Identifying the link between chronic hepatitis B infection and liver cancer may one day help cancer patients sidestep the poison of chemotherapy, a Purdue University study suggests.
The research group of Ourania M. Andrisani (oo-RAHN-ee-ah an-dri-SAH-nee) has shown that a protein the hepatitis virus instructs chronically infected liver cells to produce – known as the X protein – under certain conditions instructs precancerous infected liver cells to die. The discovery of how the X
The drug methylphenidate (brand name Ritalin) increased activity in brains of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as well as those with a reading disorder, researchers at Yale report in the American Journal of Psychiatry.
“During a test of divided attention, Ritalin increased activation in the basal ganglia, a structure of the brain involved in cognition and behavior,” said first author Keith Shafritz, former graduate student in the interdepartmental Neuros
Doctors at Long Island Jewish (LIJ) Medical Center recently discovered a link between a common chemotherapy drug and a serious bone disease called osteonecrosis of the jaw (ONJ). The discovery, published in the Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons, prompted both the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Novartis, the manufacturer of bisphosphonates used in cancer chemotherapy, to issue warnings earlier this fall to physicians and dentists about the risk for this potential adverse eff
Following are summaries of a few of the papers being presented at the AGU meeting by scientists affiliated with the Earth Institute at Columbia University.
Global Poverty
Mapping Poverty: The Geographical And Biophysical Correlates Of Hunger And Infant Mortality
It is difficult to design programs to reduce poverty unless you understand where and why that poverty occurs. De Sherbinin and colleagues present recent efforts to integrate global spatial dat
The Pacific Northwest has seen its share of major environmental battles. Now a new historical study of the fur trade indicates that early Europeans and Americans in the region struggled with similar issues nearly two centuries ago as they sought to exploit and preserve the area’s natural resources.
In a pilot study examining the historical record for the National Park Service, a University of Washington researcher has found that the Hudson’s Bay Company, the dominant o
Researchers use pentacene to develop next-generation solar power
As the price of energy continues to rise, businesses are looking to renewable energy for cheaper sources of power. Making electricity from the most plentiful of these sources – the sun -can be expensive due to the high price of producing traditional silicon-based solar cells. Enter organic solar cells. Made from cheaper materials, their flexibility and feather-weight construction promise to open up new markets for
Ice dams across the deepest gorge on Earth created some of the highest-elevation lakes in history. New research shows the most recent of these lakes, in the Himalaya Mountains of Tibet, broke through its ice barrier somewhere between 600 and 900 AD, causing massive torrents of water to pour through the Himalayas into India.
Geological evidence points to the existence of at least three lakes, and probably four, at various times in history when glacial ice from the Himalayas blocked
Combined positron emission tomography and computerized tomography (PET/CT) can help diagnose occult (hidden) recurrent cancer, possibly a cancer patient’s greatest post-treatment fear, report a team of Israeli physicians in the December issue of the Society of Nuclear Medicine’s “Journal of Nuclear Medicine.”
PET and CT scans are standard imaging tools that allow clinicians to pinpoint the location of cancer within the body before making treatment recommendations. PET/C
Nanotechnology researchers at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign have demonstrated a tiny, implantable detector that could one day allow diabetics to monitor their glucose levels continuously-without ever having to draw a blood sample.
The work, which is the first application of a whole new class of biological sensors, was funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and announced December 12 in the online edition of the journal Nature Materials.
Princi
Researchers at the University of Essex have found that high doses of vitamin B1 (thiamine) could lower cholesterol in diabetes patients and help prevent heart disease.
The results of the research project, led by Professor Paul J Thornalley of the Department of Biological Sciences, suggest that diabetics should avoid even mild thiamine deficiency and that thiamine supplements could significantly decrease the risk of heart disease and kidney failure.
Diabetes increases th
A European team based in Heidelberg (Germany) and their colleagues from the HEGRA collaboration have discovered a new, unidentified, very high energy gamma-ray source in our Galaxy. This source was detected via ground-based observations of the Imaging Atmosphere Cherenkov Telescope System.
This system of five telescopes is designed to detect the light produced when high energy particles enter the Earth’s atmosphere. The discovery of this source, TeV J2032+4130, is of particular
A researcher has discovered an effective way to remove a troubling new pollutant from our nation’s water sources.
Pratim Biswas, The Stifel and Quinette Jens Professor of Environmental Engineering Science and director of the Environmental Engineering Science Program at Washington University in St. Louis, has found a method for removing the toxin MTBE from water. MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether) has been detected at low levels in municipal water sources around the nation and in
After eleven months of politics, now it’s time for some real “core values” – not those of the candidates but those of the great gas giant planet, Jupiter.
The planet Jupiter may have a core of tar, according to new reasearch from WUSTL.
Katharina Lodders, Ph.D., Washington University in St. Louis research associate professor in Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences, studying data from the Galileo probe of Jupiter, proposes a new mechanism by which the planet formed
Engineers who were studying beach erosion got more than they bargained for recently when they discovered unexpected wave behavior in the water along an east coast shoreline.
The finding could ultimately cause researchers to re-examine ideas about beach erosion and the repair of beaches that are damaged by tropical storms. “It could just be that the physics of the system is a little different than we thought,” said Thomas Lippmann, a research scientist in the Department of Civil and
Powerful research tools that speed up vaccine development have led to the start today of human tests for a preventive vaccine against the respiratory disease SARS. The disease killed hundreds of people around the world before it was brought under control in 2003 with aggressive conventional public health measures.
Researchers at the Vaccine Research Center, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), will conduct
A naturally occurring COX-2 inhibitor
Cancer researchers at the Case Western Reserve University (Case) School of Medicine, University Hospitals of Cleveland (UHC) and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute have found a “Celebrex-like” gene that suppresses the growth of colon cancer. The researchers discovered that the gene, called 15-PGDH, is found in normal cells and is virtually undetectable in colon cancer cells. When the researchers restored the gene in tumor cells and injected th
Feedback
