Harvard University

Modernizing the Institutional Review Board Process for Implementation Science – A Narrative Review of Barriers and Ethical Considerations

Abstract Purpose of Review This review highlights the barriers and facilitators that implementation science studies face in the institutional review board (IRB) approval pathway and provides recommendations on how to potentially streamline this process. Recent findings Significan...

Woven endobridge device compared to stent-assisted coiling and microsurgical clipping for intracranial aneurysms

Background: Endovascular techniques and devices, including Woven EndoBridge (WEB) and stent-assisted coiling (SAC), expand the choice of therapies for complex aneurysms, while the evidence directly comparing them to microsurgical clipping (MSC) remains very limited. This meta-ana...

Response-Tailored or Standard-Duration Antibiotic Treatment for Infective Endocarditis

BACKGROUND: In patients with infective endocarditis on the left side of the heart, the current recommendation of up to 6 weeks of antibiotic therapy is based largely on expert consensus opinion. Whether a clinical response-tailored antibiotic management strategy can shorten treat...

An enantioselective covalent inhibitor of BAX confers cytoprotection in vivo

No therapies directly block apoptosis in tissue injury or the many diseases driven by cell loss. The BCL-2 family protein BAX is a central mediator of this pathway and C126 resides within a key regulatory region where physiologic or pharmacologic ligands can activate or inhibit i...

Optimal Public Transportation Networks: Evidence from the World's Largest Bus Rapid Transit System in Jakarta

Designing public transport networks involves trade-offs between coverage, service frequency, and direct service. We use the expansion of the bus system in Jakarta, Indonesia, to study these trade-offs. We analyze how new direct connections, changes in bus travel time, and wait-ti...

Cancer Risk in Kidney Transplant Recipients on Belatacept Versus Calcineurin Inhibitors: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

BACKGROUND: Belatacept has been increasingly used as a maintenance immunosuppression in kidney transplant recipients since its approval in 2011, due to favorable renal and cardiovascular profiles compared with calcineurin inhibitors (CNIs). However, the long-term risk of cancers...

The Reading Brain from Womb to Classroom: Typical and Atypical Development and Implications for a Preventative Education Model

Learning to read is a process and milestone with far-reaching implications for education, vocation, and health. Most models and empirical studies of reading development, however, focus on school entry and often limit potential influences to children's oral language and print-base...

The importance of classifying central hypopneas: a call to action

Obstructive and central sleep apnea share pathophysiologic features and often coexist within individual patients. There is general agreement on the criteria for scoring obstructive and central apneas but less guidance and clarity on how and when to classify obstructive and centra...

Impact of Response to Hypomethylating Agent‐Based Therapy on Survival Outcomes in the Context of Baseline Clinical‐Molecular Risk and Transplant Status in Patients With Higher‐Risk Myelodysplastic Syndromes/Neoplasms: An analysis From the International Consortium for MDS (icMDS)

Baseline IPSS-M risk, response to hypomethylating agent (HMA) therapy, and receipt of allogeneic stem cell transplant (allo-HCT) have all been individually shown to impact overall survival (OS) in patients with myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS). However, the prognostic impact of re...

Disruption of sphingolipid metabolism promotes tau seeding through endolysosomal membrane rigidification and rupture

Endolysosomal dysfunction is a hallmark of Alzheimer’s disease and related tauopathies, yet underlying mechanisms remain poorly understood. This study investigates the role of sphingolipid metabolism in maintaining endolysosomal membrane integrity and its impact on tau aggregatio...

Perceptions of surrogate decision-makers of cardiac arrest patients on engaging in research during high emotional distress

The perception that individuals in crisis experience undue psychological burden by participation in research is a barrier to including surrogate decision-makers to critically ill patients in research studies. Importantly, perceptions from those who have engaged as surrogates are...

Toward Improved Classification of Vulvar Smooth Muscle Tumors

Vulvar smooth muscle tumors have been evaluated using site-specific (1979 and 1996 Vulvar Criteria) or Uterine Criteria. We compared the performance of 3 classification systems for predicting clinical behavior in the largest series of 35 such tumors to date. Follow-up was availab...

Feasibility of Real‐Time Central Risk Assignment for Children's Oncology Group Pediatric Renal Tumor Trials

BACKGROUND: The Children's Oncology Group (COG) AREN03B2 Renal Tumor Biology and Classification Study undertook real-time central reviews to enable accurate risk stratification for enrollment on therapeutic trials. The present study assessed the feasibility of the central review...

The Costs of Parkinson's Disease in Europe: Results of the Costs of Illness in Neurology Initiative

Abstract Background Parkinson's disease (PD) is the second most common neurodegenerative disease. It imposes substantial and growing burden on patients, families, and caregivers and reduces quality of life. The disability and care needs associated with PD carry economic ramificat...

Utility of Face2Gene’s DeepGestalt and D-Score applications in paediatric neurodevelopmental disorders in South Africa

Abstract Face2Gene is a clinical tool that leverages facial features to aid genetic diagnosis. The DeepGestalt application suggests potential diagnoses based on facial similarity, while the D-Score evaluates likelihood of an individual having dysmorphic features suggestive of a p...

Non-Gaussian Noise Magnetometry Using Local Spin Qubits

Atomic scale qubits, as may be realized in nitrogen vacancy (NV) centers in diamond, offer the opportunity to study magnetic field noise with nanometer scale spatial resolution. Using these spin qubits, one can learn a great deal about the magnetic-field noise correlations, and c...

Electronic cigarettes for smoking cessation

RATIONALE: Electronic cigarettes (EC) are handheld electronic vaping devices that produce an aerosol by heating a liquid. People who smoke, healthcare providers, and regulators want to know if EC can help people quit smoking, and if they are safe to use for this purpose. This upd...

MUTYH Activity Maintains Telomere Stability in Response to Chronic Telomeric 8-Oxoguanine Damage in Cancer Cells

Telomeres are highly susceptible to oxidative DNA damage, particularly 8-oxoguanine (8-oxoG), which is processed by glycosylase-initiated base excision repair (BER). OGG1 removes 8-oxoG opposite C, and MUTYH removes A misinserted opposite 8-oxoG to prevent mutations. While OGG1 h...

Association of prenatal exposure to opioids, cannabis, and polysubstance use with cord blood DNA methylation patterns in a multiancestry cohort

Abstract Background: Blood DNA methylation patterns are highly predictive of prenatal exposure to smoking and differential methylation has been associated with maternal alcohol use. We extended this to determine whether DNA methylation patterns in cord blood are associated with p...

Fusion-driven oncogenic programs shape the immune landscape in translocation renal cell carcinoma

Renal cell carcinomas comprise multiple molecularly distinct cancers but most are treated empirically with therapies designed for clear cell RCC (ccRCC), the most common subtype, due to incomplete understanding of subtype-specific biology. We analyzed single-cell transcriptomes a...