Anemia drugs made by Amgen and Johnson & Johnson may raise the risk of death among those suffering from cancerous diseases, a new study says.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins took advantage of a new technique that reads the makeup of proteins to identify nearly all chemical changes nature makes by adding phosphate to proteins manufactured in human cells.

Salicylates, including aspirin, are used to treat a range of inflammatory conditions and can be used to prevent diseases such as cancer, but the way aspirin works is not yet fully understood.

For the first time, scientists from the University of Washington School of Medicine, Indiana University Bloomington and the University of Cambridge have determined how a plant hormone - auxin - interacts with its hormone receptor, called TIR1.Their report, on the cover of this week's issue of Nature, also may have important implications for the treatment of human disease, because TIR1 is similar to human enzymes that are known to be involved in cancer.