Using computer simulations to predict which drug candidates offer the greatest potential has thus far not been very reliable, because both small drug-like molecules and the amino acids of proteins vary so much in their chemistry. Uppsala researchers have now cunningly managed to develop a method that has proven to be precise, reliable and general. The largest class of human target proteins for drugs are the so-called G-protein-coupled receptors. They are targets for about 40 per cent of all drugs on the market. These receptors are found in the cell membrane and handle ...

Blue-footed Boobies are on the decline in the Galápagos. A new study appearing in the journal Avian Conservation and Ecology indicates numbers of the iconic birds, known for their bright blue feet and propensity to burst into dance to attract mates, have fallen more than 50 percent in less than 20 years. The drastic drop in population is probably due to an unexplained disappearance of sardines from the Boobies' diet, said Dave Anderson, a professor of biology at Wake Forest University and the study's principal investigator. This in turn has adult Boobies electing not ...

Tropical Cyclone Jack may have hurricane-force winds today, April 21, but strong vertical wind shear is expected to weaken the storm. NASA's TRMM satellite passed overhead and saw that the bulk of the storm's rainfall was being pushed south of the center from the wind shear. Tropical Cyclone Jack formed on Sunday, April 20, near 13.4 south and 91.1 east, and began moving to the south at 6 knots/6.9 mph/11.1 kph. Jack strengthened quickly and hours after its birth, the storm already had maximum sustained winds near 55 knots/63.2 mph/101.9 kph. On April 21 at 0900 UTC/5 ...

Scientists have long been trying to understand how the Andes and other broad, high-elevation mountain ranges were formed. New research by Carmala Garzione, a professor of earth and environmental sciences at the University of Rochester, and colleagues sheds light on the mystery. In a paper published in the latest Earth and Planetary Science Letters, Garzione explains that the Altiplano plateau in the central Andes—and most likely the entire mountain range—was formed through a series of rapid growth spurts. "This study provides increasing evidence that the plateau formed ...

A new study in the Journal of Food Science, published by the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT), found that common edible flowers in China are rich in phenolics and have excellent antioxidant capacity. Edible flowers, which have been used in the culinary arts in China for centuries, are receiving renewed interest. Flowers can be used as an essential ingredient in a recipe, provide seasoning to a dish, or simply be used as a garnish. Some of these flowers contain phenolics that have been correlated with anti-inflammatory activity and a reduced risk of cardiovascular disease ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. --- The most effective way to tackle debilitating diseases is to punch them at the start and keep them from growing. Research at Michigan State University, published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, shows that a small "molecular tweezer" keeps proteins from clumping, or aggregating, the first step of neurological disorders such as Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease and Huntington's disease. The results are pushing the promising molecule toward clinical trials and actually becoming a new drug, said Lisa Lapidus, MSU associate professor ...

Russian scientists, in collaboration with their colleagues from Pittsburgh University, find how lipid mediators are produced. The relevant paper was publish in Nature Chemistry. Lipid mediators are molecules playing an important role in inflammation process. A study devoted to some of them has earned a Nobel prize in 1982. Mitochondria are known as "cellular power plants", the organelles where oxidation of various substances leads to formation of adenosine triphosphate (ATP), a molecule universally used for storage and transportation of energy inside cells. But this is ...

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- An Indiana University study of reactions to the 2011 death of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs suggests health communicators have a critical window of opportunity after a public figure dies to disseminate information about disease prevention and detection. The study, involving a survey of 1,400 adult men and women, found that immediately after Jobs' death, more than a third of survey participants sought information about how he died or about cancer in general, and 7 percent sought information about pancreatic cancer, the disease that took Jobs' life. Lead ...

MINNEAPOLIS – (April 21, 2014) – An Allina Health study published in the current issue of the journal Applied Clinical Informatics showed that a significant number of diagnostic tests and procedures can be avoided if clinicians exchange health information with other health systems. Allina Health uses Care Everywhere which is a health information exchange tool embedded in the Allina Health electronic health record called Excellian® that is powered by Epic (Epic Systems Corporation, Verona, Wis.) With patient consent, Allina Health providers can use this tool to exchange ...

As U.S. policymakers consider ways to ease prohibitions on marijuana, the public health approaches used to regulate alcohol and tobacco over the past century may provide valuable lessons, according to new RAND Corporation research. Recent ballot initiatives that legalized marijuana in Colorado and Washington for recreational uses are unprecedented. The move raises important questions about how to best allow the production, sales and the use of marijuana while also working to reduce any related social ills. A new study published online by the American Journal of Public ...

We all think we have a rough idea of what happened 12,000 years ago when people at several different spots around the globe brought plants under cultivation and domesticated animals for transport, food or fiber. But how much do we really know? Recent research suggests less than we think. For example, why did people domesticate a mere dozen or so of the roughly 200,000 species of wild flowering plants? And why only about five of the 148 species of large wild mammalian herbivores or omnivores? And while we're at it, why haven't more species of either plants or animals been ...

Singapore, 19 April 2014 – A research team led by the National Neuroscience Institute (NNI) has uncovered a novel function of the Amyloid Precursor Protein (APP), one of the main pathogenic culprits of Alzheimer's disease. This discovery may help researchers understand how the protein goes awry in the brains of Alzheimer's disease patients, and potentially paves the way for the development of innovative therapeutics to improve the brain function of dementia patients. The findings were published in the prestigious scientific research journal Nature Communications last ...

Smoking during pregnancy – particularly among economically-disadvantaged women – leads to a host of poor pregnancy outcomes, including miscarriage, preterm birth, SIDS, and additional adverse effects later in life. Without a formal treatment intervention, women in this population continue to smoke, and their babies suffer. Vermont Center on Behavior and Health Director Stephen Higgins, Ph.D., and colleagues, have developed an effective behavioral economic approach that offers women financial incentives for quitting. The groups' most recent findings, published online ...

Advances in the technology frontier have resulted in major disruptions and transformations in the massive data processing infrastructures. For the past three decades, classical database management systems, data warehousing and data analysis technologies have been well recognized as effective tools for data management and analysis. More recently, data from different sources and in different format are being collected at unprecedented scale. This gives rise to the so-called 3V characteristics of the big data: volume, velocity and variety. Classical approaches of data warehousing ...

(PHILADELPHIA) -- Muscle weakness is a common symptom of both long-time alcoholics and patients with mitochondrial disease. Now researchers have found a common link: mitochondria that are unable to self-repair. The results will be published online April 21 in The Journal of Cell Biology. The link to self-repair provides researchers both a new way to diagnose mitochondrial disease, and a new drug target. Mitochondria -- organelles that produce the energy needed for muscle, brain, and every other cell in the body -- repair their broken components by fusing with other mitochondria ...

In recent years, there are growing studies concerning the use of different carrier materials for sustained-release and controlled-release of nerve growth factor in neuroscience research. In a study by Prof. Gao Li and team from Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology in China, amino-functionalized ethylenediamine-treated multi-walled carbon nanotubes were used to prepare carbon nanotubes-nerve growth factor complexes by non-covalent grafting. Results showed that amino functionalization improved carbon nanotubes-nerve growth factor complex dispersibility, ...

Conversations about wartime atrocities often omit certain details. According to research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, these omissions can lead people to have different memories for the event depending on social group membership. "We started thinking about this project around the time when stories began to emerge in the popular media about atrocities committed by American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan," says lead researcher Alin Coman, psychological scientist at Princeton University. "We wanted to scientifically ...

The recent discovery of the Higgs boson has confirmed theories about the origin of mass and, with it, offered the potential to explain other scientific mysteries. But, scientists are continually studying other, less-understood forces that may also shed light on matters not yet uncovered. Among these is quantum turbulence, writes Katepalli Sreenivasan, an NYU University Professor, in a special issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Sreenivasan's introductory analysis, written with issue co-editors Carlo Barenghi of Newcastle University and Ladislav ...

WASHINGTON — In a study of crimes committed by people with serious mental disorders, only 7.5 percent were directly related to symptoms of mental illness, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association. Researchers analyzed 429 crimes committed by 143 offenders with three major types of mental illness and found that 3 percent of their crimes were directly related to symptoms of major depression, 4 percent to symptoms of schizophrenia disorders and 10 percent to symptoms of bipolar disorder. "When we hear about crimes committed by people ...

WASHINGTON -- As the school year winds down and final exams loom, teachers may want to avoid reminding students of the bad consequences of failing a test because doing so could lead to lower scores, according to new research published by APA. "Teachers are desperately keen to motivate their students in the best possible way but may not be aware of how messages they communicate to students around the importance of performing well in exams can be interpreted in different ways," said lead author David Putwain, PhD, of Edge Hill University in Lancashire, England. The study, ...

ATLANTA--Ginseng can help treat and prevent influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), a respiratory virus that infects the lungs and breathing passages, according to research findings by a scientist in Georgia State University's new Institute for Biomedical Sciences. In a recent issue of Nutrients and an upcoming publication of the International Journal of Molecular Medicine, Sang-Moo Kang reports the beneficial effects of ginseng, a well-known herbal medicine, on human health. Kang's primary research focuses on designing and developing effective vaccines against ...

VIDEO: This movie explains the new coating material. Click here for more information. Ever stop to consider why lotus plant leaves always look clean? The hydrophobic – water repelling – characteristic of the leaf, termed the "Lotus effect," helps the plant survive in muddy swamps, repelling dirt and producing beautiful flowers. Of late, engineers have been paying more and more attention to nature's efficiencies, such as the Lotus effect, and studying its behavior in order ...

Central-east Mexico gave birth to the domesticated chili pepper — now the world's most widely grown spice crop — reports an international team of researchers, led by a plant scientist at the University of California, Davis. Results from the four-pronged investigation — based on linguistic and ecological evidence as well as the more traditional archaeological and genetic data — suggest a regional, rather than a geographically specific, birthplace for the domesticated chili pepper. That region, extending from southern Puebla and northern Oaxaca to southeastern Veracruz, ...

The wetlands of the Mississippi River Delta are slowly sinking and rapidly eroding, but new research from Rice University and the University of South Carolina has found the river's supply of sand -- the material engineers most need to rebuild the delta -- will stay constant for centuries. The new study, which appears online this week in Nature Geoscience, is encouraging news for scientists and government officials who are working to shore up southeastern Louisiana's rapidly disappearing wetlands. The delta sinks each year as its soil settles and becomes more compact. ...

Cell reprogramming converts specialised cells such as nerve cells or skin cells towards an embryonic stem cell state. This reversal in the evolutionary development of cells also requires a reversal in the biology of telomeres, the structures that protect the ends of chromosomes; whilst under normal conditions telomeres shorten over time, during cell reprogramming they follow the opposite strategy and increase in length. A study published today in the journal Stem Cell Reports, from the Cell Publishing Group, reveals that the SIRT1 protein is needed to lengthen and maintain ...