Treatment for prostate cancer leads to significant five-year declines in sexual and urinary function, according to a new study. However, general and other specific health-related quality of life factors, such as bowel function, are not affected. These findings come from the first prospective comparative study examining differences between normal aging and the effects of prostate cancer treatment, published in the November 1, 2004 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Societ
A new study finds chemotherapy improves survival and reduces the risk of recurrence in women with stage I ovarian cancer (cancer that has not spread beyond the ovary). But it remains unclear which patients would most benefit from adjuvant chemotherapy and what the optimal treatment regimen would entail. The findings come from an analytical review of data from 13 randomized control trials (RCTs), which will be published in the November 1, 2004 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American
MacroPore Biosurgery, Inc. (Frankfurt: XMP) today announced that adipose tissue-derived regenerative cells improved heart function following myocardial infarction in a large-animal preclinical safety study. This study, performed in swine, confirms previous preclinical work by MacroPore Biosurgery and others suggesting that the Company’s proprietary, patented technology is safe and may be clinically useful in treating heart disease. The goal of the study was to determine the safety of adipose tissue-
For the second time in two years, scientists at the Stanford University School of Medicine have discovered a new type of regulatory T cell that reduces asthma and airway inflammation in mice, bolstering the theory that a deficiency of such cells is a prime cause of the breathing disorder as well as allergies.
The team’s research not only provides a detailed profile of these newfound cells but also sheds light on how such cells are related to other T cells and suggests that there
Yale researchers demonstrate the crucial role of a membrane lipid called phosphatidylinositol-4,5-bisphosphate (PtdIns (4,5)P2) in the communication of information between synapses in the brain, according to a study published this week in Nature.
“This study is the first to show that lowering the levels of this lipid in nerve terminals affects the efficiency of neurotransmission,” said senior author, Pietro De Camilli, Eugene Higgins Professor of Cell Biology and a Howard Hughes Me
A study in the recent issue of Psychological Science in the Public Interest addresses how economic status is no longer a sufficient gauge of a nation’s well-being. The authors argue that the psychological well-being of its citizens is the greatest measure of a nation– not the well-being of its economy. “While wealth has trebled over the past 50 years…well-being has been flat, mental illness has increased at an even more rapid rate, and data, not just nostalgic reminiscences, indicate that t
Carbon loss from soils exceeds storage by plants
Institute of Arctic Biology (IAB) ecologists Donie Bret-Harte and Terry Chapin and colleagues working in northern Alaska discovered that tundra plants and soils respond in surprisingly opposite ways to conditions that simulate long-term climate warming.
Their findings are published in the September 23, 2004 edition of the leading science journal Nature and are featured in the journal’s News and Views section.
Bret-Harte
Nursing study, co-authored by Case Western Reserve University professor, published in journal Pain
A study aimed at giving health care providers a better understanding of the multidimensional nature and effects of school-age children’s post-operative pain concludes that using imagery with analgesics reduced tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy pain and anxiety following surgery.
Findings of the study, “Imagery reduces children’s post-operative pain,” authored by Myra Ma
Implications include developing materials that both detect and kill biological agents
University of Pittsburgh researchers have synthesized a simple molecule that not only produces perfectly uniform, self-assembled nanotubes but creates what they report as the first “nanocarpet,” whereby these nanotubes organize themselves into an expanse of upright clusters that when magnified a million times resemble the fibers of a shag rug. Moreover, unlike other nanotube structures, these tubes
Stem cells taken from umbilical cord blood, then given intravenously along with a drug known to temporarily breach the brain’s protective barrier, can dramatically reduce stroke size and damage, Medical College of Georgia and University of South Florida researchers say.
“What we found was interesting, phenomenal really,” says Dr. Cesario V. Borlongan, neuroscientist and lead author of the study published in the October issue of the American Heart Association journal, Stroke.
In what may be a first step toward expanding the arsenal against HIV, UC Irvine researchers have successfully targeted an HIV protein that has eluded existing therapies.
Researchers targeted Nef, a protein responsible for accelerating the development of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, or AIDS. Nef was targeted with small molecules synthesized by the researchers – molecules that disrupted Nef’s interaction with other proteins. The technique used for identifying the synthetic mo
With the recent “warm commissioning” of its linear accelerator, Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) has passed a crucial test and milestone on its way to completion in 2006.
The SNS’s linear accelerator, or linac, is composed of two sections: the “warm,” or room temperature section, and a superconducting section that operates at temperatures hundreds of degrees below zero. Los Alamos National Laboratory, part of the team of six DOE national laboratories
CBEN pioneers method of mitigating nanoparticle toxicity via surface enhancement
Researchers at Rice University’s Center for Biological and Environmental Nanotechnology (CBEN) have demonstrated a simple way to reduce the toxicity of water-soluble buckyballs by a factor of more than ten million. The research will appear in an upcoming issue of the journal Nano Letters, published by the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific society. One of the first toxi
A new study on “waves (or fronts) of detachment” involved in the process of friction offers a new perspective on an old scientific puzzle and could provide a key to improving predictions of future earthquakes, say scientists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
The work of the scientists, Prof Jay Fineberg, head of the Hebrew University’s Racah Institute of Physics, Dr Gil Cohen and graduate student Shmuel N Rubinstein, is described in an article in the journal Nature entitled “Det
Patients needing second-time or “re-do” heart surgery have a new safer alternative. New findings show that an “off-pump” surgical procedure is performed safely and has improved outcomes for patients than traditional methods.
Due to a newly standardised approach and enhanced technology, doctors can perform this controversial surgery and eliminate the damaging effects of using a heart bypass machine. Off-pump surgery, also known as the “beating heart” method, is performed while the
Physicists at Imperial College London are developing a new optical disk with so much storage capacity that every episode of The Simpsons made could fit on just one.
Speaking at the Asia-Pacific Data Storage Conference 2004 in Taiwan today, Dr Peter Török, Lecturer in Photonics in the Department of Physics, will describe a new method for potentially encoding and storing up to one Terabyte (1,000 Gigabytes) of data, or 472 hours of film, on one optical disk the size of a CD or DVD
Feedback
