Among patients undergoing evaluation for coronary artery bypass surgery, stroke neurologists are frequently consulted when the patient also has severe carotid artery stenosis (blockage of an artery that supplies blood to the brain). In a small number of these cases, a carotid endarterectomy is performed at the same time as the bypass surgery, with the assumption that combining the procedures in a single surgical event may decrease subsequent risk of stroke or death. While combining these procedur
In a paper in this month’s freely-available online global health journal PLoS Medicine Seung Kim and colleagues from Stanford University suggest that one way of producing insulin-secreting pancreatic islet cells for future possible treatment of type I diabetes is to look beyond immature pancreatic cells and embryonic stem cells to other early cell types. Kim and colleagues took cells derived from brain which usually mature into neural cells, and exposed them to a series of signals that are
There are 300 million cases of malaria each year worldwide, causing one million deaths. Around 90% of these deaths occur in Africa, mostly in young children. One of the greatest challenges facing Africa in the fight against malaria is drug resistance; resistance to chloroquine (CQ), the cheapest and most widely used antimalarial, is common throughout Africa, and resistance to sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (SP), the first-developed and least expensive alternative to CQ, is also increasing. These trends h
A new fashion company making clothes that release complimentary medicines into the skin when worn and a new broadband youth TV channel tailored to the young Asian market, are among the latest creative businesses to win start up grants of up to £35,000 from NESTA (the National Endowment for Science, Technology & the Arts), the organisation that invests in UK creativity and innovation.
The awards were made through NESTA’s Creative Pioneer Programme, which aims to invest over £3 mil
A new ESA study predicts that the devastating Sumatran earthquake, which resulted in the tragic tsunami of 28 December 2004, will have left a ‘scar’ on Earth’s gravity that could be detected by a sensitive new satellite, due for launch next year.
The Sumatran earthquake measured 9 on the Richter scale and caused widespread devastation and death when it struck unexpectedly late last year. Thankfully, earthquakes of this magnitude are rare events, taking place perhaps once every tw
Careers are influenced by manifold factors – and in other ways than we think. This has been demonstrated by a study now-published by the Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration. The extensive project traced numerous job histories over an extended time period and analysed critical influencing factors. The project funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) thereby questions some popular beliefs. The most important results will now be published as a book.
A team h
In the 15 years that the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has orbited Earth, it has taken three-quarters of a million photographs of the cosmos. Two new views have been released of Hubble’s most well-known images: the Whirlpool Galaxy, M51, and the Eagle Nebula, M16.
The new images released for Hubble’s 15th anniversary are among the largest and sharpest views Hubble has ever taken, and were made with Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS).
The new Whirlpool Galaxy i
Thanks to data from ESA’s XMM-Newton spacecraft, European astronomers have observed for the first time rotating ‘hot spots’ on the surfaces of three nearby neutron stars.
This result provides a breakthrough in understanding the ‘thermal geography’ of neutron stars, and provides the first measurement of very small-sized features on objects hundreds to thousands light-years away. The spots vary in size from that of a football field to that of a golf course.
Neutron st
There has been a significant fall in serious violence in England (13%) and Wales (20%) over the last five years, according to a major study into trends in serious violence by Cardiff University.
The research led by the University’s Violence Research Group analysed figures for assault related injuries from a representative sample of 32 major Accident and Emergency departments in England and Wales. The study also looked at the effectiveness of CCTV surveillance in preventing v
Children treated for soft tissue sarcomas have a significantly higher risk of developing subsequent cancers later in life, according to a new study. The study appears in the June 1, 2005 issue of CANCER (http://www.interscience.wiley.com/cancer-newsroom), a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, and indicates children treated with combined chemotherapy and radiation therapy, in particular, had greater risks of developing a new malignancy.
With improvements in can
Elderly lung cancer patients tolerate combined chemotherapy and radiotherapy with no higher risk of death than younger patients, according to a new study appearing in the June 1, 2005 issue of CANCER (http://www.interscience.wiley.com/cancer-newsroom), a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society
Lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer deaths in the U.S., with half of those diagnosed at age 70 years or older. About 20 percent of patients with lung cancer will hav
West Nile virus alarmed Americans when it made its first U.S. appearance in New York City in 1999. It has since spread from coast to coast, sickened more than 16,000 Americans and killed more than 600. As the virus spread, medical investigators hastened research to develop an effective vaccine or therapy. None currently exist, but a newly published paper by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis points to a promising treatment. This research, published today online by Nature Medicine
PET scans and cognitive tests have suggested that Alzheimer’s disease patients with genetically modified tissue inserted directly into their brains show a reduction in the rate of cognitive decline and increased metabolic activity in the brain, according to a study published in the April 24, 2005 online issue of the journal Nature Medicine by researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine.
PET scans demonstrated an increase in the brain&#
Tensions between fishing communities and marine scientists over research into fisheries conservation have been overcome in a unique project sponsored by the ESRC in the islands of the Orkney archipelago.
The study was led by Professor Jonathan Side of the Heriot Watt University’s Orkney- based International Centre for Island Technology, and focussed on an inshore creel fishery for lobsters and crabs. It brought unprecedented participation from all sides of the debate while in
Particles could make earlier cancer diagnosis possible
Specially designed nanoparticles can reveal tiny cancerous tumors that are invisible by ordinary means of detection, according to a study by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.
The researchers demonstrated that very small human melanoma tumors growing in mice—indiscernible from the surrounding tissue by direct MRI scan—could be “lit up” and easily located as soon as 30 minute
Using a new electrically-assisted microbial fuel cell (MFC) that does not require oxygen, Penn State environmental engineers and a scientist at Ion Power Inc. have developed the first process that enables bacteria to coax four times as much hydrogen directly out of biomass than can be generated typically by fermentation alone.
Dr. Bruce Logan, the Kappe professor of environmental engineering and an inventor of the MFC, says, “This MFC process is not limited to using only carbohydra
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