Scientists at the University of Southampton have found that the precise shape of an antibody makes a big difference to how it can stimulate the body's immune system to fight cancer, paving the way for much more effective treatments. The latest types of treatment for cancer are designed to switch on the immune system, allowing the patient's own immune cells to attack and kill cancerous cells, when normally the immune cells would lie dormant. In a study, funded by Cancer Research UK and published in the journal Cancer Cell, the Southampton team have found that a particular ...

PHILADELPHIA - (Dec. 11, 2014) - A team of scientists, led by researchers at The Wistar Institute, has found that an infection with herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV-1) causes rearrangements in telomeres, small stretches of DNA that serve as protective ends to chromosomes. The findings, which will be published in the Dec. 24 edition of the journal Cell Reports, show that this manipulation of telomeres may explain how viruses like herpes are able to successfully replicate while also revealing more about the protective role that telomeres play against other viruses. "We know ...

The saga of the Osedax "bone-eating" worms began 12 years ago, with the first discovery of these deep-sea creatures that feast on the bones of dead animals. The Osedax story grew even stranger when researchers found that the large female worms contained harems of tiny dwarf males. In a new study published in the Dec. 11 issue of Current Biology, marine biologist Greg Rouse at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego and his collaborators reported a new twist to the Osedax story, revealing an evolutionary oddity unlike any other in the animal kingdom. Rouse's ...

HOUSTON -- (Dec. 11, 2014) -- In a triumph for cell biology, researchers have assembled the first high-resolution, 3-D maps of entire folded genomes and found a structural basis for gene regulation -- a kind of "genomic origami" that allows the same genome to produce different types of cells. The research appears online today in Cell. A central goal of the five-year project, which was carried out at Baylor College of Medicine, Rice University, the Broad Institute and Harvard University, was to identify the loops in the human genome. Loops form when two bits of DNA that ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Some drugs used to treat diabetes mimic the behavior of a hormone that a University at Buffalo psychologist has learned controls fluid intake in subjects. The finding creates new awareness for diabetics who, by the nature of their disease, are already at risk for dehydration. Derek Daniels' paper "Endogenous Glucagon-Like Peptide-1 Reduces Drinking Behavior and Is Differentially Engaged by Water and Food Intakes in Rats," co-authored with UB psychology graduate students Naomi J. McKay and Daniela L. Galante, appears in this month's edition of the Journal ...

London, United Kingdom, December 11, 2014 - Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) is an emerging virus, with the first case reported in 2012. It exhibits a 40% fatality rate and over 97% of the cases have occurred in the Middle East. In three new studies in the current issue of the International Journal of Infectious Disease, researchers reported on clinical outcomes in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), how long patients will shed virus during their infections, and how the Sultanate of Oman is dealing with cases that have appeared there. An editorial ...

(MEMPHIS, Tenn. - December 11, 2014) Toddlers who undergo total body irradiation in preparation for bone marrow transplantation are at higher risk for a decline in IQ and may be candidates for stepped up interventions to preserve intellectual functioning, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital investigators reported. The findings appear in the current issue of the Journal of Clinical Oncology. The results clarify the risk of intellectual decline faced by children, teenagers and young adults following bone marrow transplantation. The procedure is used for treatment of cancer ...

University of Rochester researchers believe they're on track to solve the mystery of weight gain - and it has nothing to do with indulging in holiday eggnog. They discovered that a protein, Thy1, has a fundamental role in controlling whether a primitive cell decides to become a fat cell, making Thy1 a possible therapeutic target, according to a study published online this month by the FASEB Journal. The research brings a new, biological angle to a problem that's often viewed as behavioral, said lead author Richard P. Phipps, Ph.D. In fact, some diet pills consist of ...

New Rochelle, NY, December 11, 2014--In cases of traumatic brain injury (TBI), predicting the likelihood of a cranial lesion and determining the need for head computed tomography (CT) can be aided by measuring markers of bone injury in the blood. The results of a new study comparing the usefulness of two biomarkers released into the blood following a TBI are presented in Journal of Neurotrauma, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available free on the Journal of Neurotrauma website at http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/neu.2013.3245 ...

MAYWOOD, Il. - Riding a couple roller coasters at an amusement park appears to have triggered an unusual stroke in a 4-year-old boy, according to a report in the journal Pediatric Neurology. The sudden acceleration, deceleration and rotational forces on the head and neck likely caused a tear in the boy's carotid artery. This tear, called a dissection, led to formation of a blood clot that triggered the stroke, Loyola University Medical Center neurologist Jose Biller, MD and colleagues report. Strokes previously have been reported in adult roller coaster riders, but ...

Worcester, Mass. - A new statistical model developed by a research team at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) may enable physicians to create personalized cancer treatments for patients based on the specific genetic mutations found in their tumors. Just as cancer is not a single disease, but a collection of many diseases, an individual tumor is not likely to be comprised of just one type of cancer cell. In fact, the genetic mutations that lead to cancer in the first place also often result in tumors with a mix of cancer cell subtypes. The WPI team developed a new ...

The once mighty super typhoon has weakened to a depression in the South China Sea as it heads for a final landfall in southern Vietnam. NASA's Aqua satellite captured an image of the storm that showed it was weakening. NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Hagupit on Dec. 11 at 05:20 UTC (12:20 a.m. EST) and the MODIS instrument captured a visible image of the storm. The MODIS image showed that the thunderstorms had become fragmented around the circulation center. On Dec. 11 at 1500 UTC (10 a.m. EST) Tropical Depression Hagupit's maximum sustained winds dropped to 30 knots ...

San Antonio -- December 11, 2014 -- Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) is preparing to unveil a new, miniature portable solar observatory for use onboard a commercial, manned suborbital spacecraft. The SwRI Solar Instrument Pointing Platform (SSIPP) will be on exhibit at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), Dec. 16-19, at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, Calif. Using reusable suborbital commercial spacecraft for the SSIPP development effort improves on a traditional space instrument development process that goes back to the dawn of the space ...

DARIEN, IL - A new study shows that paid work time is the primary waking activity exchanged for sleep and suggests that chronic sleep loss potentially could be prevented by strategies that make work start times more flexible. Results show that work is the dominant activity exchanged for less sleep across practically all sociodemographic categories. Compared to normal sleepers, short sleepers who reported sleeping 6 hours or less worked 1.55 more hours on weekdays and 1.86 more hours on weekends or holidays, and they started working earlier in the morning and stopped working ...

December 11, 2014 - Hospitals with robotic surgical systems are more likely to perform "nephron-sparing" partial nephrectomy--a recommended alternative to removal of the entire kidney--in patients with kidney cancer, reports a study in the December issue of Medical Care. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health. "Hospital acquisition of the surgical robot is associated with greater proportion of partial nephrectomy, an underutilized, guideline-encouraged procedure," write Dr Ganesh Sivarajan of New York University Langone ...

An interstellar mystery of why stars form has been solved thanks to the most realistic supercomputer simulations of galaxies yet made. Theoretical astrophysicist Philip Hopkins of the California Institute of Technology (CalTech) led research that found that stellar activity -- like supernova explosions or even just starlight -- plays a big part in the formation of other stars and the growth of galaxies. "Feedback from stars, the collective effects from supernovae, radiation, heating, pushing on gas, and stellar winds can regulate the growth of galaxies and explain why ...

Unlike mammals, birds have no external ears. The outer ears of mammals play an important function in that they help the animal identify sounds coming from different elevations. But birds are also able to perceive whether the source of a sound is above them, below them, or at the same level. Now a research team from Technische Universität München (TUM) has discovered how birds are able to localize these sounds, namely by utilizing their entire head. Their findings were published recently in the PLOS ONE journal. It is springtime, and two blackbirds are having ...

NEW YORK, NY - Patients with operable kidney cancers were more likely to have a partial nephrectomy -- the recommended treatment for localized tumors -- when treated in hospitals that were early adopters of robotic surgery, according to a new study. Researchers from NYU Langone Medical Center and elsewhere, publishing online December 11 in the journal Medical Care, report that by 2008, hospitals that had adopted robotic surgery at the start of the current century (between 2001 and 2004) performed partial nephrectomies in 38% of kidney cancer cases compared to late adopters ...

Novel research reveals that the risk of acute gout attacks is more than two times higher during the night or early morning hours than it is in the daytime. The study published in Arthritis & Rheumatology, a journal of the American College of Rheumatology (ACR), confirms that nocturnal attacks persist even among those who did not consume alcohol and had a low amount of purine intake during the 24 hours prior to the gout attack. The body produces uric acid from the process of breaking down purines--natural substances in cells in the body and in most foods--with especially ...

Parkinson's disease sufferers have a different microbiota in their intestines than their healthy counterparts, according to a study conducted at the University of Helsinki and the Helsinki University Central Hospital (HUCH). "Our most important observation was that patients with Parkinson's have much less bacteria from the Prevotellaceae family; unlike the control group, practically no one in the patient group had a large quantity of bacteria from this family," states DMSc Filip Scheperjans, neurologist at the HUCH Neurology Clinic. The researchers have not yet ...

A team of researchers led by North Carolina State University has found that stacking materials that are only one atom thick can create semiconductor junctions that transfer charge efficiently, regardless of whether the crystalline structure of the materials is mismatched - lowering the manufacturing cost for a wide variety of semiconductor devices such as solar cells, lasers and LEDs. "This work demonstrates that by stacking multiple two-dimensional (2-D) materials in random ways we can create semiconductor junctions that are as functional as those with perfect alignment" ...

Researchers have found new evidence that explains how some aspects of our personality may affect our health and wellbeing, supporting long-observed associations between aspects of human character, physical health and longevity. A team of health psychologists at The University of Nottingham and the University of California in Los Angeles carried out a study to examine the relationship between certain personality traits and the expression of genes that can affect our health by controlling the activity of our immune systems. The study did not find any results to support ...

Could there finally be tangible evidence for the existence of dark matter in the Universe? After sifting through reams of X-ray data, scientists in EPFL's Laboratory of Particle Physics and Cosmology (LPPC) and Leiden University believe they could have identified the signal of a particle of dark matter. This substance, which up to now has been purely hypothetical, is run by none of the standard models of physics other than through the gravitational force. Their research will be published next week in Physical Review Letters. When physicists study the dynamics of galaxies ...

In the hunt for better knowledge on the aging process, researchers from Lund University have now enlisted the help of small birds. A new study investigates various factors which affect whether chicks are born with long or short chromosome ends, called telomeres. The genetic make-up of our cells consists of genes lined up on chromosomes. The ends of the chromosomes are called telomeres, and they protect the chromosomes from sticking to each other. The longer the telomeres, the longer time the chromosomes are able to function. And conversely, the shorter these ends, ...

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Invasive plant and animal species can cause dramatic and enduring changes to the geography and ecology of landscapes, a study from Purdue University and the University of Kentucky shows. A review of studies on how life forms interact with and influence their surroundings concluded that invasive species can alter landscapes in myriad ways and with varying degrees of severity. These changes can be quick, large-scale and "extremely difficult" to reverse, said study author Songlin Fei, a Purdue associate professor of quantitative ecology. "Invaders ...