PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] -- Brown University computer scientists have developed a new interactive tool to help researchers and clinicians explore the genetic underpinnings of cancer. The tool -- dubbed MAGI, for Mutation Annotation and Genome Interpretation -- is an open-source web application that enables users to search, visualize, and annotate large public cancer genetics datasets, including data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) project. "The main motivation for MAGI has been to reduce the computational burden required for researchers or doctors to ...

How much does diet affect the cancer patient? Do "antioxidants" really play an important role in health - or are they causing more cancers than they cure? And what exactly is the relationship between obesity and cancer? The latest Special Issue in ecancermedicalscience collects four original articles from experts in cancer and metabolism, addressing the hottest areas of research in this rapidly developing field. "In our clinical practice, cancer patients often ask 'Doctor, is there something specific I should eat or avoid eating?'" says Guest Editor of this Special ...

The brain's effect on other parts of the body has been well established. Now, a group that includes two University of Florida Health researchers has found that it's a two-way street: Body fat can send a signal that affects the way the brain deals with stress and metabolism. While the exact nature of those signals remains a mystery, researchers say simply knowing such a pathway exists and learning more about it could help break a vicious cycle: Stress causes a desire to eat more, which can lead to obesity. And too much extra fat can impair the body's ability to send a ...

Many of the same genes may affect GCSE results across a broad range of subjects according to a new study from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience at King's College London. The research, published today in Scientific Reports, also suggests that educational achievement at GCSE is highly heritable, with over half of the difference between results potentially due to inherited differences in DNA. Previous studies have shown that academic achievement in the core subjects of English, mathematics and science at GCSE may be influenced by the same genetic traits. ...

Philadelphia, PA, July 23, 2015 - Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI) can have devastating consequences. Both are associated with high rates of disability and suicide, and although they are separate conditions, they commonly co-occur. For example, a soldier who has developed PTSD as a result of a traumatic experience may have also sustained a brain injury during that experience. Significant research has been conducted to understand the brain mechanisms underlying PTSD and TBI, but there has still been a lack of knowledge regarding exactly ...

New research by health scientists at the University of York has revealed that a greater proportion of men than women suffer from cannabis psychosis. There has been much research exploring the nature of the relationship between cannabis -- the most widely used illicit drug in the United Kingdom -- and psychosis, however the role of gender in relation to cannabis psychosis is less well explored and understood. A new study by researchers in the Department of Health Sciences at York used large datasets over a period of 11 years to investigate the differences in men and ...

A new drug that blocks cancer's escape route from chemotherapy could be used to treat deadly lung and pancreatic cancers, new research reports. Scientists have shown in human cancer cells and in mice that the drug - discovered at The Institute of Cancer Research, London - boosts the effectiveness of conventional chemotherapy. The drug, known as CCT245737, is scheduled to begin first-in-human clinical trials in patients with lung and pancreatic cancers - two cancers with low survival rates that continue to resist currently available treatments. The new study is published ...

A team of researchers from the University of Leicester and France's G2ELab-CNRS in Grenoble have for the first time observed the growth of free nanoparticles in helium gas in a process similar to the decaffeination of coffee, providing new insights into the structure of nanoparticles. Nanoparticles have a very large surface area compared with their volume and are often able to react very quickly. This makes them useful as catalysts in chemical reactions and they are often used in sports equipment, clothing and sunscreens. In a paper published by the Journal of Physical ...

Contact between children and fathers following parental separation facilitates the continued abuse of women and children, according to new research focusing on the experiences of families with a prior history of domestic abuse conducted by social work experts at Trinity College Dublin. The research, which explored the experiences of post-separation fathering in families with prior history of domestic abuse perpetrated by the father against the mother, involved the completion of survey questionnaires 219 mothers regarding their 449 children as well as face-to-face interviews ...

TAMPA, Fla. - Recent advances in the understanding of cancer have led to more personalized therapies, such as drugs that target particular proteins and tests that analyze gene expression patterns in tumors to predict a patient's response to therapy. Moffitt Cancer Center researchers have contributed to these advances by developing the first test that analyzes the sensitivity of tumors to radiation therapy. They discovered that colon cancer metastases have varying sensitivity to radiation therapy based on their anatomic location. Researchers from Moffitt previously developed ...

An algorithm dubbed ENVE could be the Google for genetic aberrations -- and it comes from Case Western Reserve. Remember the World Wide Web before the famed search engine? The web offered extraordinary amounts of information, but no consistently reliable way to secure relevant results. Cancer researchers at Case Western Reserve encountered a comparable conundrum when considering reams of data about the body that new technological advances provide -- how could they tell what parts of the information actually offer value. In this instance, the goal was to distinguish ...

This news release is available in German. Organic molecules allow producing printable electronics and solar cells with extraordinary properties. In spintronics, too, molecules open up the unexpected possibility of controlling the magnetism of materials and, thus, the spin of the flowing electrons. According to what is reported in Nature Materials by a German-French team of researchers, a thin layer of organic molecules can stabilize the magnetic orientation of a cobalt surface. (DOI: 10.1038/NMAT4361) "This special interaction between organic molecules and metal ...

Reintroducing a species into an area where it has vanished can be a great tool for conservation, but for reintroduction to be successful it's crucial to understand how the habitat has changed in the interim and whether the reintroduced species will be able to thrive in its former home. Extirpated in the 1960s as a result of human activity, Bald Eagles (Haleiaeetus leucocephalus) have been reintroduced to California's Channel Islands over the last 35 years. A study published this week in The Condor: Ornithological Applications examined the diets of these reestablished eagles ...

People who grew up in a working class family are more satisfied in later life than those from a higher class background according to new research from The University of Manchester. The study by Dr Bram Vanhoutte and Professor James Nazroo, published in the Journal of Population Ageing, also found that English people who climb the social ladder are more content and happy when they get older than people in the States who are similarly upwardly mobile. The research sought to find out whether social mobility makes people happier in later life while taking into account ...

Investigators affiliated with VIB and UGent recently achieved great success with a study involving biomedical research on mouse models. The research group of Prof Peter Vandenabeele (VIB/UGent) recently used tangible examples to demonstrate how the side effects of genetic modification of mice can complicate the interpretation of biomedical research. The team developed a web tool that allows scientists to estimate the impact of this phenomenon more accurately. Their findings were recently published in the medical journal Immunity and received ample attention by a preview ...

Mangrove forests could play a crucial role in protecting coastal areas from sea level rise caused by climate change, according to new research involving the University of Southampton. A joint study between researchers at the University of Southampton along with colleagues from the Universities of Auckland and Waikato in New Zealand used leading-edge mathematical simulations to study how mangrove forests respond to elevated sea levels. Taking New Zealand mangrove data as the basis of a new modelling system, the team were able to predict what will happen to different types ...

The U.S. Supreme Court's recent ruling legalizing marriage between same-sex couples in all 50 states follows on the heels of national polls showing rapid cultural changes in attitudes toward lesbian and gay people. A new University of Virginia study confirms this, showing that not only are Americans' conscious and unconscious biases against lesbian women and gay men decreasing across all demographic groups, but the trend also appears to be accelerating. "Many people have this gut feeling that our culture has changed," said lead researcher Erin Westgate, a doctoral psychology ...

ROCHESTER, MINN. - A group of 118 of the nation's leading cancer experts have drafted a prescription for reducing the high cost of cancer drugs and voiced support for a patient-based grassroots movement demanding action on the issue. Their recommendations and support are outlined in a commentary, co-authored by the group, in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings. "High cancer drug prices are affecting the care of patients with cancer and our health care system," says lead author Ayalew Tefferi, M.D., a hematologist at Mayo Clinic. "The average gross household income in ...

WASHINGTON, DC (July 23, 2015) -- Chicken, turkey and pork sold in grocery stores harbors disease-causing bacteria known as Klebsiella pneumoniae, according to a new study. The research, which was published online today in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, shows that contaminated meat may be an important source of human exposure to Klebsiella.The U.S. food safety system has traditionally focused on a few well-known bacteria like Listeria, Salmonella and Campylobacter, which cause millions of cases of food poisoning every year. The research published today suggests ...

The Middle East is called the "Cradle of Civilization" because it is where our hunter-gatherer ancestors first established sedentary farming communities. Recently, the traditional dating of humans' first agricultural attempt was shaken up by the discovery of the earliest-known example of plant cultivation in the Levant, 11,000 years earlier than previously accepted. The team of archaeologists, botanists, and ecologists from Bar-Ilan University, Haifa University, Tel Aviv University, and Harvard University published their work in the scientific journal Plos One on July ...

Until now, researchers believed farming was "invented" some 12,000 years ago in the Cradle of Civilization -- Iraq, the Levant, parts of Turkey and Iran -- an area that was home to some of the earliest known human civilizations. A new discovery by an international collaboration of researchers from Tel Aviv University, Harvard University, Bar-Ilan University, and the University of Haifa offers the first evidence that trial plant cultivation began far earlier -- some 23,000 years ago. The study focuses on the discovery of the first weed species at the site of a sedentary ...

Family members who make major medical decisions for relatives in an intensive care unit (ICU) may suffer posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) if they cope by avoiding the situation, according to a new study by scientists at Case Western Reserve University's Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing. The patient isn't the only one affected by the long stay, according to Amy Petrinec, from the school of nursing. Family members may suffer, especially if they're required to make medical decisions with long-range consequences they may not understand, or are reluctant to question. Family ...

(NEW YORK CITY - July 22, 2015) Is it possible that too much iron in infant formula may potentially increase risk for neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson's in adulthood -- and are teeth the window into the past that can help us tell? This and related theories were described in a "Perspectives" article authored by researchers from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and the University of Technology Sydney and Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health in Australia, and published online recently in Nature Reviews Neurology. "Teeth are of particular ...

LOS ANGELES (July 22, 2015) - For the first time, researchers have employed a gene-editing technique involving low-dose irradiation to repair patient cells, according to a study published in the journal Stem Cells Translational Medicine. This method, developed by researchers in the Cedars-Sinai Board of Governors Regenerative Medicine Institute, is 10 times more effective than techniques currently in use. "This novel technique allows for far more efficient gene editing of stem cells and will increase the speed of new discoveries in the field," said co-senior author Clive ...

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Coral reefs, under pressure from climate change and direct human activity, may have a reduced ability to protect tropical islands against wave attack, erosion and salinization of drinking water resources, which help to sustain life on those islands. A new paper gives guidance to coastal managers to assess how climate change will affect a coral reef's ability to mitigate coastal hazards. About 30 million people are dependent on the protection by coral reefs as they live on low-lying coral islands and atolls. At present, some of these islands experience ...