BIO5 Latest News

  • Aphids Saved From Gruesome Death by Virus-Infected Bacteria  

    The term "beneficial virus" sounds like an oxymoron. But for pea aphids under attack by parasitic wasps, carrying infected

    bacteria is the difference between life and a slow death, according to new research from The University of Arizona. The wasps lay eggs inside the aphids, and the wasp larvae eat the living aphids from the inside out.

  • Research Team Designing Holographic Imaging System for Ovarian Cancer  

    Two University of Arizona researchers have formed a research team to design, build and evaluate two versions of an ovarian cancer medical imaging and screening instrument that will use holographic components in a new type of optical microscope. Raymond Kostuk and Jennifer Barton have secured a five-year, $2.4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to build the instrument that they hope will one day be used to monitor women at high risk for ovarian cancer.  Barton heads the UA department of biomedical engineering and is assistant director of the BIO5 Institute. Kostuk is the Kenneth Von Behren Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and professor of optical sciences.

  • Deymier Accepts Position as Head of New School of Sustainable Engineered Systems  

    Professor Pierre Deymier is the new director of the recently established School of Sustainable Engineered Systems, or SSES. SSES unites the departments of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, Materials Science and Engineering, Mining and Geological Engineering, and Systems and Industrial Engineering. Deymier has been associate head of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering since 2001, and is on the faculty of the BIO5 Institute, the applied mathematics graduate interdisciplinary program, and the biomedical engineering program. He joined the Department of Materials Science and Engineering in 1985 as an assistant professor, becoming associate professor in 1991 and full professor in 1997.

  • Sensitizing Tumor Response to Cancer Therapy  

    Two forms of skin and brain cancer respond very poorly to chemotherapy and radiation: melanoma and glioblastoma multiforme brain cancer. Both are the focus of an intensive effort in the department of nutritional sciences at The University of Arizona to find natural, biologically active compounds that will sensitize the cancerous tumors to therapy without damaging normal tissue. By using the compounds in conjunction with conventional treatment, the researchers hope patient survival rates will ultimately increase.  

    The incidence of melanoma, an aggressive and often fatal form of skin cancer, is increasing at the rate of 3 percent annually, according to the American Cancer Society. Dacarbazine, the standard chemotherapeutic drug for melanoma for decades, has been ineffective when used alone. To improve its performance, Randy Burd, assistant professor of nutritional sciences and member of the UA's BIO5 Institute, has been testing the drug and its new analog Temozolomide in combination with various bioactive compounds to gain greater response rates on melanoma tumors in cell cultures.
     

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