Is atherosclerosis a modern disease after all?

Is atherosclerosis a modern disease after all?

What factors should we blame most for the continuing pandemic of heart and artery disease throughout the Western world? The argument has endured more twists and turns than California Route 1. For years, the diet cholesterol hypothesis has held sway, with added blame...
How cancer escapes chemotherapy

How cancer escapes chemotherapy

This is a heads up for a very useful essay, written by Mel Greaves, for The Darwin Cancer Blog – a blog dedicated to commenting on evolutionary approaches to cancer. In this essay, titled “Ways of Escape”, Greaves draws a number of comparisons...

More misery for the amyloid hypothesis

Further to our feature, a few weeks ago, on the state of health of the amyloid hypothesis – the dominant hypothesis to explain Alzheimer’s disease – comes news of yet another abandoned trial. This time the company is Merck and the drug under test is...

Inflammaging – the role of inflammation in the aging process

Aging is associated with a number of chronic diseases – cardiovascular disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, and cancer. They are all part of the process of immunosenescence. The chronic inflammation that is a feature of the declining...