A student has invented a revolutionary evacuation wheelchair that could save lives in emergencies because it has the capability to go down stairs without someone else pushing it.

Health and safety legislation and the Fire Brigade recommend that people do not use lifts to exit buildings during emergencies. However, for people with mobility problems this raises a serious issue as they become dependent on their friends and colleagues to assist their safe escape.

Simon Kingston

The difference in size between males and females of the same species is all down to the battle for a mate, according to a study of shorebirds published by British scientists today (August 9 2004).

The findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, are the first explanation for a rule identified over forty years ago by German scientist Bernhard Rensch.

Rensch’s rule, as it has become known, says that the ratio between the sizes of the sexes is

A “stink fight” between ring-tailed lemurs might be dead serious to them. But to observers, the scented struggle ranks among the more odd, even comical sights at the Duke University Primate Center — already renowned for the biological eccentricities of its exotic denizens.

Preparations for battle begin when male combatants load their “weapons” — vigorously rubbing their tails against their shoulders and between their wrists, infusing the fur with scent from glands there.

Science can put a dent in the sex life of a scarab beetle by blocking its ability to pick up female scent, according to Walter Leal, professor of entomology at UC Davis. The research could eventually lead to methods to control insect pests without affecting harmless or beneficial insects.

“Chemical communication is the prime means of communication in insects,” Leal said. If those communications can be controlled in the environment, insect pests could be prevented from breeding, he

Advances in biomedical imaging are allowing UC Davis researchers to use mice more effectively to study cancers comparable to human disease. The system can distinguish different stages of cancer and could lead to more sensitive screening tests for cancer-fighting drugs.

Positron emission tomography (PET) is widely used for detecting and following cancer in human patients. It works by following short-lived radioactive tracers that are taken up by fast-growing cancer cells.

Day-active bees, such as the honeybee, are well known for using visual landmarks to locate a favoured patch of flowers, and to find their way home again to their hive. Researchers have now found that nocturnal bees can do the same thing, despite experiencing light intensities that are more than 100 million times dimmer than daylight. The new findings, reported in the latest issue of Current Biology by a team led by Eric Warrant at Lund University, Sweden, advance our understanding of the visual

A retrospective study and two case studies provide new information regarding the safety of a popular dental product.

Only one in ten diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity (oral cancer) is younger than 45 years. Many young adults lack the traditional risk factors for oral cancer, namely, long term tobacco and/or alcohol use. As a result, investigation of other factors which may contribute to the development of cancer in these patients is difficult because of the re

Lack of access to care and socioeconomic factors are linked to advanced head and neck cancer in Alabama’s Black Belt, so labeled because of its rich black soil and once thriving agricultural trade. The region is now a target of efforts to enhance early identification and treatment for head and neck cancer.

Now known for its massive poverty (nearly one in three residents live below the poverty level), lack of education (more than 40 percent of adults have not completed high school), a

Researchers find that laryngeal cancer patients treated with chemo-radiation have a similar survival rate and better speech after treatment than those who had their voice box removed.

This finding could be important for the 10,000 patients who will be diagnosed with laryngeal cancer in 2004. Many treatment options exist: surgery, radiation, chemotherapy, chemo-radiotherapy (chemo-radiation), or a combination thereof. Depending on the extent of disease, surgery may involve removal o

Researchers have investigated the associations between ammonia, air pollution, socioeconomic status, and access to medical care with incidence and mortality rates of salivary cancer in the South Carolina population. The findings from this study revealed that an association was found between emissions of ammonia and mortality rates of salivary gland cancer in Caucasian men.

Nearly 2,900 new cases of salivary gland cancer will be diagnosed in the United States in 2004, an increasing

A surgical incision between the trachea and esophagus (tracheo-esophageal puncture) following removal of the tongue and voice box provides effective speech communication for select head and neck cancer patients who otherwise would not be able to speak.

Most treatments for tongue and voice box cancer allow patients to retain those organs and maintain speech communication. For those few patients whose cancers do not respond to organ-sparing techniques, surgical removal of the tong

People who live with HIV in rural areas are less likely to keep up with their treatment schedules if they are problem drinkers, say Tulane University researchers. Overall, about one in three HIV positive people surveyed by the researchers reported skipping at least one dose of their medications in the past week.

Tulane epidemiologists analyzed data from 273 patient interviews at eight rural clinics across Louisiana.

“Cities are generally thought to be the areas hit the ha

Not only has life evolved, but life has evolved to evolve.

That’s the conclusion drawn by two Rice University scientists who have designed a computer simulation to test the idea that evolvability — the likelihood of genetic mutation — is a trait that can itself be favored or disfavored through the process of natural selection.

The results of the study appear in the Aug. 10 issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Researchers Michael Deem,

Chicken liver may seem like an odd component of a medical procedure, but for thousands of patients over the past generation, the cuisine has been doctor’s orders to help diagnose gastrointestinal disorders.

Perhaps not for much longer, though, based on the results of a recent Medical College of Georgia School of Allied Health Sciences student project.

Micah Grant, Woldeab Medhin and Aaron Scott, juniors in the School of Allied Health Sciences’ nuclear medicine

The Australian dingo descends from domesticated dogs that people from Southeast Asia brought with them to Australia some 5,000 years ago. Genetic studies indicate that it is probably a matter of a single occasion and a very small number of dogs.

The story begins when a few domestic dogs originally originating from East Asia, jump ashore from a boat. “No matter how you get to Australia, you have to travel across open seas for at least 50 km-a journey no large land-based animal has eve

Malaria drug blocks brain conduits, a boon for neuroscience research

Brown University researchers have discovered that mefloquine, an anti-malarial drug, blocks two gap junction proteins, or connexins, in low doses and with very few side effects in the brains of laboratory mice. The work opens an important door: Connexins found in high concentrations in the brain are believed to play a critical role in movement, vision and memory.

To understand how these communication “tun