While promising the possibility of hardier crops and a larger, more robust food supply for the world, worries continue over the effect genetically engineered plants might have on the environment. One fear is over the movement of altered genes from domesticated populations to the wild and the effect of these “escaped” genes on ecosystems. In a study published in the December issue of Ecological Applications, Charity Cummings (University of Kansas), Helen Alexander (University of Kansas), Allison Snow

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine have determined the molecular machinery that triggers normal cardiac muscle growth and survival, and have linked defects in this complex to an inherited form of human cardiomyopathy, a type of heart failure where an enlarged heart loses its ability to pump blood.

Published in the December 27, 2002 issue of the journal Cell, the study also identifies a subset of German cardiomyopathy patients with a specific gene

Unexplained and severe tinnitus–a ringing or buzzing in the ears–can be temporarily reduced in some patients by “jamming” the brain’s electrical activity with focused magnetic stimulation, according to a preliminary study to be published December 23, 2002 in the online edition of the Annals of Neurology. The results confirm that some phantom sounds are generated by abnormal activity in the brain itself.

“Controlled clinical trials are now necessary to evaluate whether this method can

Don’t worry – you are not the only one who thought this was a nice amateur photo of planet Saturn, Lord of the Rings in our Solar System!

But then the relative brightness and positions of the moons may appear somewhat unfamiliar… and the ring system does look unusually bright when compared to the planetary disk…??

Well, it is not Saturn, but Uranus, the next giant planet further out, located at a distance of about 3,000 million km, or 20 times the distance between the Sun and t

Life expectancy and prosperity will continue to rise and food production should keep up with population growth, but the Kyoto agreement will have little effect on global warming according to this week’s Christmas issue of the BMJ.

Using official statistics and global trends, Bjørn Lomborg, Director of the Danish Environmental Assessment Institute and author of The Skeptical Environmentalist attempts to draw a reasonably good picture of the true state of the world.

Life expectancy fo

Research continues in an effort to determine if these neural cells can be transplanted to treat stroke, brain tumors and neurodegenerative disorders

Researchers at Cedars-Sinai’s Maxine Dunitz Neurosurgical Institute have for the first time demonstrated that stem cells from whole adult bone marrow can be differentiated into several types of cells of the central nervous system.

A long-term objective of this research is to determine if these neural stem cells can be trans