march of dimes
New research helps explain how progesterone preventspreterm birth
SAN FRANCISCO, FEB. 10, 2011 — Research presented today at the 31st Annual meeting of the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM) — The Pregnancy Meeting has found that three proteins known as XIAP, BID, and Bcl-2 are responsible in part for …
Preterm birth rates improve in most states
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y., Nov. 17, 2010 ¬ — Eight states earned a better grade on the 2010 March of Dimes Premature Birth Report Card and 32 others and the District of Columbia saw their preterm birth rates improve.
Following three decades of incr…
Protein Research Provides Clues to How Blood Clots, Wounds Heal
They are proteins that cut other proteins, enabling a wide range of essential functions such as wound healing, blood clotting and formation of muscle and nerve cells.
But serine proteases also can cut a path of destruction, contributing to the plaques involved in heart disease and Alzheimer’s and to extensive birth defects as well when something goes awry. Understanding this sort of physiological crescendo called a protease cascade is a goal of Dr. Ellen K. LeMosy, developmental biologist at the Medical College of Georgia.