The extreme diversity of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) strains is a major obstacle to anti-AIDS vaccine elaboration or the development of new treatments against the disease. IRD scientists, working jointly with other institutes (1), used statistical methods to determine the adaptive molecular mechanisms the virus deploys to avoid neutralization by the host immune defences. This adaptive molecular evolutionary strategy, based on genetic variability, proved to be a feature common to the different
The loss of 2 or more inches in height during adulthood serves as a powerful predictor of osteoporosis in the hip, and thus the risk for hip fractures, in elderly women, according to a new study at The Ohio State University Medical Center. The finding has led researchers to recommend that primary care physicians routinely screen aging patients for height loss.
“May is National Osteoporosis Month, and in 2004, an osteoporotic or fragility fracture of the hip should be preventable,” said Dr. S
A Purdue University researcher is combining two technologies – hearing aids and cochlear implants – to help improve speech understanding and sound quality for cochlear implant users.
Research by King Chung, an assistant professor in audiology, and colleagues shows that by applying advanced hearing aid technologies, such as preprocessors, to cochlear implants, background noise can be reduced, speech understanding enhanced and sound quality improved for cochlear implant users. Chung collabora
A quick new technique able to identify genes that evolve rapidly as well as those that change slowly already has pinpointed new targets for researchers developing drugs against tuberculosis and malaria, and it could do the same for other infectious diseases, according to a paper in this week’s Nature.
The technique, reported in the April 29 issue of the journal, was developed by researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, Harvard and Princeton universities, and the Nationa
By watching mice “dance” and comparing the DNA of the dancers to their flat-footed siblings, scientists have discovered a genetic cause of cleft lip and palate in mice, a finding that is already being used to search for a similar genetic defect in humans.
A team led by Rulang Jiang of the Center for Oral Biology at the University of Rochester Medical Center found that a gene known as Tbx10 is responsible for causing cleft lip and palate in mice. The group, which reported its results April 2
In some hours, at midnight between Friday and Saturday, ten more countries will join the European Union. The EC-supported Venus Transit 2004 (VT-2004) programme is active in almost all of these, with VT-2004 National Nodes already established the Czech Republic, Hungary, Malta, Poland, Slovenia and Slovakia; more are likely to follow soon. The organisers include the Astronomical Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic and the next VT-2004 meeting will be held near Prague on May 7-
The Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI) introduces a new driving simulator, Driving Simulator III, after several years of intensive development work.
We at The Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute are very proud to have introduced this driving simulator that is unique in many ways. The new driving simulator will play an important role in research about roads and transportation, comments Urban Karlström, Director General at The Swedish National Road
Findings of a preliminary study in this week’s issue of THE LANCET suggest that transplanted adult bone-marrow cells could regenerate nerve cells in the brains of human stem-cell recipients. These early findings, if confirmed in future research, have implications for the treatment of neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s disease.
Ethical concerns over the use of embryonic stem cells has focused attention on the potential of adult bone-marrow cells to stimulate new cell growth in t
South African research published in this week’s issue of THE LANCET highlights how women with physically violent and controlling male partners are at an increased risk of HIV-1 infection.
HIV/AIDS is more widespread among women in sub-Saharan Africa than any other population. Although violence from a male partner and relationship inequalities are thought to be associated with increased HIV risk among women, no study has yet assessed gender-based violence as a risk factor for HIV after adju
The first solid evidence of human use of fire in Eurasia as early as 790,000 years ago has been found in excavations in Israel conducted by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Institute of Archaeology.
The discovery was made in excavations, which have been conducted over seven seasons, at the Benot Ya’aqov bridge site along the Dead Sea rift in the Hula Valley of northern Israel. According to Prof. Naama Goren-Inbar, head of the Institute of Archaeology and director of the Benot Ya’aqov exc
The ornate map, seemingly crude by today’s standards, depicts sea monsters off the coast of Scotland, sinking galleons, sea snakes, and wolves urinating against trees.
When oceanographers from Plymouth Marine Laboratory and the University of Rhode Island compared a large group of swirls, shown on the chart off the east coast of Iceland, with thermal images from an Earth observation satellite they found the swirls corresponded almost perfectly with the Iceland-Faroes Front – where the Gulf
The Zoological Museum of the Universiteit van Amsterdam (ZMA), Netherlands, is now presenting 3D images of part of the bird collection on the internet. This is a completely new technology and never before a part of the collection has been presented in this way. The database contains 151 images of 50 species.
By using the mouse, the 3D images can be rotated on the computer screen and in this way the characteristic plumages of the various bird species can be studied from all angles and in dif
The Bug Nebula, NGC 6302, is one of the brightest and most extreme planetary nebulae known. At its centre lies a superhot dying star smothered in a blanket of ‘hailstones’. A new Hubble image reveals fresh detail in the wings of this ‘cosmic butterfly’.
This image of the Bug Nebula, taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope (HST), shows impressive walls of compressed gas. A torus (‘doughnut’) shaped mass of dust surrounds the inner nebula (seen at the upper right).
At the h
The population of the aged, globally, is growing inexorably and by 2020, the figure will have risen by 25%. In fact, the number of those in their 80s will have more than doubled. This means changes in family structures: there are more and more elderly persons living alone while the number of carers is falling.
Falls are one of the most common problems amongst the elderly, 30% of them having a fall at least once a year and representing 75% of the total number of victims of falls. 70% of accid
According to research work at the University Hospital, cell therapy could improve many of the motor deficits of patients with Parkinson’s Disease.
With Parkinson’s a degeneration of cell groups takes place and so, from a conceptual perspective, the perfect treatment would be to replace the cells lost. The big drawback in the search for a suitable cell is to find one that survives for a lengthy period within the brain, that integrates well into the brain structures in order to comply w
The largest single research project into solar power ever funded by the UK research councils was launched this month and could help make the energy source much more widely used in Britain.
The University of Bath is among six universities and seven companies in the UK that began the £4.5 million project this month (April) to halve the cost of converting the sun’s rays to electricity using solar cells.
The four-year research project could make solar power a viable alternative to
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