A research team at Cornell University has succeeded in converting nitrogen into ammonia using a long-predicted process that has challenged scientists for decades.

The achievement involves using a zirconium metal complex to add hydrogen atoms to the nitrogen molecule and convert it to ammonia, without the need for high temperatures or high pressure.

“The value of our work is that we have answered the very basic chemical question of how to take this very inert and unreactive [nitrog

It used to be considered dogma that a nerve, once injured, could never be repaired. Now, researchers have learned that some nerves, even nerves in parts of the brain, can regenerate or be replaced. By studying the chemical signals that encourage or impede the repair of nerves, researchers at the University of Washington, the Salk Institute, and other institutions may contribute to eventual treatments for injured spines and diseased retinas, according to a presentation at the annual meeting of the Ame

For the first time, scientists have identified fresh produce as the source of an outbreak of human Yersinia pseudotuberculosis infections, according to an article published in the March 1 issue of The Journal of Infectious Diseases, now available online. The outbreak was identified in Finland and traced epidemiologically to farms producing lettuce.

Y. pseudotuberculosis, first identified in 1883, causes infections characterized by fever and abdominal pain that are often confused with acute

A genetic factor that protects you against heart disease during middle age could reduce the odds that you’ll celebrate your hundredth birthday. Research published in BMC Medical Genetics shows that a genetic trait, which is rarely found in centenarians, is associated with lower cholesterol levels. The risk of suffering from heart disease is increased by a number of factors, including having high levels of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol in your blood. The main component of low-densi

A rapid blood test to help distinguish between bacterial and other (predominantly viral) infections could substantially reduce the inappropriate use of antibiotics for common infections, conclude authors of a study in this week’s issue of THE LANCET.

Lower respiratory tract infections are often treated with antibiotics-even though there is often no evidence of bacterial infection. Such inappropriate use of antibiotics is contributing to the increase of antibiotic-resistant bacteria with seri

The work offers potential insights into disease processes, including cancer

Researchers at Jefferson Medical College and Jefferson’s Kimmel Cancer Center are gaining a better understanding of the cues that help guide cells to the right places in developing embryos. Steven Farber, Ph.D., assistant professor of microbiology and immunology at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, and his co-workers have found that statins, the group of anti-cholestero

Scientists at the Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center have scientifically validated for the first time that stem cells in umbilical cord blood can infiltrate damaged heart tissue and transform themselves into the kind of heart cells needed to halt further damage.

Clinical proof of this principle has existed for a decade, as Duke physicians have used cord blood to correct heart, brain and liver defects in children with rare metabolic diseases. But until now they lacked the molecular evidence t

A fruit fly gene called radish, and the newly identified protein it encodes, have opened doors to understanding the genes and neuronal networks that govern a special type of memory, termed anesthesia-resistant memory. Researchers had previously known that for most animals — not just humans — loss of consciousness from anesthesia causes amnesia for recently experienced events. In contrast, for reasons that are not well understood, older memories are resistant to the effects of anesthesia. With the h

The recent marriage of evolutionary biology with developmental biology has resulted in the birth of a new field, evolutionary developmental biology, or “evo-devo.” Evo-devo scientists study the mechanisms that produce evolutionary changes in body plans over time. As one of the field’s creators, Indiana University Bloomington biologist Rudolf Raff brings new understanding to the evolution of humans and other organisms by uniting fossil data and information about the genes that control development

In this month’s essay, Tim Hubbard and Jamie Love argue that we need a better way to research and develop new drugs. They contend that the existing system for drug development–rooted within the pharmaceutical industry–is inefficient and unsustainable. Drugs are too expensive and are beyond the reach of many people in the developed as well as the developing world.

The inadequacies in the current system, suggest Hubbard and Love, are a consequence of a business model that uses a single

Cancer often begins with mutations in tumor suppressor pathways. Tumor suppressor genes–such as p53–arrest cell growth and induce apoptosis (programmed cell death) in response to cellular stress, such as chromosomal damage. Cells with p53 mutations can escape these constraints, leading to the uncontrolled growth characteristic of “immortal” cancer cells. Nearly all types of tumors have mutations in the p53 pathway, many of them in the p53 gene itself. Treatments focused on restoring p53 function–w

Like most persistent viruses, HIV uses a variety of strategies to counteract its host’s response to infection. HIV infects the very cells that coordinate the immune response, which compromises the immune system and leaves the body susceptible to normally harmless microorganisms. It is these opportunistic infections, rather than the virus itself, that make HIV so deadly. Victor Appay and colleagues now show that an important effect of persistent HIV infection is generally elevated immune activati

MADISON-Mutations that allow AIDS viruses to escape detection by the immune system may also hinder the viruses’ ability to grow after transmission to new hosts, scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison announced this week in the journal Nature Medicine.

The discovery may help researchers design vaccines that exploit the notorious mutability of HIV by training the immune system to attack the virus where it’s most vulnerable. The work appears alongside a study of HIV-infected people

Molecular Probes technology powers breakthrough in drug discovery

Panama’s International Cooperative Biodiversity Group (ICBG) announces the development of a new test for identification of antimalarial compounds with wide applicability in the developing world. The assay for plant-derived compounds also can be used to detect anti-plasmodial compounds from synthetic or natural sources. Initial results of the research are published in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hy

For some time, researchers have known that people with diabetes have a greater risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia than those without diabetes, but the exact cause of this link has not been known. Now, a new study by researchers in Cologne, Germany, and at Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston, to be published this week online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, suggests that insulin resistance in brain cells can affect how they function, causing som

Ninety percent cut in death risk from aspirin, beta blocker, ACE inhibitor and statin

An inexpensive cocktail of four tiny pills can make a big difference in heart patients’ death risk, a new University of Michigan study finds. And the life-saving effect of the four-drug regimen is bigger than the sum of its parts.

In the new paper, U-M Cardiovascular Center researchers report that heart attack and unstable angina patients who were prescribed all four types of proven medica