NEW YORK - Talk about an extreme makeover: Scientists have transformed one type of cell into another in living mice, a big step toward the goal of growing replacement tissues to treat a variety of diseases.

The cell identity switch turned ordinary pancreas cells into the rarer type that churns out insulin, essential for preventing diabetes. But its implications go beyond diabetes to a host of possibilities, scientists said.

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By Jeffrey Perkel
HealthDay Reporter

SUNDAY, Aug. 10 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers have developed a strain of mice resistant to diet-induced obesity.

The findings could one day lead to possible drug treatments for obesity in people. They also shed light on the brain circuitry that controls energy homeostasis -- the balance between how much energy (i.e., food) an animal takes in and how quickly it burns that energy.

SUNDAY, July 27 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers say they have found a way to prevent preeclampsia in mice that might eventually help pregnant women with this potentially deadly disorder.

In a report published in the July 27 issue of Nature Medicine, the University of Texas-Houston Medical School researchers said they found an important pathway to the development of preeclampsia and managed to block it by injecting the mice with certain human autoantibodies that have been found in women with the condition.

By Steven Reinberg
EmpowHer's HealthDay Reporter

TUESDAY, April 15 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers say they've created a synthetic vaccine that can be delivered as a nasal spray for human papillomavirus -- the source of the most common sexually transmitted disease in the United States and a cause of cervical cancer.

The experimental vaccine, tested so far just with mice, also offers protection against different strains of HPV, the researchers said.