science wire

March 16 2010 The Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research turns 40! Today, the Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research, part of the Novartis Research Foundation, is celebrating its 40th birthday.

Male elephants of breeding age - over 28 years old - make up more than 5 percent of well-protected populations.

Tuberculosis still affects thousands of victims worldwide.

Today, the Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research, part of the Novartis Research Foundation, is celebrating its 40th birthday.

Local researchers at UC San Diego Medical Center are collaborating with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, and University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) on the largest clinical trial of hypothermia (brain cooling) for stroke to date.

They include poor communication skills and reduced mobility. Those affected may also suffer seizures, digestive and breathing problems and often need constant care.

This prosthetic device, which has gone through many incarnations since, is an alternative to complete knee replacement, helping patients recover mobility faster after the operation and giving them an implant that, in over 90 per cent of cases, lasts for over 20 years.

David Botstein , director of the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics at Princeton University, has been named a recipient of the Albany Medical Center Prize in Medicine for his leading role in mapping the human genome.

A Princeton University-led research team has discovered that protein competition over an important enzyme provides a mechanism to integrate different signals that direct early embryonic development. The work suggests that these signals are combined long before they interact with the organism's DNA, as was previously believed, and also may inform new therapeutic strategies to fight cancer.

March 09, 2010 — Viruses are believed to be the cause of as many as 20 percent of all cancers, but some viruses can infect human cells and remain latent.

Pharmaceutical companies could substantially reduce the expense of costly treatments for cancer and other diseases produced from mammalian or bacterial cells by growing these human therapeutic proteins in algae?rapidly growing aquatic plant cells that have recently gained attention for their ability to produce biofuels.

They compared this with general intelligence levels, using vocabulary tests, to work out whether brain function in participants had diminished over time. This study shows that older people with diabetes who have higher levels of stress hormones in their blood are more likely to have experienced cognitive decline.

PA 40/10 Scientists at The University of Nottingham have pinpointed one of the mechanisms which cancer cells use to survive chemotherapy.

Dr. Marc McKee, of McGill's Faculty of Dentistry and the Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology, is collaborating closely with Enobia Pharma Inc, a Quebec biotech company, to develop innovative treatments for serious genetic bone diseases.

Scientists at UC San Diego studying the biological clocks of bacteria, fungi, plants and animals have joined forces to apply their knowledge across these diverse groups of organisms to human sleep disorders in a newly established Center for Chronobiology.

PA39/10 The University of Nottingham is collaborating with one of China's largest pharmaceutical companies in an international research initiative.

BERKELEY — In the long evolutionary road from bacteria to humans, a major milestone occurred some 1.5 billion years ago when microbes started building closets for all their stuff, storing DNA inside a nucleus, for example, or cramming all the energy machinery inside mitochondria.

Researchers from UCL?s Institute of Ophthalmology say what we can and can?t see in our peripheral vision may not be the result of a random process.

Researchers from UCL's Institute of Ophthalmology say what we can and can't see in our peripheral vision may not be the result of a random process. As you read this, you may notice that the word directly in front of you is clear, but all the surrounding words are hard to decipher. For most people, this effect ? known as 'crowding' ? is not a problem.

This past week, the David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT received funding from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to become a Center for Cancer Systems Biology (CCSB).

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.

Currently, beachgoers are informed about water-quality conditions based on results from the previous day's sample.

Currently, beachgoers are informed about water-quality conditions based on results from the previous day's sample.

On Jan. 8, the day Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger introduced his latest budget proposal, he simultaneously declared a fiscal emergency for the state of California.

Professor David Becker (UCL Cell and Developmental Biology) is one of seven  finalists nominated for the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council's 2010 Innovator of the Year Award competition.

The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) have awarded a $300,000 grant for research focusing on the nature of the immune response induced by the action mechanisms of plant-made Virus-Like Pa

, a bacterium which lives in a symbiotic relationship with nematodes. The tiny worms enter insect larvae through natural openings, where they proceed to "cough up" the bacteria, so to speak.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. " MIT neuroscientists have designed a new MRI sensor that responds to the neurotransmitter dopamine, an achievement that may significantly improve the specificity and resolution of future brain imaging procedures.

Liverpool, UK - 26 February 2010: Promiscuous females may be the key to a species¿ survival, according to new research by the Universities of Liverpool and Exeter.

In ongoing work to identify how genes interact with social environments to impact human health, UCLA researchers have discovered what they describe as a biochemical link between misery and death.

In the Life Sciences the safe long-term storage of living materials such as cells or whole organisms as well as their worldwide exchange between research groups is becoming more and more important.

PASADENA, Calif. -Research in genomic sciences, astronomy, seismology, and neuroeconomics are some of the many projects being funded at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

Science | Business Pete Wilton mosquitoes flightless could halt dengue fever in its tracks. The finding is reported in a paper in this week's on work led by Luke Alphey of Oxford University's Department of Zoology and Oxford spin-out firm Oxitec .

If you see a student dozing in the library or a co-worker catching 40 winks in her cubicle, don't roll your eyes.

The National Science Foundation has awarded $25 million to establish the Emergent Behaviors of Integrated Cellular Systems Center (EBICS) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Animals | Genetics | Science 22 Feb 10 Researchers, based in Ireland and Britain, have found the complete mitochondrial DNA genome sequence of ancient wild cattle using a sample from a 6,700 year-old bone.

For immediate release: February 19, 2010 Media contact: Emily Aronson, earonson [a] princeton (p) edu, (609) 258-5733 Tilghman to present annual James Baldwin Lecture Princeton University President S

Giant plankton-eating fishes roamed the prehistoric seas for over 100 million years before they were wiped out in the same event that killed off the dinosaurs, new fossil evidence has shown. An international team describe how new fossils from Asia, Europe and the US reveal a previously unknown dynasty of giant plankton-eating bony fishes that filled the seas of the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods, between 66-172 million years ago.