In a series of studies in breast cancer patients, researchers at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center have confirmed the presence of “chemobrain” after chemotherapy treatment – but they also discovered that a significant portion of patients have cognitive declines even before chemotherapy. The studies, the latest of which is reported June 21 in the online edition of the journal Cancer, are the first to document such pretreatment losses in patients with non-metastatic breast c
Scientists have induced a movement disorder in rats that closely resembles Parkinson’s disease in humans. The study, published June 21, 2004, in the online edition of the Annals of Neurology, suggests that natural toxins found in the environment could contribute to the development of this debilitating movement disorder. The full study will be available via Wiley InterScience.
The compounds, called proteasome inhibitors, can be produced by bacteria and fungi. Man-made proteasome inhibitors
“AIDS is now the leading cause of death in military and police forces in some African countries, accounting for more than half of in-service mortality,” write Ugboga Nwokoji and Ademola Ajuwon in the Open Access journal BMC Public Health today. They believe that secrecy about AIDS-related deaths, and multiple sex partnering in the Nigerian navy could be helping to fuel the HIV epidemic in Nigeria, Africa’s most populated country.
Their survey of 480 Nigerian naval personnel revealed that
Early and accurate detection of oncological disease is critical to the treatment and, ultimately, survival of patients suffering from cancer. In an effort to determine the accuracy of an integrated PET/CT scanner with more traditional diagnostic imaging methods for whole-body, malignant tumors, researchers in Essen, Germany, compared the imaging results of the integrated FDG-PET/CT with CT images alone, PET images alone, and CT and PET images viewed side-by-side.
The scientists theorized
Advances in the study of the salmonella bacteria, being undertaken at the Pamplona Institute of Agrobiotechnology and Natural Resources and led by professor Iñigo Lasa Uzcudun of the Public University of Navarre, have been recognised in the principal international magazine in the field of Microbiology, Molecular Microbiology, at a congress held recently in the German city of Heidelberg.
The Navarre researchers are analysing the role that a new family of Salmonella typhimurium proteins pl
Long before a Hollywood blockbuster about catastrophic climate change packed cinema multiplexes this spring, researchers at the top of the world, supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), were using an array of scientific tools to build a comprehensive scientific picture of environmental change in the Arctic and what it may mean for the rest of the globe. Led by oceanographer James Morison, of the University of Washington, NSF-supported scientists from Oregon State University, as we
Whenever a hurricane races across the Atlantic Ocean, chances are phytoplankton will bloom behind it. According to a new study using NASA satellite data, these phytoplankton blooms may also affect the Earth’s climate and carbon cycle.
Dr. Steven Babin, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md., studied 13 North Atlantic hurricanes between 1998 and 2001. Ocean color data from the SeaWiFS instrument on the SeaStar satellite were used to analyze l
Acrylamide (AA)is a substance that has found widespread application in industry, e.g. for the purification of drinking water and in food packaging. Due to its toxicological properties, legal limits have been set both for drinking water and for migration into food.
Following a request of the participants of the European Workshop on “Analytical methods for the acrylamide determination in food”, the Institute for Reference Materials and Measurements (IRMM) of the European Commission’s Directo
Iowa City Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center and University of Iowa (UI) researchers have unlocked part of the mystery of how a harmless virus known as GBV-C slows the progression of HIV and prolongs survival for many patients. The report appears in the June 19 issue of The Lancet, the leading British medical journal.
The findings provide the clearest insight yet into the biological mechanisms of GBV-C, a benign cousin of the hepatitis C virus. The virus infects almost all HIV patients
Sometimes it takes time to uncover nature’s secrets. Take the case of callimicos, also called Goeldi’s monkeys, a reclusive and diminutive South American primate. Discovered a century ago by Swiss naturalist Emil August Goeldi, the animals were once considered to be a possible “missing link” between small and large New World monkeys.
But new findings from the first long-term studies of the monkeys in the wild seem to indicate that this is not the case, although the animals have a uniqu
New research at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill provides insights into the fundamental mechanisms controlling blood vessel formation and may have implications for therapies such as non-surgical restoration of circulation.
The study findings appear in the June 15 issue of the journal Blood.
Blood vessel formation, or angiogenesis, is an integral part of normal organ development and function. It also contributes to abnormal conditions, particularly tumor formation an
According to a new report, Asian/Pacific Islanders living in the United States earn more science or engineering (S&E) bachelor’s degrees than whites earn, relative to their college-age (20-24 year old) peers. Meanwhile, data on blacks, Hispanics, and American Indian/Alaska Natives show steady, although small, increases in the number of S&E bachelor’s degrees earned during the same period. The new, online report, Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities in Science and Engine
Study of major significance unlocks the door to the complex role of how hormones work in women and demonstrates steep decline of hormones in early reproductive years.
Findings from the Australian based Jean Hailes Foundation will be presented this week at the Endocrine Society’s 86th Annual Meeting that establish normal hormone levels in women across the life span.
This definitive study is part of the Sue Ismiel International Study into Women’s Health and Hormones, involving 1
Latest Eurostat data show that although women are still significantly under-represented in scientific and engineering disciplines, the numbers of female graduates in these fields have increased over the last few years. The new figures on “Women, science and technology: Measuring recent progress towards gender equality” provide continuing evidence of a narrowing of the gender gap for graduates in “hard sciences”, especially in engineering. From 1998-2001, the numbers of graduates in engineering and re
The findings of a new study published in the Journal of Cardiovascular Electrophysiology demonstrate that the use of high resolution imaging can greatly aid physicians who are treating patients suffering from a particular type of irregular heart beat.
The study, conducted at the Taipei Veterans General Hospital in Taipei, Taiwan, provides insight into the mechanism of atrial flutter, a common heart rhythm disturbance that circulates around the atria, or top chambers of the human heart. Three
US research published on Thursday 10 June in Europe’s leading reproductive medicine journal Human Reproduction[1] suggests that a single act of unprotected intercourse is more likely to lead to an unwanted pregnancy than was previously believed.
In a study on women who had either been sterilised or were using an intrauterine device (IUD) the frequency of intercourse increased during the six most fertile days of the menstrual cycle and peaked at ovulation ¨C despite the fact that these
Feedback
