Human but not mouse islets transplanted into immunodeficient NSG mice effectively accumulate lipid droplets (LDs). Because chronic lipid exposure is associated with islet β-cell dysfunction, we investigated LD accumulation in the intact human and mouse pancreas over a range of ages and states of diabetes. Very few LDs were found in normal human juvenile pancreatic acinar and islet cells, with numbers subsequently increasing throughout adulthood. While accumulation appeared evenly distributed in postjuvenile acinar and islet cells in donors without diabetes, LDs were enriched in islet α- and β-cells from donors with type 2 diabetes (T2D). LDs were also found in the islet β-like cells produced from human embryonic cell–derived β-cell clusters. In contrast, LD accumulation was nearly undetectable in the adult rodent pancreas, even in hyperglycemic and hyperlipidemic models or 1.5-year-old mice. Taken together, there appear to be significant differences in pancreas islet cell lipid handling between species, and the human juvenile and adult cell populations. Moreover, our results suggest that LD enrichment could be impactful to T2D islet cell function.

The host environment is a crucial factor for considering the transplant of stem cell–derived immature pancreatic cells in patients with type 1 diabetes. Here, we investigated the effect of insulin (INS)-deficient diabetes on the fate of immature pancreatic endocrine cell grafts and the underlying mechanisms. Human induced pluripotent stem cell–derived pancreatic endocrine progenitor cells (EPCs), which contained a high proportion of chromogranin A⁺ NK6 homeobox 1⁺ cells and very few INS⁺ cells, were used. When the EPCs were implanted under the kidney capsule in immunodeficient mice, INS-deficient diabetes accelerated increase in plasma human C-peptide, a marker of graft-derived INS secretion. The acceleration was suppressed by INS infusion but not affected by partial attenuation of hyperglycemia by dapagliflozin, an INS-independent glucose-lowering agent. Immunohistochemical analyses indicated that the grafts from diabetic mice contained more endocrine cells including proliferative INS-producing cells compared with that from nondiabetic mice, despite no difference in whole graft mass between the two groups. These data suggest that INS-deficient diabetes upregulates the INS-secreting capacity of EPC grafts by increasing the number of endocrine cells including INS-producing cells without changing the graft mass. These findings provide useful insights into postoperative diabetic care for cell therapy using stem cell–derived pancreatic cells.

The Braves made it clear that, individually, each of their prospects was available in exchange for J.T. Realmuto. But they were not willing to provide the volume of prospects or the MLB-experienced asset sought by the Marlins, who ended an offseason-long saga by dealing the All-Star catcher to the Phillies on Thursday.

All 30 Major League teams will wear special "MLB 150" patches on their uniforms for the entire 2019 season in honor of the 150th anniversary of the 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings, the first openly all-salaried professional baseball team.

Those hoping to watch Ronald Acuna Jr. extend last season's incredible post-All-Star break production should remember that his pace would have equated to 45 homers and 33 stolen bases over 162 games.

Freddie Freeman spent the offseason sharing excitement about the possibility that Josh Donaldson would not end up being the Braves' only significant offseason addition.

Braves manager Brian Snitker joked that he could almost detect a smile as he shared a phone conversation with Nick Markakis after the stoic outfielder re-signed with the club in January. Snitker and others actually saw that smile on Tuesday morning, when Markakis reported to Spring Training to begin his fifth season with the Braves and attempt to push the club past the rebuild he positively enriched through his leadership.

All 30 Major League teams will wear special "MLB 150" patches on their uniforms for the entire 2019 season in honor of the 150th anniversary of the 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings, the first openly all-salaried professional baseball team.

Steve Wilkerson enters Orioles camp competing for a super-utility role after a brief big league cameo last year. He isn't traveling light, as Wilkerson has 10 gloves on display.

Adipose tissue macrophages (ATMs) are involved in the development of insulin resistance in obesity. We have recently shown that myeloid cell–specific reduction of HMG-CoA reductase (Hmgcr^m–/m–), which is the rate-limiting enzyme in cholesterol biosynthesis, protects against atherosclerosis by inhibiting macrophage migration in mice. We hypothesized that ATMs are harder to accumulate in Hmgcr^m–/m– mice than in control Hmgcr^fl/fl mice in the setting of obesity. To test this hypothesis, we fed Hmgcr^m–/m– and Hmgcr^fl/fl mice a high-fat diet (HFD) for 24 weeks and compared plasma glucose metabolism as well as insulin signaling and histology between the two groups. Myeloid cell–specific reduction of Hmgcr improved glucose tolerance and insulin sensitivity without altering body weight in the HFD-induced obese mice. The improvement was due to a decrease in the number of ATMs. The ATMs were reduced by decreased recruitment of macrophages as a result of their impaired chemotactic activity. These changes were associated with decreased expression of proinflammatory cytokines in adipose tissues. Myeloid cell–specific reduction of Hmgcr also attenuated hepatic steatosis. In conclusion, reducing myeloid HMGCR may be a promising strategy to improve insulin resistance and hepatic steatosis in obesity.

All 30 Major League teams will wear special "MLB 150" patches on their uniforms for the entire 2019 season in honor of the 150th anniversary of the 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings, the first openly all-salaried professional baseball team.

The reality is setting in for Astros star second baseman Jose Altuve, who's shared a clubhouse with close friend Marwin Gonzalez for the previous seven springs. They became confidants on and off the field, which is what makes this spring so strange.

Astros third baseman Alex Bregman continues to progress from the arthroscopic elbow surgery he had a month to remove bone chips.

Astros outfielder Josh Reddick vows to start hitting to the opposite field more this year, which is something he did well in 2017, but not '18. Reddick hit .242 with 17 homers and 47 RBIs last year after hitting .314 with 13 homers and 82 RBIs to help the Astros to the World Series title in '17.

It took only two words for Alex Bregman to send 9-year-old Jax Nystrom into a frenzy, but this kind of reaction -- young people freaking out at the slightest bit of attention from him -- has become commonplace for the Astros' All-Star third baseman.

HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania (AP) — A Pennsylvania inmate whose dreadlocks violated a jail’s haircut policy has been released from solitary confinement after more than a year, although his federal lawsuit is still pending. A federal...

Dozens of United States children have been hospitalised with a serious inflammatory condition possibly linked with the coronavirus and first seen in Europe. New York authorities announced Wednesday that 64 potential cases had been reported to...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal health officials have revoked US authorisation for masks made by more than 60 Chinese manufacturers after they failed to meet standards needed to protect health care workers. The Food and Drug Administration had...

JAMAICA OLYMPIC Association (JOA) President Christopher Samuda believes that his sports administration experience will aid him in helping to finally shape a professional football league in the Caribbean. Concacaf announced Samuda’s appointment to...

Germany’s decision that football can return this month provided encouragement for players and teams across Europe yesterday that the shutdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic could soon be coming to an end. With COVID-19 infections declining,...

Western Bureau: A number of swimming officials in western Jamaica say that the region’s struggles with underdevelopment will continue even if the COVID-19 pandemic is brought under control. They say this is because they still lack proper pools to...

Supreme Ventures Racing and Entertainment Limited, operators of Caymanas Track, has announced the re-opening of the main track, effective tomorrow. The company said in a press release on Thursday evening that the track will be opened for two days...

BERLIN, Germany (AP): THE BUNDESLIGA football season will resume on May 16 in empty stadiums, picking up right where it left off two months ago amid the coronavirus pandemic. Yesterday’s announcement comes one day after clubs were told the season...

OTTAWA, Canada (CMC): The Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football’s (Concacaf) hexagonal round of qualifying for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar may have to be scrapped because of the disruption the COVID-19...

National 400m hurdles champion Rushell Clayton is concerned about what she says are inequalities between men and women in track and field. Clayton was speaking at a Women in Sports Conference in Kingston recently and discussed issues of inequality...

Rabies is the archytypical zoonotic disease, and only by vaccination in animals will we prevent infections in people. In two podcasts linked to our latest clinical review "The prevention and management of rabies"​ we'll be discussing how we can get there. In this podcast Sarah Cleaveland, professor of comparative epidemiology at the University of...

Multimorbidity presents a number of different challenges, for the patients living with the conditions, but also for the health professionals caring for them in systems that often are not designed with these more complex needs in mind. Emma Wallace, general practice lecturer, and Susan Smith, a professor of general practice at the Royal College of...

Bone pain is the most common type of pain from cancer and is present in around one third of patients with bone metastases, currently, improvements in cancer treatments mean that many patients are living with metastatic cancer for several years. Christopher Kane, NIHR academic clinical fellow in palliative medicine at Leeds University School of...

Mark Folman, a GP in Nottinghamshire, is concerned that more and more work, with more and more patients, means less time with those who really need him. BMJ Voices is a collection of readers’ experiences of working in the NHS. For this, The BMJ is seeking short audio submissions from UK listeners. These submissions will be published on...

In this podcast Alexandra Barratt, professor of public health at the University of Sydney, discusses how questions about overdiagnosis in breast cancer screening programmes were first raised 45 years ago, and why it has taken so long for the concept to become mainstream. Read her full analysis: http://www.bmj.com/content/350/bmj.h867

Obioma Ezekobe is a GP in an urgent care centre in Central Middlesex Hospital. She believes that the public need to be educated about the use of NHS resources, and be taught when it is appropriate to seek care. If you would like to contribute to this collection, please email a brief audio recording to voices@bmj.com or phone +44 (20) 3058 7427...

Some apps have the potential to encourage healthier habits and are accessible to most people, argues Iltifat Husain, but Des Spence notes the lack of any evidence of effectiveness and the potential for encouraging unnecessary anxiety. Read more about in our head to head "Can healthy people benefit from health apps?" -...

Pleural effusions are common, with an estimated 1-1.5 million new cases in the United States and 200 000-250 000 in the United Kingdom each year. Rahul Bhatnagar, academic clinical lecturer at the University of Bristol, describes how pleural effusions may be investigated and treated in the community and secondary care, with a particular focus on...

When healthy volunteers are scanned as part of a research project, unexpected findings, with uncertain implications, can be thrown up. Joanna Wardlaw, professor of applied neuroimaging and honorary consultant neuroradiologist at the University of Edinburgh, joins us to discuss how her group deals with these incidental findings, and what...

PTSD may develop after exposure to exceptionally threatening or horrifying events. About 3% of the adult population has PTSD at any one time, and more than 50% in survivors of rape. In this podcast Jonathan Bisson, professor of psychiatry at the School of Medicine in Cardiff joins us to talk about the evidence for diagnosis and treatment, and...

Francesca Conway, from the Department of Primary Care and Public Health at Imperial College London is co-author of an article on diagnosis of COPD. She joins us to discuss the major guideline recommendations, and highlights where they concur and where they differ. Read the full article: http://www.bmj.com/content/351/bmj.h6171

Nick Oliver, consultant diabetologist at Imperial Healthcare NHS Trust and Philippa Cooper, who has type I diabetes, join us to explain how structured education works for patients, and give tips on self management. Read the full review: http://www.bmj.com/content/352/bmj.i998

In February World Health Organization (WHO) declared the microcephaly epidemic in South America an international public health emergency. Today, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC, has confirmed that it’s is Zika virus which is causing that microcephaly.  The outbreak was originally spotted in Recife, in Brazil, and it’s...

Providing information to enable informed choices about healthcare sounds immediately appealing to most of us. But Minna Johansson, GP trainee and PhD student at the University of Gothenburg, argues that preventive medicine and expanding disease definitions have changed the ethical premises of informed choice and our good intentions may...

Global evidence indicates that mandated treatment of drug dependence conflicts with drug users’ human rights and is not effective in treating addiction. Karsten Lunze, associate professor at the Boston University School of Medicine, joins us to describe the evidence, and why he is convinced seemingly counter intuitive hard reduction...

The "internal market" was created after the 1987 UK general election focused attention on inadequate funding in the NHS, long waiting lists for elective surgery, and large unwarranted variations in clinical care. Economists attributed these problems to a lack of incentives for efficiency, and the remedies offered included increasing competition...

With the emergence of sofobuvir, a new direct acting antiviral, treatment for Hepatitis C infection is currently undergoing it's greatest change since the discovery of the virus 25 years ago. However Gilead, who manufacture the treatment, are under fire for the cost of the druge - around $90 000 for a course of treatment. Victor Roy, doctoral...

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has embraced a new model of drug testing and marketing called “adaptive pathways”, allowing new drugs for “unmet medical needs” to be launched on the market faster, on the basis of fewer data. While industry claims this is necessary, an analysis on thebmj.com looks at the assumptions underlying the new pathway,...

"I say to all Australian doctors - young, old, the political and the apolitical - that on this depends not just our ethical credibility as a profession, but our shared humanity. " Following the leaked emails published in The Guardian newspaper, alleging abuse of asylum seekers detained by the Australian government on the Pacific island of Nauru,...

Glasgow GP, writer, broadcaster, and The BMJ's weekly columnist Margaret McCartney joins us to talk about her new book "The State of Medicine: Keeping the Promise of the NHS". Read all of Margaret's columns: goo.gl/iKmmie

In an ideal world, policies would be evidence based - but governments are made of humans, who have positions and ideologies and moral bases. In this podcast Anthony Painter, from the RSA will be talking about why universal basic income may work, but who’s proponents cross ideological barriers, and writer and philosopher AC Grayling explains how...

Underneath all of our civilisation and science, we’re still primates - and the connection between patient and doctor can be reinforced by simply taking a hand. Robin Youngson, cofounder of hearts in healthcare, and Mitzi Blennerhassett, who has written extensively on patient engagement, have co-authored an editorial calling for the humanisation...

All doctors, irrespective of their specialty or the setting in which they work, will care for patients who die. Around half of all deaths occur in hospitals. Evidence suggests that the quality of communication around this process is poorer in hospitals than in other settings, according to responses from relatives who have experienced bereavement....

As the NHS strains under pressure from rising patient activity, an ageing population, and financial constraints, The BMJ hosted a discussion on how clinicians should be helping to manage demand at last week’s Nuffield Trust health policy summit. Taking part are: - Eileen Burns, president of the British Geriatrics Society - Andrew Fernando, GP...

We're creating a manifesto for better evidence. The centre for Evidence Based Medicine at the University of Oxford, and the BMJ, are asking what are the problem with medical evidence, and how can we fix them? In this second discussion we went to Nottingham​ University, to find out what the people who create the bread and butter of EBM -...