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Health & Medicine

Mothers who drink during pregnancy may increase children’s cancer risk, study shows

Women who drink alcohol during pregnancy may put their daughters at a higher risk of breast cancer, according to researchers at Lombardi Cancer Center at Georgetown University Medical Center. Their findings were reported at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Cancer Prevention meeting in Boston.

“Previous studies have shown a strong link between alcohol consumption and increased breast cancer risk, and this may be caused by alcohol increasing levels of circulating estrogen,”

Agricultural & Forestry Science

New Challenges in Food and Agriculture Research Unveiled

The changing attitude of European society to research in food and agriculture demands that researchers pay more attention to the concerns of the public and other stakeholders

Today in Brussels, the annual Euragri conference, entitled “Science for Society – Science with Society” and sponsored by the European Commission, addressed European consumers’ concerns and proposed new goals, roles and rules to respond better and quicker to the needs of society. Research Commissioner Philippe Bu

Health & Medicine

Lund Researchers Lead EU Project on Killer Bacteria Infections

Serious streptococcus infections is the theme of a major EU project to be coordinated and led by researchers from Lund University. Associate Professor Claes Schalen and researcher Aftab Jasir, both at the Department of Medical Microbiology, Dermatology, and Infections, Section for Bacteriology, are the coordinator and project leader, respectively. Group A streptococci (GAS) are also called killer bacteria since serious GAS infections can develop with dramatic rapidity.

“Since the late 1980s

Health & Medicine

MRI Predicts Heart Attack Risk in Coronary Patients

For the first time, researchers have shown that magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can predict the risk of heart attacks or cardiac deaths in coronary heart disease patients, according to a report in today’s rapid access issue of Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association.

MRI can be used to locate tissue damage in a heart attack or pinpoint blockages, but it has not been used to predict heart attacks.

“This study is the first to determine that MRI is a strong prognos

Life & Chemistry

Foxd3 Gene: Key to Maintaining Stem Cell Pluripotency

Foxd3 joins the small, but growing list of stem cell regulating genes

In the search to understand the nature of stem cells, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have identified a regulatory gene that is crucial in maintaining a stem cell’s ability to self-renew. According to their findings, the Foxd3 gene is a required factor for pluripotency – the ability of stem cells to turn into different types of tissue – in the mammalian embryo. Their research is

Earth Sciences

Hawaii’s Mauna Loa volcano is beginning to stir, new data reveal

Mauna Loa – Hawaii’s biggest and potentially most destructive volcano – is showing signs of life again nearly two decades after its last eruption.

Recent geophysical data collected on the surface of the 13,500-foot volcano revealed that Mauna Loa’s summit caldera has begun to swell and stretch at a rate of 2 to 2.5 inches a year, according to scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and Stanford University. Surface inflation can be a precursor of a volcanic eruption

Health & Medicine

Increased Liver Injury Risk Linked to TB Medications

A newly recommended treatment for latent tuberculosis (TB) infection can cause liver injury, and therefore needs to be used with great caution and frequent monitoring, according to a UCSF-led, multi-center study.

The research reporting the increased liver injury from the drugs, rifampin and pyrazinamide, was conducted by investigators at UCSF, Boston University, and Emory University and appears in the October 15 issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine.

The study is the first large

Earth Sciences

Purdue Scientist Reveals 3D Insights Into Earth’s Mantle Dynamics

The swirl of malleable rock in the earth’s mantle – located between the earth’s crust and core – may have greater effect on the earth’s surface than was once believed, a Purdue research team reports.

Using computer technology to create three-dimensional models of the earth’s mantle, Purdue’s Scott King has found evidence that some dramatic features of the earth’s surface could be the result of relatively rapid shifts in the direction in which crustal plat

Life & Chemistry

Study backs theory that accumulating mutations of ’quiet’ genes foster aging

A theory that suggests the aging process might be safely slowed by targeting genes that are quiet early but threaten damage later in life has gotten a boost from new findings from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

The researchers don’t promote such tinkering in their paper, which appears online this week in advance of publication by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Rather they detail their tests, based on models of mathematical prediction, of the two l

Health & Medicine

Neural Stem Cells Track Brain Tumor Cells in Mice Study

Findings are cover story of Oct. 15 issue of Cancer Research

Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center’s Maxine Dunitz Neurosurgical Institute have successfully tested a new treatment for brain cancer by utilizing neural stem cells to track and destroy cancer cells within the brain. Scientists hope the encouraging results may eventually lead to an effective treatment for glioma, the most aggressive form of primary brain tumor in humans. The study, conducted in mice with experime

Life & Chemistry

UCLA Study Identifies Key Molecular Process to Overcome Fear

In a discovery with implications for treatment of anxiety disorders, UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute investigators have identified a distinct molecular process in the brain involved in overcoming fear. The findings will be published in the Oct. 15 edition of the Journal of Neuroscience .

The study of how mice acquire, express and extinguish conditional fear shows for the first time that L-type voltage-gated calcium channels (LVGCCs) — one of hundreds of

Health & Medicine

Immediate Treatment Delays Glaucoma Progression: Study Insights

Researchers have found that immediately treating people who have early stage glaucoma can delay progression of the disease. This finding supports the medical community’s emerging consensus that treatment to lower pressure inside the eye can slow glaucoma damage and subsequent vision loss. These results are reported in the October 2002 issue of Archives of Ophthalmology.

Scientists found that immediate treatment of newly-discovered primary open-angle glaucoma, the most common form of glaucoma

Earth Sciences

New Insights on Sprites: Energy Boost in Earth’s Atmosphere

Balloon Experiments Reveal New Information About Sprites

An atmospheric phenomenon called “sprites” could be pumping 50 times more energy into the upper atmosphere than was previously thought, suggesting our understanding of the global atmosphere is incomplete, according to University of Houston space physicists.

Sprites are large, brief flashes of light that occur very high in the atmosphere above large thunderstorms. Instead of discharging toward the earth like lightning,

Health & Medicine

Fish Oil Fatty Acids Show Promise Against Cancer Cells

Fatty acids from fish oils and fatty fish can destroy the power station – the mitochondria- in certain types of cancer cells, making the cells commit suicide.These are the conclusions in a new thesis that Hilde Heimli at the Institute for Nutrition Research at the University of Oslo, in Norway, presented in October 2002. The study was supported by the Norwegian Cancer Society.

Kreft.no: In her thesis, Hilde Heimli has examined how polyunsaturated omega-3 fatty acid is ingested by diff

Agricultural & Forestry Science

Citrus-Based Solutions for Eco-Friendly Wood Protection

One of the most widespread ways to protect wood from organisms’ attacks is to use chemicals. However, due to the risks its usage involves (toxic for the user, pollution of the environment…), the interest to obtain a more effective but non-polluting protector has increased.

Nowadays, the research of active matter with biocide effects has become one of the most interesting research lines to find new pesticides.

Objectives

The aim of the project the Basque Research Ce

Information Technology

Software Tool Boosts Jet Engine Design Efficiency by 100x

Purdue University researchers have created a software tool that is more than 100 times faster than other programs used by engineers to improve jet engine designs

The software analyzes engine models and quickly extracts information that indicates whether the design is mechanically sound, said Mario Rotea, a professor in Purdue’s School of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

Considering the complex inner workings of a jet engine, software aimed at predicting how well a new desig

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