Tongxinluo has been widely used in China for the treatment of acute stroke and for neuroprotection. Research group at Encephalopathy Center, Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, China intragastrically administered Tongxinluo superfine powder suspension or its vehicle to rats for 5 successive days before middle cerebral artery occlusion. There are many advantages of using small animal PET for drug research. First, the results of the study in vitro cannot be directly applied to human studies, while small animal PET imaging methods and results can ...

TEMPE, Ariz. – A team of researchers from Arizona State University and Mayo Clinic is showing how a staple of Earth science research can be used in biomedical settings to predict the course of disease. The researchers tested a new approach to detecting bone loss in cancer patients by using calcium isotope analysis to predict whether myeloma patients are at risk for developing bone lesions, a hallmark of the disease. They believe they have a promising technique that could be used to chart the progression of multiple myeloma, a lethal disease that eventually impacts ...

Physicists at the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland and even in the fictional world of CBS' "The Big Bang Theory" look to subatomic particles called neutrinos to answer the big questions about the universe. Now, a group of scientists led by a physics professor with the College of Science at Virginia Tech are asking whether the neutrino could provide the world with clues about nuclear proliferation in Iran and other political hotspots. Neutrinos are produced by the decay of radioactive elements, and nuclear reactors produce large amounts of neutrinos that cannot ...

A team of researchers from the Virginia Tech-Wake Forest University School of Biomedical Engineering and Sciences have developed a new way of using electricity to open the blood-brain-barrier (BBB). The Vascular Enabled Integrated Nanosecond pulse (VEIN pulse) procedure consists of inserting minimally invasive needle electrodes into the diseased tissue and applying multiple bursts of nanosecond pulses with alternating polarity. It is thought that the bursts disrupt tight junction proteins responsible for maintaining the integrity of the BBB without causing damage to the ...

A team of researchers from the Center for Engineering in Medicine at the Massachusetts General Hospital have developed a novel fluorescence-based assay for sensitive detection of antibodies within microliter volume serum samples. This new assay is at least 50 times more sensitive than the traditional radioimmunoassay (RIA), which is the gold standard currently used in the clinic. This new technology is particularly attractive for immunological assays as it allows: 1) use of very small volumes of sample reagents (5 ¦ÌL), and 2) use of traditional analytical systems such ...

(NEW YORK – August 11) Blood expression levels of genes targeted by the stress hormones called glucocorticoids could be a physical measure, or biomarker, of risk for developing Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), according to a study conducted in rats by researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and published August 11 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). That also makes the steroid hormones' receptor, the glucocorticoid receptor, a potential target for new drugs. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is triggered by a terrifying ...

While in Germany, Partho P. Sengupta, MD, of Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai used a computer to perform a robot-assisted trans-Atlantic ultrasound examination on a person in Boston. In another study Kurt Boman, MD, of Umeå University in Sweden in collaboration with Mount Sinai, showed how a cardiologist's video e-consultation, coupled with a remote robot-assisted echocardiogram test, dramatically reduces the waiting time for a diagnosis faced by heart failure patients who live in a rural communities far from the hospital from nearly four months to less than one ...

They are the largest fish in the world but the impact of this majestic and charismatic animal on the economy of the island nation of the Maldives was largely unknown. A new study by scientists of the Maldives Whale Shark Research Programme (MWSRP) reveals that a small group of whale sharks in a single Maldivian Atoll accounts for nearly 3% of the global shark ecotourism and nearly half that of the Maldives'. "The Republic of Maldives hosts one of few known year round aggregation sites for whale sharks", said James Hancock co-author and a director of MWSRP. "We have seen ...

Whether or not humans are the only empathic beings is still under debate. In a new study, researchers directly compared the 'yawn contagion' effect between humans and bonobos (our closest evolutionary cousins). By doing so they were able to directly compare the empathic abilities of ourselves with another species, and found that a close relationship between individuals is more important to their empathic response than the fact that individuals might be from the same species. The ability to experience others' emotions is hard to quantify in any species, and, as a result, ...

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 12, 2014 — Criminals are smuggling an estimated $30 billion in U.S. currency into Mexico each year from the United States, but help could be on the way for border guards, researchers will report here today. The answer to the problem: a portable device that identifies specific vapors given off by U.S. paper money. They will present the new research at the 248th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world's largest scientific society. The meeting features nearly 12,000 reports on new advances in science and other ...

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 12, 2014 — As hemp makes a comeback in the U.S. after a decades-long ban on its cultivation, scientists are reporting that fibers from the plant can pack as much energy and power as graphene, long-touted as the model material for supercapacitors. They're presenting their research, which a Canadian start-up company is working on scaling up, at the 248th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world's largest scientific society. The meeting features nearly 12,000 presentations on a wide range of science topics and ...

SAN FRANCISCO — A new technique that transforms stinky, air-polluting landfill gas could produce the sweet smell of success as it leads to development of a fuel cell generating clean electricity for homes, offices and hospitals, researchers say. The advance would convert methane gas into hydrogen, an efficient, clean form of energy. The researcher's report is part of the 248th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world's largest scientific society. The meeting, attended by thousands of scientists, features nearly 12,000 reports on new advances ...

Predators play important roles in maintaining diverse and stable ecosystems. Climate change can push species to move in order to stay in their climatic comfort zones, potentially altering where species live and how they interact, which could fundamentally transform current ecosystems. A symposium focusing on climate's effects on predators—causing cascading effects on whole ecosystems -- will take place on Tuesday, August 12th during the Ecological Society of America's 99th Annual Meeting, held this year in Sacramento, California. There will be "winners" and "losers" ...

The impact of major cardiovascular risk factors combined is greater in women than men and in blacks than whites. While the gender gap may be narrowing, differences by race may be increasing, according to new research in the American Heart Association journal Circulation. "We've been targeting traditional risk factors in public health campaigns for many years," said Susan Cheng, M.D., M.P.H., study lead author and Assistant Professor of Medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Mass. "We wanted to take a look at how well we've been doing over time at keeping ...

Osteoporosis drugs known as bisphosphonates may not protect women from breast cancer as had been thought, according to a new study led by researchers at UC San Francisco (UCSF). The drugs' protective effect was widely assumed after several observational studies showed that women who took them were less likely to get breast cancer. But when researchers assessed the effect of two of the most widely used osteoporosis drugs – sold under the brand names, Fosamax and Reclast – in two large randomized clinical trials, neither drug protected women with osteoporosis from getting ...

A recent study conducted by researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and the University of Hawaii demonstrates a new approach to measuring early brain development of infants, resulting in more accurate whole brain growth charts and providing the first estimates for growth trajectories of subcortical areas during the first three months after birth. Assessing the size, asymmetry and rate of growth of different brain regions could be key in detecting and treating the earliest signs of neurodevelopmental disorders, such as autism or perinatal ...

Extremely premature babies in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) had fewer infections when medical staff wore gloves after washing their hands compared with hand washing alone. The author is David A. Kaufman, M.D., of the University of Virginia School of Medicine, Charlottesville, and colleagues. Late-onset infections (more than 72 hours after birth) and necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC, tissue death in the intestines) can cause death and neurodevelopmental impairment in extremely premature babies. Even after hand washing, medical staff can still have microorganisms ...

A 40-year-old California man exhibits normal cognitive function although he has no apolipoprotein E (apoE), which is believed to be important for brain function but a mutation of which is also a known risk factor for Alzheimer disease (AD). Researchers suggest this could mean that therapies to reduce apoE in the central nervous system may one day help treat neurodegenerative disorders such as AD. The study was authored by Angel C. Y. Mak, Ph.D., of the University of California, San Francisco, and colleagues. The patient was referred to UCSF with severe high cholesterol ...

An analysis of data from two randomized clinical trials finds that three to four years of treatment with bisphosphonates to improve bone density is not linked to reduced risk of invasive postmenopausal breast cancer. The authors are Trisha F. Hue, Ph.D., M.P.H., of the University of California, San Francisco, and colleagues. Some studies have suggested that bisphosphonates, which are commonly used to treat osteoporosis, may have antitumor and antimetastatic properties. Some observational studies have suggested bisphosphonates may protect women from breast cancer. ...

DALLAS – Aug. 11, 2014 – Two years ago, the parents of Chloe Olivarez watched painfully as their daughter experienced epileptic seizures hundreds of times a day. The seizures, caused by a rare metabolic disease that depleted her brain of needed glucose, left Chloe nearly unresponsive, and slow to develop. Within hours, treatment with an edible oil dramatically reduced the number of seizures for then-4-year-old Chloe, one of 14 participants in a small UT Southwestern Medical Center clinical trial. "Immediately we noticed fewer seizures. From the Chloe we knew two years ...

Plasmodium falciparum, the parasite that causes malaria, has proven notoriously resistant to scientists' efforts to study its genetics. It can take up to a year to determine the function of a single gene, which has slowed efforts to develop new, more targeted drugs and vaccines. MIT biological engineers have now demonstrated that a new genome-editing technique, called CRISPR, can disrupt a single parasite gene with a success rate of up to 100 percent — in a matter of weeks. This approach could enable much more rapid gene analysis and boost drug-development efforts, says ...

West Orange, NJ. August 11, 2014. Kessler Foundation researchers have identified an association between the built environment and disability-related outcomes for adults with physical impairments. The article, Disability and the built environment: an investigation of community and neighborhood land uses and participation for physically impaired adults, was published in the July issue of Annals of Epidemiology (doi: 10.1016/j.annepidem.2014.05.003). The authors are Amanda Botticello, PhD, MPH, and Nicole Cobbold, BS, of Kessler Foundation, and Tanya Rohrbach, MS, of Raritan ...

MADISON, Wis. — When the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently requested a figure for its annual report, to show global temperature trends over the last 10,000 years, the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Zhengyu Liu knew that was going to be a problem. "We have been building models and there are now robust contradictions," says Liu, a professor in the UW-Madison Center for Climatic Research. "Data from observation says global cooling. The physical model says it has to be warming." Writing in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences today, ...

Scientists hunting for life beyond Earth have discovered more than 1,800 planets outside our solar system, or exoplanets, in recent years, but so far, no one has been able to confirm an exomoon. Now, physicists from The University of Texas at Arlington believe following a trail of radio wave emissions may lead them to that discovery. Their recent findings, published in the Aug. 10 issue of The Astrophysical Journal, describe radio wave emissions that result from the interaction between Jupiter's magnetic field and its moon Io. They suggest using detailed calculations about ...

In An Account of the Foxglove and Some of its Medical Uses, published in 1785, Sir William Withering cautioned readers that extracts from the plant foxglove, also called digitalis, was not a perfect drug. "Time will fix the real value upon this discovery," he wrote. Now, more than 200 years later, researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have validated Withering's warning with the discovery that patients with atrial fibrillation — a rapid and irregular heart rhythm — who are treated with the digitalis-derivative digoxin are more likely to die than similar ...