In response to concerns from hospitals to prepare for eventual pandemic flu outbreaks, the French company AirInSpace, with support from ESA’s Technology Transfer Programme, has successfully adapted technology developed to protect astronauts for use in critical care centres to protect immune-deficient patients against airborne pathogens such as the avian flu virus.

Independent tests conducted at the Laboratory of Virology and Viral Pathogenesis in Lyon, France, by Professor Bruno Li

Orthopedic Surgeons at Rush Are Co-Developers of Implant That Focuses on Shape, Not Size

The first knee replacement shaped to fit a woman’s anatomy has received clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and will be distributed to orthopedic surgeons to use next week. Dr. Aaron G. Rosenberg and Dr. Richard A. Berger, orthopedic surgeons at Rush University Medical Center, were two of the 10 developer surgeons who sought to address shape-related differences of a wo

Cold, wet conditions early in the year mean that 2006 is shaping up as the worst year for California’s butterflies in almost four decades, according to Art Shapiro, professor of evolution and ecology at UC Davis.

That’s a turnaround from last spring, when millions of painted lady butterflies migrated through the Central Valley. But other species have seen steep declines in recent years and could disappear from the region altogether.

“It has been the worst

St. Jude investigators discover role of several key genes in retina development

Investigators at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital have discovered the role of several key genes in the development of the retina, and in the process have taken a significant step toward understanding how to prevent or cure the potentially deadly eye cancer retinoblastoma. Retinoblastoma is the third most common cancer in infants after leukemia and neuroblastoma (nerve cancer). Retinoblastoma tha

A new way to preserve the cells that surround and protect nerves could lead to new treatments for demyelinating diseases such a multiple sclerosis, a research team reports in the May 10, 2006, issue of the Journal of Neuroscience.

The approach grew out of a novel explanation, quickly gaining followers, for the mechanism of nerve damage caused by multiple sclerosis. Instead of concentrating on the alterations that result in autoimmune assaults on the nervous system, researchers l

Researchers at New York University’s Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences have developed a new algorithm that enhances the ability to detect a cancer gene, and have applied their algorithm to map the set of tumor-suppressor genes involved in lung cancer. The algorithm uses data from Affymetrix’s gene-chips that can scan hundreds of patients’ genomes to find gains and losses in gene-copies. The findings will appear in the July issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics.

The

In isolated environments, astronauts, flight crews, offshore workers and military forces must maintain vigilance and work together to ensure a safe and successful mission.

Between daily living, telemedicine activities and moon-walking simulations, participants in the NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) 9 project helped National Space Biomedical Research Institute (NSBRI) researchers study performance ability, problem-solving and team cohesion issues that could aff

Texas scientists have added one more trick to the amazing repertoire of carbon nanotubes — the ability to carry electrical signals to nerve cells.

Nanotubes, tiny hollow carbon filaments about one ten-thousandth the diameter of a human hair, are already famed as one of the most versatile materials ever discovered. A hundred times as strong as steel and one-sixth as dense, able to conduct electricity better than copper or to substitute for silicon in semiconductor chips, carbon

A lifelong habit of trimming just a few calories from the daily diet can do more than slim the waistline – a new study shows it may help lessen the effects of aging.
Scientists from the University of Florida’s Institute on Aging have found that eating a little less food and exercising a little more over a lifespan can reduce or even reverse aging-related cell and organ damage in rats.

The discovery, described this month in the journal Antioxidants and Redox Signaling, builds o

Ghrelin, a hormone long considered a key player in obesity, may instead take a major role in maintaining the balance between insulin and glucose and the development of diabetes, said Baylor College of Medicine researchers in a report in the current issue of the journal Cell Metabolism.

“Everybody has been pushing the connection between obesity and ghrelin,” said Dr. Roy G. Smith, director of the BCM Huffington Center on Aging, “Companies have been developing ghrelin antagonists

Scientists verify that ionic and other air purifiers add to pollutants already in a room in levels that can exceed health standards

In a small, poorly ventilated room, an indoor air purifier that produces even a few milligrams of ozone per hour can create an ozone level that exceeds public health standards, researchers at UC Irvine have found.

Scientists also discovered that ozone produced by air purifiers adds to ozone already present in any room – a prediction that had

Florida State University sociologists in Tallahassee, Fla. have found that some South Floridians who survived 1992’s Hurricane Andrew suffered mental health problems many years later, a finding that has led the researchers to predict even more dire consequences for those who lived through last year’s devastating Hurricane Katrina.

The researchers, sociology doctoral student and lead author David Russell and professors John Taylor and Donald Lloyd, presented their findin

Innovations for society

Imaging techniques are increasingly at the forefront of progress in science and technology. The Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) is among the leaders in this development. Imaging techniques turn objects visually inside out, allowing ever greater precision– for instance in medical diagnosis. They also contribute to a better understanding of the mechanisms of certain diseases, like Alzheimer’s or osteoporosis. Further applications occur in materials resea

2nd IFOM-IEO Campus Meeting on Cancer

What is the best strategy to determine the specific function of a gene? Certainly a good idea is to eliminate the gene and see what kind of effects this move has on the whole organism. With this goal in mind, the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, the Whitehead Institute and the Broad Institute at MIT and Harvard – together with a consortium of five bioinformatics companies (Bristol-Myers, Novartis Pharma, Eli Lilly, Sigma, Astra Zeneca

A research team from Uppsala University has uncovered an entirely new mechanism for how communication between cells is regulated. By functioning like glue, a certain type of sugar in the body can make cell communication more effective and stimulate the generation of new blood vessels. The discovery paves the way for the development of drugs for cancer and rheumatism, for example. The study is being published on May 9 in the prominent journal Developmental Cell.

Blood vessels are made up o

… about the nature of reactions in living beings and to be able to inhibit or accelerate them

Experimental methods have certain limits and there are times when nature briefly switches off the lights on scene to hide its tricks. One of these moments takes place during chemical reactions. All chemical reactions go through a sort of Limbo, a ghost-like stage between the initial reagents and the final product in which it is almost impossible to know experimentally what has occurred