CAMBRIDGE, MA -- MIT engineers have devised a way to rapidly test hundreds of different drug-delivery vehicles in living animals, making it easier to discover promising new ways to deliver a class of drugs called biologics, which includes antibodies, peptides, RNA, and DNA, to human patients. In a study appearing in the journal Integrative Biology, the researchers used this technology to identify materials that can efficiently deliver RNA to zebrafish and also to rodents. This type of high-speed screen could help overcome one of the major bottlenecks in developing disease ...

The U.S. Department of Defense has made progress in reducing the stigma associated with seeking help for mental illnesses such as depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, but more improvement is still needed, according to a new RAND Corporation study. Despite efforts of both the Defense Department and the Veterans Health Administration to enhance mental health services, many service members still do not seek needed care for mental health problems. Defense officials have made a concerted effort to promote treatment as a way to reduce stigma, according to the study. ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., September 30, 2014--Sea monkeys have captured the popular attention of both children and aquarium hobbyists because of their easily observable life cycle -- sold as dehydrated eggs, these tiny brine shrimp readily hatch, develop and mate given little more than a tank of salt water. Physicists, though, are interested in a shorter-term pattern: Like other zooplankton, brine shrimp vertically migrate in large groups in response to changing light conditions, coming closer to the surface at night and retreating deeper during the day. Two researchers at ...

WASHINGTON D.C., September 30, 2014 – Applying a well-known optical phenomenon called thin-film interference, a group of researchers at Harvard University has demonstrated the ability to "paint" ultra-thin coatings onto a rough surface -- work that holds promise for making future, flexible electronic devices, creating advanced solar cells and detailing the sides of next-gen rocket ships and spacecraft with extremely lightweight decorative logos. When light passes through oil in water, it becomes iridescent, revealing a myriad of colors that glisten and shift along with ...

WASHINGTON D.C., Sept. 30, 2014 – Ice is ubiquitous in nature—found within terrestrial and astrophysical environments alike—and contains many atoms and molecules trapped inside it. For example, ice beneath the world's oceans hosts a vast reservoir of greenhouse gases, which if released would have a profound effect on climate change. On the earth's surface, seasonal ice and permafrost-covered regions represent a vast reservoir for the collection, concentration and release of environmental and trace gases—encompassing national security concerns about the persistence and ...

Every ten seconds a human being dies from pneumococcus infection making it the leading cause of serious illness across the globe Research discovers six unique states of pneumococcus Knowledge of these six characteristics can help in development of tailored vaccines Every ten seconds a human being dies from Streptococcus pneumoniae infection, also known as pneumococcus, making it a leading global killer. An interdisciplinary team of researchers from the University of Leicester in collaboration with international experts have unlocked a genetic switch controlling ...

Colonoscopies are a very valuable procedure by which to screen for the presence of colorectal cancer. However, it seems that healthy Americans who do undergo this sometimes uncomfortable examination often have repeat screenings long before they actually should. Gina Kruse of Massachusetts General Hospital in the US and colleagues advise that endoscopists stick to the national guidelines more closely. Their findings appear in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, published by Springer. Current national guidelines strongly recommend that adults aged 50 and older should ...

Dublin, Ireland, September 30th, 2014 – A new report launched today by the Intellectual Disability Supplement to TILDA (The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing) conducted by academics from the School of Nursing and Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, has highlighted the serious, complex and unique health and social challenges facing Ireland's intellectual disability population. The IDS-TILDA study is the first study of its kind in Europe and the only one in the world with the ability to compare the ageing of people with intellectual disability directly with the ...

Prenatal exposure to tetrachloroethylene (PCE) in drinking water may increase the risk of stillbirth and placental abruption, according to a new study led by a Boston University School of Public Health researcher. The study, published in the journal Environmental Health, compared 1,091 PCE-exposed pregnancies and 1,019 unexposed pregnancies among 1,766 women in Cape Cod, Ma., where water was contaminated in the late 1960s to the early 1980s by the installation of vinyl-lined asbestos cement pipes. PCE exposure was estimated using water-distribution system modeling software. ...

The New England Journal of Medicine reports positive results of a phase 1 clinical trial of the drug crizotinib against the subset of lung cancer marked by rearrangement of the gene ROS1. In this multi-center study of 50 patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer testing positive for ROS1 gene rearrangement, the response rate was 72 percent, with 3 complete responses and 33 partial responses. Median progression-free survival – the time it takes for the disease to resume its growth after being slowed by treatment – is estimated at 19.2 months with exactly half of ...

DURHAM, N.C. -- Pollution in urban and farm runoff in Hawaii is causing tumors in endangered sea turtles, a new study finds. The study, published Tuesday in the peer-reviewed open-access journal PeerJ, shows that nitrogen in the runoff ends up in algae that the turtles eat, promoting the formation of tumors on the animals' eyes, flippers and internal organs. Scientists at Duke University, the University of Hawaii and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) conducted the study to better understand the causes behind the tumor-forming disease Fibropapillomatosis, ...

When it comes to using marijuana, new research, involving mice and published in the October 2014 issue of the Journal of Leukocyte Biology, suggests that just because you can do it, doesn't mean that you should. That's because a team of Italian scientists have found that using marijuana in adolescence may do serious long-term damage to the immune system. This damage may result in autoimmune diseases and chronic inflammatory diseases, such as multiple sclerosis, inflammatory bowel disease and rheumatoid arthritis in adulthood. "I hope that the knowledge that early exposure ...

Researchers of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich report that a new class of chemical compounds makes cancer cells more sensitive to chemotherapeutic drugs. They have also pinpointed the relevant target enzyme, thus identifying a new target for anti-tumor agents. Researchers led by LMU's Professor Angelika Vollmar and Professor Stephan Sieber of the Technische Universität München have identified a class of chemicals that represent a potential new weapon in the fight against malignant tumors. The compound is itself non-toxic, but it stimulates the killing ...

If you want your doctor to know what goes wrong with your muscles because of age, disease or injury, it's a good idea to know what "normal" actually is. That's where a new research report published in the October 2014 issue of the FASEB Journal comes in. In the report, a team of scientists produce a complete transcriptome—a key set of molecules that can help scientists "see" which genes are active in an organ at a particular time. What's more, they found never-before-detected gene activity and that men have approximately 400 more active genes in their skeletal muscle than ...

Having trouble getting pregnant—even with IVF? Here's some hope: A new research report published in October 2014 issue of The FASEB Journal, explains how scientists developed a synthetic version of a sperm-originated protein known as PAWP, which induced embryo development in human and mouse eggs similar to the natural triggering of embryo development by the sperm cell during fertilization. "We believe that the results of this study represent a major paradigm shift in our understanding of human fertilization by providing a precise answer to a fundamental unresolved scientific ...

Screening for a genetic condition in younger people who are diagnosed with bowel cancer would be cost-effective for the NHS and prevent new cases in them and their relatives, new research has concluded. Researchers at the University of Exeter Medical School were funded by the National Institute for Health Research Health Technology Assessment (NIHR HTA) Programme to assess the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of screening for Lynch Syndrome. Their findings, published in Health Technology Assessment, indicate that screening the 1,700 people under the age of 50 who ...

This news release is available in German. Animals often differ in their behavioural response to risky situations such as exposure to predators. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology now found in a long-term study on different populations of great tits that risk-taking behaviour correlates with both metabolic rate and ambient temperature. High metabolic rates and low temperatures were associated with high risk-taking behaviour, as in these scenarios birds were more likely to approach potential predators. The readiness to take a risk is to a ...

A new research report published in the October 2014 issue of The FASEB Journal may make the early detection of cancer as easy as a simple blood test. This test, called the "lymphocyte genome sensitivity" (LGS) test, could not only detect some cancers earlier than ever before, but it may eliminate the need for some types of biopsies, as well as identify those more likely to develop cancer in the future. "The test could allow earlier cancer detection, so helping to save peoples' lives," said Diana Anderson, a researcher involved in the work from the School of Life Sciences ...

Tropical Storm Rachel is spinning down west of Mexico's Baja California, and another tropical low pressure area developing off the coast of southwestern Mexico dwarfs the tropical storm. NOAA's GOES-West satellite showed the size difference between the two tropical low pressure areas. NOAA's GOES-West satellite captured an image of the Eastern Pacific Ocean on Sept. 30 at 1200 UTC (8 a.m. EDT). In the infrared image, Tropical Storm Rachel appeared small in comparison to the low pressure area called System 90E, coming together hundreds of miles south. As Rachel spins down ...

Many people recognize "the bubble boy" as an unusual character from a "Seinfeld" episode or a John Travolta movie. But in reality, a genetic disease called SCID, short for severe combined immunodeficiency, forces patients to breathe filtered air and avoid human contact because their bodies' natural defenses are too weak to fight germs. Although it affects fewer than 2,000 new births each year worldwide, SCID is a cousin to acquired immune deficiency syndrome triggered by a human immunodeficiency virus — HIV/AIDS. Now, using a mouse model, Virginia Tech researchers ...

The bands of thunderstorms wrapping around Tropical Storm Phanfone in the Northwestern Pacific Ocean appeared fragmented to NASA's TRMM satellite. On Sept. 30, a typhoon watch remains in effect for the far northern Marianas Islands including Pagan and Alamagan. Tropical storm warnings have been cancelled for Tinian and Saipan, but remain in effect for Pagan, Alamagan and surrounding waters. A flash flood watch remains in effect for the island of Saipan. For updated forecasts for these islands, visit the U.S. National Weather Service Office's Guam website: http://www.prh.noaa.gov/guam/cyclone.php. On ...

Because heart cells cannot multiply and cardiac muscles contain few stem cells, heart tissue is unable to repair itself after a heart attack. Now Tel Aviv University researchers are literally setting a new gold standard in cardiac tissue engineering. Dr. Tal Dvir and his graduate student Michal Shevach of TAU's Department of Biotechnology, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, and Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, have been developing sophisticated micro- and nanotechnological tools — ranging in size from one millionth to one billionth of a meter — ...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Researchers report that some stickleback fish fathers can have long-term effects on the behavior of their offspring: The most attentive fish dads cause their offspring to behave in a way that makes them less susceptible to predators. These behavioral changes are accompanied by changes in gene expression, the researchers report. The findings appear in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. "There is lots of evidence that moms are very important for their offspring," said University of Illinois animal biology professor Alison Bell, ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – A new study shows just what it takes to convince a person that she is qualified to achieve the career of her dreams. Researchers found that it's not enough to tell people they have the skills or the grades to make their goal a reality. Instead, many people need a more vivid and detailed description of just how pursuing their dream career will help make them successful. This is especially important for people who have the skills and potential to pursue a particular career, but lack the self-confidence, said Patrick Carroll, author of the study and ...

Silver nanoparticles are well known for their anti-bacteria properties[1-4]. One of the main routes by which they may act as an anti-bacteria agent, is through attaching themselves to the thiol group present on the cellular membrane surface and hence disrupting the membrane's function[5]. Hence, it is crucial to gain a greater understanding of this complex silver-thiol interaction to determine silver nanoparticles' role in biological systems. With thiols, silver nanoparticles have been proposed to form various types of compounds with different structures[6-8]. One of the ...