Sensitive teeth affect roughly a third of adults in some surveys, and the usual fix is to seal the surface over. A Tokyo Dental College team has shown that 6-MSITC, a compound in Japanese wasabi, pushes dentin-building cells to lay down new tissue instead. It began with a question asked at a sushi counter in Kanda.
The first commercial transplant of AMCHEPRY, the world's first approved iPS cell-derived medicine, is set for October in Kyoto. Why proving it takes 35 patients and six years, and why the US and EU have no equivalent product.
A team at the Institute of Science Tokyo found resistance genes running harder inside hospital drain biofilm than in the wastewater itself. Why new pipes can backfire.
Tohoku University and Air Water went after the two bottlenecks that have kept photothermal cancer therapy in the lab for twenty years. IDP1, an artificial protein designed with AlphaFold, kept nanoparticles circulating for 150.5 minutes against 17.8 for PEG, and a 0.5 mm endoscope that fits inside a 16-gauge needle fired an 808 nm laser from inside the tumor at 28 percent less power. In mice, the tumors were gone within 14 days. How that compares with US trials already running in humans.
Rubbing a sore spot really does help. Kyushu University researchers have identified the touch neurons behind it in mice, a subpopulation called Npy2r-Cre that dampens pain signals in the spinal cord. The PNAS study puts specific cells behind the 1965 gate control theory.
Keio University reports up to four years of follow-up on four patients given iPS-derived cells for spinal cord injury: no tumors, no serious harm. What it means, and how Japan's path compares to the US and Europe.
Why does osteosarcoma cluster in the knees of growing teenagers? A University of Tokyo team, working from an accidental clue in aging research, has pieced together how the cancer starts: an accelerator gene (c-Myc), a brake gene (p53), and a signal from the bone's growth plate. It could reshape drug discovery for a rare cancer.
Researchers at Showa and Kansai Medical Universities grew mesothelial-like cells from human iPS cells to repair the peritoneum, the membrane that wears out and ends peritoneal dialysis. A look at the mouse proof-of-concept and why Japan's PD rate is so unusually low.
Japan's iPS cell therapy already treated fresh spinal injuries. Now a Keio University team is preparing a trial for the far harder chronic phase, where more than 100,000 patients have long been told regeneration simply isn't possible.
An Osaka University startup, Endoluminal Solutions, has built a 4mm single-use endoscope aimed at replacing barium gastric-cancer screening. A look at the miniaturization behind it and where it fits in an endoscope industry Japan's Olympus dominates.
Nagasaki University and Shionogi have found FPSA, a compound that targets plasmepsin X, the enzyme malaria parasites use to burst out of red blood cells. As artemisinin resistance spreads across Africa, a fresh mechanism of action matters. A look at Japan's global-health drug discovery and where this actually stands.