Biological Concepts

Studying Parkinson’s Disease

July 16, 2018July 16, 2018Danny Schnitzler Comment

Parkinson’s disease is a progressive, neurodegenerative disorder that affects six million people across the world. Symptoms of the disease become apparent with age, which means

New Insights Into How Metformin Works: Changing your gut microbiome

June 8, 2017August 28, 2017Rina Soetanto Comment

Metformin is the most commonly prescribed medication for Type 2 Diabetes. Although it is well known to be very effective in lowering blood glucose

White blood cells poke little holes in your blood vessels to get out

January 22, 2017January 23, 2017Rina Soetanto Comment

The walls of your blood vessels are very good at keeping blood cells in. But to protect you from pathogens, white blood cells need to

How do clinical trials work?

January 16, 2017January 19, 2017Anthony Faso Comment

Have you ever wondered why new drugs that you see reported in the papers never seem to become available, or if they do, it’s many

What are prions, and how do they cause mad cow disease?

January 8, 2017January 11, 2017Jack Simpson 3

Have you ever wondered what caused mad cow disease? It is not caused by bacteria, viruses or parasites. In fact, mad cow disease is instead caused by

How do white blood cells actually kill cancer cells?

January 5, 2017January 7, 2017Rina Soetanto Comment

I recently wrote a post about a clinical trial that freed a woman from her advanced cancer. Her treatment used her own white blood cells –

What is epigenetics?

December 13, 2016January 11, 2017Jack Simpson 1

Most of us probably have a bit of an idea of what genetics is: Inside our cells, we have DNA that contains the instructions to build and

Trapping viruses with red blood cells

December 12, 2016January 18, 2017Jack Simpson 1

Did you know that erythrocytes (that’s a fancy name for red blood cells) don’t have DNA? While most of the cells in the human body

What is personalised medicine?

December 12, 2016January 9, 2017Rina Soetanto 1

You probably wouldn’t give your 80-year-old neighbour the same Christmas gift that you got for your 6-month-old nephew. But chances are, if they got sick

What is the human microbiome?

December 12, 2016January 14, 2017Jack Simpson Comment

There are as many bacteria in our bodies as there are our own cells. Once we are born, we are colonised by trillions of bacteria