Findings pinpoint mechanism behind social deficits
New imaging research at UCLA detailed Dec. 4 as an advance online publication of the journal Nature Neuroscience shows children with autism have virtually no activity in a key part of the brain’s mirror neuron system while imitating and observing emotions.
Mirror neurons fire when a person performs a goal-directed action and while he or she observes the same action performed by others. Neuroscientists believe this ob
Study underscores another keyreason to control hypertension
People with high blood pressure and their doctors have a new reason to work at controlling this common but high-risk condition: As patients get older, they might otherwise have worse-than-normal problems with short-term memory and verbal ability. New research shows that uncontrolled hypertension puts people at higher risk for sharper drops in these cognitive functions than does blood pressure that’s normal due to
As the future of Earth’s forests moved up the agenda at the United Nations Climate Change Conference – negotiating a post-Kyoto strategy to combat global warming – ESA and its national collaborators presented delegates with promising results from projects using satellites to identify wide-area forest retreat and expansion.
The planet’s climate is moving into uncharted territory, as our burning of fossil-fuels and clearances of forests release massive amounts of heat-trapping
A number of EUREKA projects in the field of cinema mean Europe is now being acknowledged as a leader in technologies for the film industry.
EUREKA Project E! 1683 Film Special Effects developed a powerful new software package to create realistic special effects for the film industry called ’Key Light’. This software has been used in the making of the Harry Potter series of films, with the latest, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, having recently been screened to the two-man cre
Russian researchers suggest that diamond deposits should be explored by smell of soil. Kimberlite pipes deeply hidden under the sedimentary rock cover are given away by the composition of adsorbed gases in superstrata. Specialists of the All-Russian Research Institute of Geological, Geophysical and Geochemical Systems, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Open Joint Stock Company “Arkhangelskgeoldobycha” (Stock company “ALROSA”) have compared the composition of gases adsorbed in the rock of already
In the mine, like in medicine, prevention is the best way of treatment. It means that it is easier to prevent an explosion than to fight with its consequences, which unfortunately turn sometimes into disasters. Explosion in coal mines happen, as a rule, because of accumulation of combustion agent – natural gas and/or slack – in the air underground. The natural gas and/or slack may explode spontaneously – simply because its concentration in the air has reached the critical value. To learn how much
Valuable results for the complex jigsaw puzzle of cancer development
CDK6 is the plain name of a molecule that is often characteristically altered in medulloblastoma. This type of cancer is among the most common malignant brain tumors in children. Heidelberg molecular geneticians of the German Cancer Research Center (Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum, DKFZ) have now found out that CDK6 can serve as an important indicator to help physicians determine the prognosis of patients. The
Physicists at Kiel University discover an unusual state of matter
The existence of an unusual state of matter, a crystal that consists entirely of holes, has been proven at Kiel University. As reported in the latest issue of Physical Review Letters (December 2nd , 2005), an international team led by Professor Michael Bonitz has, for the first time, demonstrated with the help of extensive computer simulations that this exotic phenomenon, the existence of which was hitherto only a
Researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) have successfully conducted an important round of successful laser experiments at the National Ignition Facility (NIF), validating key computer simulations and theoretical projections relevant to the plasma and X-ray environment necessary to achieve ignition.
NIF, which is more than 80 percent complete, is a 10-story building in which 192 laser beams are focused on a tiny target inside a 30-foot diameter aluminum-lined
For the first time, scientists have manipulated hydrogen atoms into stable sites beneath the surface of a palladium crystal, creating a structure predicted to be important in metal catalysts, in hydrogen storage, and in fuel cells. The research will be published in the 13 December 2005 issue of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
Observations of the effects of the resulting subsurface hydrides–hydrogen atoms with a partial negative charge–confirmed th
Scientists have uncovered key new information towards understanding the crucial first step in protein synthesis, the process by which the genetic code, harbored within DNA and copied into RNA, is translated into the production of proteins. This new information also helps to explain how viruses, such as Hepatitis C, are able to highjack protein synthesis machinery in humans for their own purposes.
Biochemist Jennifer Doudna and biophysicist Eva Nogales, both of whom hold j
Scientists have a tough time visualizing the tiny hatchways that allow nutrients to pass into our cells, but a group of Purdue University biologists may have found the next best thing: a glimpse into the workings of the “motor” that opens and closes them.
A research team led by Jue Chen has clarified the connection between these minuscule gates – which are called membrane transport proteins – and the steps by which they use a cell’s energy to permit or deny materials entry
Findings reported at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America
Breast CT, an investigational technology for early breast cancer detection, may be better than mammography at detecting breast lesions and is much more comfortable for women, researchers from the University of California, Davis reported today at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America in Chicago.
“In this initial evaluation, breast CT images were subjectively fou
Patients suffering from advanced head and neck cancer affecting their larynx can maintain vocal function by undergoing a combination of radiation therapy and chemotherapy instead of surgery to remove the larynx, according to a study published in the December 1, 2005, issue of the International Journal of Radiation Oncology*Biology*Physics, the official journal of ASTRO, the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology.
Doctors in the Department of Otolaryngology – Head and N
In a series of experiments in animals, researchers at Johns Hopkins have successfully used a technique that tracks mesenchymal stem cells via magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to monitor the progress of the cells in repairing tissue scarred by heart attack.
The Hopkins findings, presented in November at the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions and published in a supplement to the journal Circulation, are believed to be the first demonstration of how the technique,
Using a new form of microscopy to penetrate living lymph nodes, UCSF scientists have for the first time viewed immune cells at work, helping clarify how T cells control autoimmunity.
The technique, known as two-photon laser-scanning microscopy, was able to focus deep within the lymph node of a diabetic mouse, allowing the researchers to show that immune cells known as T regulatory, or Treg, cells control the destructive action of rogue autoimmune cells when each of the two cel
Feedback
