A new radiation protection technique can significantly reduce physician radiation exposure during coronary angiography, according to a researcher at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore, MD.

Using the new device, physicians monitor patients’ angiograms and control exam table movement from behind a lead plastic shield. A newly developed extension bar allows the physician to remain safely behind the shield and still retain table control for panning, acco

Humans are more susceptible to developing the eye cancer retinoblastoma than mice because, unlike humans, mice can compensate for the loss of activity of a gene critical to normal retinal development , according to results of a study by investigators at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. The study, published today in the open access journal BMC Biology, explains why humans with a defective copy of the Retinoblastoma gene RB1 are at high risk of developing cancer of the retina, or retinoblast

What do pizzas, spaghetti Bolognese and chilli con carne have in common? They all contain a vital ingredient that could help in the fight against cardiovascular disease – cooked tomatoes.

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is one the UK’s biggest killers, accounting for one in three deaths in the country every year. Now scientists from Liverpool John Moores University’s Nutraceutical Research Group (NRG) have been awarded over €420,000 by the European Union to investigate the health gi

This technology should help solve the puzzles of cancer, Alzheimer’s, atherosclerosis and infectious diseases.

Researchers at UC Santa Barbara have developed a new biotechnology that enables scientists to identify and engineer protease substrates, giving them the means of crafting pharmaceuticals to outsmart disease. Their work, authored by Patrick Daugherty, an assistant professor of Chemical Engineering, and Kevin Boulware, a PhD candidate, are published online today in the Pro

Anthrax vaccine administered in combination with a short course of antibiotics completely protected nonhuman primates from inhalational anthrax, the most lethal form of the disease, according to scientists at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID).

In a collaborative study involving USAMRIID and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), investigators demonstrated that postexposure vaccination can shorten the durati

Middle-aged English people are healthier than their American counterparts, according to a collaborative study issued today by English and US researchers.

Americans aged between 55 and 64 suffer from diseases such as diabetes, high-blood pressure and lung cancer at rates up to twice those seen among similar aged people in England, reports the study, published on 3 May in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

By analysing a large representative sample of peopl

The Asia-Pacific region faces a number of challenges in preparing for an influenza pandemic, yet gaps and inconsistencies in plans across the continent could hinder an effective response to a pandemic, according to a new report presented today at the Lancet Asia Medical Forum 2006, Singapore.

Over 80% of human deaths from avian influenza (H5N1) recorded to date have occurred in South East Asia, which suggests that countries in the region could be the epicentre of the next human influenza

Young children who live near a major road are significantly more likely to have asthma than children who live only blocks away, according to a study that appears in the May 1 issue of Environmental Health Perspectives.

The study found that children living within 75 meters (about 82 yards) of a major road had a 50 percent greater risk of having had asthma symptoms in the past year than were children who lived more than 300 meters (about 328 yards) away. Higher traffic volumes o

Walking fitness makes a significant difference in predicting the likelihood of future disability in the elderly, according to a study published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health (GSPH) and their collaborators found that the ability to walk 400-meters, or about a quarter mile, was an important determinant not only of whether elderly participants would be alive six years later but also how much il

More stem cells are better – expanding hematopoietic stem cells with HOXB4

Transplantation of hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs, the cells that can give rise to all blood and most immune cell types) can save patients whose own hematopoietic system is defective or has been destroyed (often through radiation or chemotherapy of cancer). HSCs are very rare, and it is often hard to obtain enough of them for a successful transplant.

To overcome this limitation, Hans-Peter Kiem and

Heart rhythm disturbances are target for preventive treatment.

Using a new genomic strategy that has the power to survey the entire human genome and identify genes with common variants that contribute to complex diseases, researchers at Johns Hopkins, together with scientists from Munich, Germany, and the Framingham Heart Study, U.S.A., have identified a gene that may predispose some people to abnormal heart rhythms that lead to sudden cardiac death, a condition affecting more than

Even wings that are still in development help living birds gain traction on slopes and scale obstacles

Biologists have long argued about how birds evolved the ability to fly, because it is not immediately evident what improvement in fitness would result from ancestral, partly evolved wings. Two theories have recently dominated the debate: one postulates that flight evolved in tree-dwelling ancestors that used their forelimbs to help them glide, while the other considers ancestral

A significant difference between human and chimpanzee immune cells may provide clues in the search to understand the diverse array of human immune-related diseases. Researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine have uncovered a a specific type of molecule expressed on non-human primate T cells, but not human T cells. T cells are important orchestrators of the immune system.

In a study to be published on-line in advance of publication in Proceedings of

An important source of uncertainty in predictions about global warming is how plants will respond to increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide. Now biologists at the University of California, San Diego have made significant advances toward understanding the mechanism plants use to regulate their carbon dioxide intake.

The study, published in the May 1 early on-line edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows how the level of carbon dioxide in the atm

A new technique devised by MIT engineers may one day help physicians detect cancerous tumors during early stages of growth.

The technique allows nanoparticles to group together inside cancerous tumors, creating masses with enough of a magnetic signal to be detectable by a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine.

The work appears as the cover feature in the May issue of Angewandte Chemie International Edition, one of the world’s leading chemistry journals.

Screening for prostate cancer in older men has been problematic. While this form of cancer can be fatal, it often progresses so slowly that men are more likely to die from some other disease. Aggressive treatments such as radical prostatectomy or radiation therapy may eradicate the cancer but have negative effects on quality of life. More conservative treatments may preserve quality of life, but may not be appropriate for those cases where the disease is progressing more quickly. In the face o