birthweight
Tuesday, 18th June 2019
Birthweight is associated with health outcomes throughout life. For example, children who are born heavier or lighter than average have a higher risk of developing diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. A new large study reveals that epigenetics is closely associated with ...
Disease and treatment
Researchers are discovering how paracetamol damages the liver
Friday, 21st June 2019
An overdose of paracetamol can be deadly. Although paracetamol poisoning causes no symptoms initially, it may have catastrophic effects on the liver. These people often feel fine for up to several days after an overdose, but the paracetamol activates a ...
Body and mind
These genes influence whether you take risks
Tuesday, 25th June 2019
New research has discovered hundreds of genetic variants that are involved in determining whether you are prone to taking risks or playing it safe.
Body and mind
How the genes of the mother and child influence birth weight
Friday, 28th June 2019
Babies who are especially small or large at birth have not only a higher risk of complications at birth but also a greater risk of overweight, type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure in adulthood. Using a new revolutionary genetic method, ...
Disease and treatment
Hunger hormone counteracts Huntington’s disease
Tuesday, 2nd July 2019
The stomach produces a hormone called ghrelin when we are hungry. Now new research shows that ghrelin can counteract some of the symptoms of Huntington’s disease, which is a disabling neurological disease.
Environment and sustainability
Half the children in Guinea-Bissau have intestinal parasites
Friday, 5th July 2019
The researchers set out to study the immune system of children with intestinal worms in Guinea-Bissau. However, they were surprised when they investigated the samples from sick children. Fewer children than expected had intestinal worms, but half had intestinal parasites. ...
Disease and treatment
Researchers discover genetic link to impaired language among children with autism
Tuesday, 9th July 2019
An international research group has discovered an association between how genes are expressed in blood and impaired language development among children with autism. The discovery may pave the way for a blood test that can diagnose children with autism at ...
Disease and treatment
Using laser-assisted drug delivery to combat major diseases
Friday, 12th July 2019
The skin provides vital protection against the external environment but also acts as a barrier for delivering medicine. Researchers have developed a technique that generates channels in the skin to enhance the penetration of topically applied drugs. Initial experiments in ...
Disease and treatment
Cancer treatment could soon target a protein
Tuesday, 16th July 2019
Researchers have found a protein that is important in helping tumours to survive, grow and metastasize. The protein could become a new target for cancer treatment.
Diet and lifestyle
Permanent night workers develop dementia more frequently
Friday, 19th July 2019
Permanent night workers frequently have disturbed and insufficient sleep. Nevertheless, it is still unknown how night work affects the brain in the long term. Now research shows that permanent night workers more frequently develop dementia. Whether this results from disturbed ...
Body and mind
Researchers battling fatal diseases caused by diabetes
Tuesday, 23rd July 2019
Kidney diseases kill tens of thousands of people with diabetes globally every year. Danish researchers are searching in blood, urine and the gut to discover ways of inhibiting these deadly complications.
Body and mind
Your genes can predict whether you will gain or lose weight
Friday, 26th July 2019
Changing lifestyle has turned out to be a very difficult way to escape obesity. The human body has extremely strong mechanisms for retaining fat. This explains why researchers increasingly believe that the obesity epidemic will be conquered by learning to ...
Environment and sustainability
Ancient proteins are the new hot property in science
Friday, 2nd August 2019
The past does not simply hold details about our history. Knowledge on human evolution can also provide important information that can be used to combat the development of disease now. The use of prehistoric DNA has revolutionized evolutionary research and ...
Disease and treatment
Micromotors can ferry living cells
Tuesday, 30th July 2019
Researchers have invented real-time hydrogel-producing micromotors that can entrap and move cells. This discovery presents significant pharmaceutical opportunities and the potential to improve how tissue can be designed both outside and inside the human body.
Body and mind
How cells decide their fate as a fetus develops
Tuesday, 13th August 2019
New research shows how a specific type of stem cell decides to become facial bone cells, nerve cells, pigmented or mesenchymal stem cells as a fetus develops. This discovery could be important for regenerative medicine and for understanding how some ...
Disease and treatment
Solving the mystery of molar miscarriages
Tuesday, 6th August 2019
Pregnancy is usually a happy time, but for some couples the joy is short lived if the pregnancy is abnormal and results in a miscarriage, which can occur at different times during pregnancy. Molar pregnancies always end up in miscarriages ...
Body and mind
Smuggling route: how the body defeats DNA parasites
Thursday, 8th August 2019
People and all other organisms are constantly involved in an arms race against genetic parasites such as retroviruses and transposons. Research on fruit flies now reveals how host cells make copies of the DNA parasites and smuggle these copies into ...
Diet and lifestyle
People with psoriasis develop cardiovascular disease more frequently
Friday, 16th August 2019
Compared with the major global diseases, psoriasis is easily overlooked, but it affects people both physically and mentally. New research shows that psoriasis does not only affect the skin. People with psoriasis develop cardiovascular disease much more frequently. The reason ...
Environment and sustainability
Scientists use evolution to revive zombie genes
Tuesday, 20th August 2019
Bacteria have many pseudogenes that have lost their function, but researchers have learned how to use adaptive laboratory evolution to revive them. This discovery opens up great pharmaceutical possibilities.
Environment and sustainability
Combating antimicrobial resistance in global sewers
Tuesday, 3rd September 2019
A Danish research project suggests that poverty and poor sanitary conditions may be a more important cause of the global problem of antimicrobial resistance than the excessive use of antibiotics.
Disease and treatment
People with diabetes need to be involved more in managing their condition
Friday, 23rd August 2019
According to a researcher, people with type 2 diabetes and other chronic diseases should be more actively involved in the group-based programmes offered by the healthcare system. Healthcare professionals favour a more person-centred approach, but this turns out to be difficult ...
Disease and treatment
New blood test detects cancer early
Friday, 30th August 2019
Danish researchers and international collaborators have developed a method for detecting all types of cancer in the early stages through a blood test. This method may eventually save many people’s lives.
Body and mind
Flippases give cells an electric shock
Tuesday, 27th August 2019
New research shows that phospholipid flippases create an electric current as these proteins move molecules of fat in the cell membrane. These flippases strongly influence the development of certain diseases.
Disease and treatment
Genetic imbalance in the immune system can lead to bile duct cancer
Friday, 6th September 2019
People with bile duct cancer or gallbladder cancer are often predisposed to genetic changes that make the immune system unable to kill the cancer cells. The discovery may lead to better diagnosis and treatment of people with these rare types ...
Disease and treatment
Danish researchers develop many candidates for promising antidiabetes target
Tuesday, 10th September 2019
For many years, researchers have known that a specific receptor is an ideal target for developing candidates for medicine to combat diabetes, but so far all efforts have failed. Now Danish researcher Thomas M. Frimurer and his group have used ...
Disease and treatment
Antibiotics inhibit lymphoma of the skin
Friday, 13th September 2019
People with cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (CTCL) often also get bacterial skin infections. While attempting to learn how to counteract infection caused by staphylococci in a person with CTCL, researchers noticed that antibiotics also suppressed the cancer symptoms. A new study ...
Body and mind
Levels of “ugly” cholesterol in the blood higher than previously thought
Monday, 16th September 2019
Danes have much higher levels of remnant cholesterol in their blood than previously thought. This discovery calls for changing the treatment of people with elevated levels of cholesterol.
Disease and treatment
You can’t score if you don’t shoot
Wednesday, 18th September 2019
Three decades ago, only a small number of researchers talked about gut hormones. Today, many people view these hormones as building blocks for developing new therapies to confront the obesity and diabetes epidemics that are sweeping the world. Daniel J. ...
Body and mind
Researchers focus on how diabetes in pregnancy affects the unborn child
Sunday, 22nd September 2019
A new Danish research project will clarify how a mother developing diabetes during pregnancy affects the genetics of her unborn child.
Body and mind
Mechanism discovered that regulates a very important transport protein
Tuesday, 24th September 2019
Sodium proton transport proteins are present in all forms of life. Now researchers understand a little better how they are regulated.
Disease and treatment
Researchers have found a key to fighting degenerative diseases
Friday, 27th September 2019
People with cancer or infections are often attacked quickly and aggressively, whereas people with neurodegenerative diseases deteriorate slowly. Nevertheless, this slow decline of body and mind is almost unavoidable since these diseases are usually incurable. Researchers have now discovered what ...
Diet and lifestyle
Herpes increases the risk of mental disorders and suicidal behaviour
Sunday, 29th September 2019
New Danish research shows that herpesvirus not only causes cold sores but also increases the risk of developing a mental disorder and attempting or dying from suicide. The discovery may be important in understanding how mental disorders develop.
Body and mind
Help! Why do our cells have so much RNA with no apparent function?
Tuesday, 1st October 2019
A cell nucleus produces significantly more non-functional RNA than functional RNA. A Danish research group is delving deep into the engine room of evolution to try and find the reason why.
Disease and treatment
New research: people with high blood pressure should get a flu shot every year
Friday, 4th October 2019
It is well known that the flu can be dangerous for older and frail people. However, new research shows that the flu is more dangerous for people with high blood pressure. A large population study among people with high blood ...
Body and mind
Gigantic virus gives researchers a headache
Tuesday, 8th October 2019
Researchers have identified a giant virus that attacks a type of bacteria known to be associated with the development of diabetes and obesity.
Diet and lifestyle
Research reveals how exercise keeps us healthy
Friday, 11th October 2019
Exercise and muscle training have many benefits. They prevent cancer and cardiovascular disease, and they stabilize blood glucose levels among people with type 2 diabetes. This is one reason why researchers have been trying for decades to understand how physical activity ...
Body and mind
Researchers map the structure of a memory protein
Tuesday, 15th October 2019
The pharmaceutical industry has waited a long time to determine the structure of a protein that plays an important role in memory and in developing numerous physiological processes, including low blood pressure, low body temperature, obesity, analgesia, drug addiction, cancer-cell ...
Environment and sustainability
Infertile men are not more likely to develop osteoporosis
Friday, 18th October 2019
New Danish research shows that men with reduced semen quality are not more likely to develop osteoporosis, as potentially feared.
Disease and treatment
6000 Danes are helping researchers to understand neuropathy
Tuesday, 22nd October 2019
A major Danish research project is attempting to discover the causes of diabetic neuropathy – a frequent yet overlooked complication of diabetes. The participants include 6000 Danes with diabetes.
Disease and treatment
People with a diabetes complication may require fewer treatments
Friday, 25th October 2019
New Danish research shows that the number of times people with diabetic macular oedema need therapy may be halved simply by combining two approved therapies.
Body and mind
Decisive discovery: how cells forget their past
Wednesday, 6th November 2019
All cells in our body contain the same genetic material. The difference between cells in the brain and in the heart therefore depends solely on which genes are expressed (turned on). How does a cell’s environment control this? New ...
Environment and sustainability
Researchers have finally gotten yeast to produce menthol
Tuesday, 29th October 2019
For many years, researchers could not get yeast to make enough of the small biological molecules industry uses as fragrances and biofuels. Now researchers have engineered synthetic enzymes into yeast, enabling it to produce the scent of menthol.
Disease and treatment
Danish researchers develop new type of immunotherapy
Sunday, 3rd November 2019
Danish researchers have discovered a new way of developing immunotherapy for cancer. Unlike current immunotherapy, which is only effective for about half the people with some types of cancer, this new type of immunotherapy may be effective on all types.
Disease and treatment
Genetic test may reveal which treatments people need to survive cancer
Sunday, 10th November 2019
A newly developed genetic test may become an important tool in the future for assessing whether individuals with cancer have a good chance of surviving with more gentle treatment or whether they need more intensive treatment.
Disease and treatment
Fruit fly gene can help us to combat disease and ageing
Saturday, 16th November 2019
Our bodies constantly repair and regenerate tissue. The body continually creates new cells based on stem cells in various types of tissue that can perform the highly specialized functions the tissue requires. When we age or when our body is ...
Body and mind
Girls and young women have surprisingly many chromosome errors in their eggs
Wednesday, 13th November 2019
Women older than 40 years are not the only women who have chromosome errors in their eggs. Teenagers have chromosome errors in 4 of 5 eggs.
Body and mind
Researchers map the immune response of bacteria
Tuesday, 19th November 2019
The discovery of the molecular mechanism behind the immune response of bacteria may become important in combating antibiotic resistance.
Environment and sustainability
New theory: why mountain regions are unusually biodiverse
Sunday, 24th November 2019
The world’s mountain regions are extraordinarily biodiverse. Research with Danish participation advances a theory explaining why.
Body and mind
One step closer to the magical molecules mediating exercise
Thursday, 28th November 2019
Exercise benefits our health and stamina. However, the precise molecular signals exercise transmits throughout the body have not yet been clarified. Researchers have now mapped several of the molecules that could mediate these useful effects in our muscles. They hope ...
Diet and lifestyle
Tick bites do not trigger Alzheimer’s disease
Sunday, 1st December 2019
New Danish research using more than 30 years of data on tick bites in Denmark shows that Lyme neuroborreliosis does not increase the risk of developing Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other diseases of the nervous system.
Disease and treatment
Severe risk of bias in the results from clinical trials of treatment for anorexia
Tuesday, 3rd December 2019
Research shows that the findings from clinical trials on treatments for mental disorders have a high risk of bias.
Diet and lifestyle
Biomarkers can help maintain a healthy body weight
Thursday, 5th December 2019
A better understanding of biomarkers holds the key to improving healthy weight management by making it more personalized and relevant. This will save many people from frustrating weight-loss processes that do not work out as planned. This is the message ...
Body and mind
Biological plumbing: how the body makes ducts
Tuesday, 10th December 2019
Danish researchers have discovered how the body makes the ducts that transport bile, enzymes and other secretions from the liver, gallbladder and pancreas to the intestine.
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