Katherine Unger Baillie

Penn Study Shows How Female Immune Cells Keep Their Second X Chromosome Shut Off

Autoimmune diseases tend to strike women more than men and having multiple X chromosomes could be the main reason why. While a process called X chromosome inactivation serves to balance out gene dosage between males and females, some genes on the “inactive X” chromosome in immune cells can sometimes escape this process, giving women an extra dose of immunity-related gene expression.

Katherine Unger Baillie

The history of Penn’s green, tree-filled campus

Walking around Penn’s verdant campus today, it’s easy to take the abundant tree canopy for granted. But at various points in history, the University was not as bucolic.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Penn Team Shows How Seemingly Acute Viral Infections Can Persist

Infections caused by viruses, such as respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, measles, parainfluenza and Ebola, are typically considered acute. These viruses cause disease quickly and live within a host for a limited time. But in some cases the effects of the infection, and presence of the virus itself, can persist.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Melanoma Cells Rewire to Resist Drug Treatment, Penn-Wistar Team Finds

In 2014, new combination therapies to treat patients with metastatic melanoma hit the market, helping extend the lives of those with this aggressive disease. Yet unfortunately, after several months of treatment, almost all patients on the regimen eventually relapsed.

Katherine Unger Baillie, Karen Kreeger, Darien Sutton

Offices ‘adopt a classroom’ to support Philly schools

Across the city and the nation, now is the time of year that many teachers open their wallets to personally pay for classroom supplies that dwindling school budgets may not provide. And many families find themselves confronted with lengthy checklists of supplies that can be costly, sometimes prohibitively so.

Katherine Unger Baillie