UK Biobank, a visionary medical project aimed at improving the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer, heart disease, diabetes and many other serious conditions is launched this week after several years of meticulous planning.
Up to three thousand people living in the south Manchester area are being given the opportunity to trailblaze the project before it goes nationwide later this year.
They are being sent invitations to take part in the start-up phase of UK Biobank
Mind the Nanogaps: Penn Researchers Create the First Reliable Method for Making Gaps for Nanotech AppsMind the Nanogaps: Penn Researchers Create the First Reliable Method for Making Gaps for Nanotech Apps
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have announced that they have bridged a major obstruction in the creation of nanoscale electronics by developing a simple, reliable and observable method of creating tiny, tiny gaps between electrodes.
Such “nanogaps” will
Researchers at the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) and the Department of Horticulture in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Virginia Tech have developed a new procedure for the efficient transfer of specific DNA sequences into the genome of strawberry. The scientists have used Agrobacterium tumefaciens, nature’s genetic engineer, to introduce DNA into the woodland or alpine strawberry Fragaria vesca.
The method takes advantage of Agrobacterium’s circular DNA
Study looks at cost-effectiveness of testing heart patients to help decide who needs implanted defibrillators
Next week, the Medicare agency will announce whether it will cover the cost of a $400 heart test that assesses a person’s risk of dying suddenly from a heart condition. Today, a study led by University of Michigan researchers suggests that the test could actually save Medicare hundreds of millions of dollars in the long run.
The researchers used a sophistic
An international collaboration of astronomers has discovered a “super-Earth” orbiting in the cold outer regions of a distant solar system about 9,000 light-years away. The planet weighs 13 times as much as Earth, and at -330 degrees Fahrenheit, it’s one of the coldest planets ever discovered outside our solar system.
Andrew Gould, leader of the MicroFUN collaboration and professor of astronomy at Ohio State University , pointed to two key implications of the discovery. “Fir
A new study finds that longer courses of a mild form of chemotherapy may help patients with a bone marrow disease only recently considered a form of cancer. Writing in the April 15, 2006 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, researchers say the study found that 45 percent of patients with Myelodysplastic Syndrome (MDS) who relapse did respond to a second course of treatment, but that the quality and duration of the second response was inferior to the initial tre
Scientists have uncovered new information about what orchestrates the complex balance between blood stem cells and mature blood cells, a relationship that is often disrupted in leukemia. The results, published in the March issue of Cancer Cell, will lead to a better understanding of the behavior of leukemic cells and may have vital clinical applications for patients recovering from chemotherapy, radiation therapy, or bone marrow transplantation.
Recent studies have implicated reduced le
A Johns Hopkins Medicine study finds that a single dose of the oral antibiotic azithromycin taken after trichiasis eye surgery can reduce the frequency with which eyelashes turn back in and abrade the eye. The oral antibiotic treatment is more effective than multiple days of treatment with the topical antibiotic ointment Tetracycline, the current method of treatment after trichiasis surgery.
Trichiasis is the leading infectious cause of blindness worldwide. It is a condition in which the
An antiviral drug may be useful in the final stages of eradicating polio worldwide, according to EXPLORING THE ROLE OF ANTIVIRAL DRUGS IN THE ERADICATION OF POLIO, a new workshop report from the National Academies’ National Research Council. The planning and development of such drugs should be initiated now, says the report, which identifies several promising targets for drug development and outlines steps for clinical trials and regulatory approval.
The World Health Organization
The amount of data acquired by satellites is increasing at an exponential rate, and researchers are learning about the value of this data in fighting epidemic outbreaks as a result of the ESA’s Epidemio project.
“I was negative about the role satellites could play in addressing epidemics, but now I am positive,” Penelope Vernatsou of the Swiss Tropical Institute in Switzerland said. The ESA-funded Epidemio project was developed in January 2004 to illustrate the benefits of remo
A new range of mobile-terminal embedded information systems, marketed under the ubitouch brand has been developed by ASCENT. These ubitouch solutions are powerful new Java-compatible applications designed to be installed on terminals, enabling the whole of a customer’s publication, communication and gaming services, as well as advanced marketing functionalities, to be customised in a brand’s colours.
In comparison to existing resources, ubitouch solutions provide a greater degree
ANTENNESSA of France has launched the INSITE box, a cheap and efficient electromagnetic-field continuous-measuring box. The INSITE box’s technology allows for continuous selective measuring on nine frequency bands (FM, GSM, UMTS, FM, TV3, TV4&5 and DCS). The box uses EME SPY dosimeter technology (patented by France Telecom and ANTENNESSA), based on a filtering principle that enables the emission bands to be identified. The measurements come to between 0.05V/m and 5V/m.
The INSITE box
Researchers believe antiretroviral therapy (ART) will not be effective in stopping HIV epidemics even if it is made universally available in poorer countries, and that widespread use could even lead to an increase in the numbers infected with HIV.
Research published today in PLoS Medicine by a team from Imperial College London reveals a model which predicts how different strategies for increasing access to ART might affect HIV infection rates.
The modelling found that while
A new chemical process for removing unwanted minerals from coal could lead to reductions in carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired power stations.
There is already a way of burning coal in a cleaner, more efficient fashion that would reduce carbon dioxide emissions: this is where the coal is turned into a gas and used to drive a turbine. However, problems with cleaning the coal before it is burnt have made generating electricity in this way very expensive. This new chemical p
Major research is being carried out by academics at Sunderland and Cambridge universities into the experiences of working class students in higher education.
The work, which is part of a £30m research programme, could help universities better understand issues such as progression and retention, as well as create a greater awareness of how to improve provision and support for students from backgrounds where there is little tradition of higher education.
The research will
Millet and sorghum are major food crops in the Sahel, where they have been diversified quite considerably. However, the existing capital is likely to shrink as a result of human activity, in terms of socioeconomic development and environmental changes, particularly climate change. While there have been very few large-scale studies of the issue to date, CIRAD and its partners are beginning to reap the first results of a project funded by the Institut français de la biodiversité (IFB). The aim is
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