The discovery of direct cell-to-cell transmission of HIV, and the finding that some anti-HIV drugs don't seem active against virus that spreads that way, have caused questions and concern. A study published on February 27th in PLOS Pathogens tested a panel of anti-HIV drugs for their ability to suppress cell-to-cell transmission of the virus. The results reveal differences between different drugs, explain why and how anti-retroviral therapy (ART) does work, and have implications for the prevention of drug resistance as well as the development of new effective anti-HIV drugs. ...

Early but not advanced forms of atherosclerotic plaques in the vessel wall disappear when the levels of 'bad' cholesterol are lowered, according to a study in mice from Karolinska Institutet, Sweden. The findings, published in PLoS Genetics, indicate that preventative cholesterol-lowering treatment could prevent more advanced, clinically relevant plaque to develop. Almost half of all deaths worldwide are caused by strokes and heart attacks. The main underlying cause is atherosclerosis, where fat accumulates in the blood vessel walls in the so-called plaques. Atherosclerosis ...

(Boston) – A study led by researchers at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) provides novel insight into the impact that genes may have on Huntington's disease (HD). The study, published online in PLOS Genetics, identified specific small segments of RNA (called micro RNA or miRNA) encoded in DNA in the human genome that are highly expressed in HD. Micro RNAs are important because they regulate the expression of genes. The researchers showed that these miRNAs are present in higher quantities in patients with HD and may act as a mitigating factor in the neurologic ...

PHILADELPHIA – The role of the so-called "obesity hormone" leptin and hormones used for birth control in the development of multiple sclerosis (MS) is examined in two new studies released today that will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology's 66th Annual Meeting in Philadelphia, April 26 to May 3, 2014. For the obesity study, BMI was calculated for 210 people with MS and 210 people of the same age and sex who did not have MS at ages 15 and 20 and at the time of the study. The study found that people who are obese at age 20 are twice as likely to later develop ...

Australian lizards are attracted to females with the brightest orange patches – but preferably not too large – on their underbelly, according to research published in the open-access journal Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. Lake Eyre dragon lizards, Ctenophorus maculosus, are found exclusively in salt deserts in southern Australia, where they feed on dead insects blown onto the salt crust. When females become fertile they develop bright orange patches on their normally pale underbelly and change their behavior towards males: instead of "waving them away" with their ...

One-third of people who survive a stroke before age 50 are unable to live independently or need assistance with daily activities 10 years after their stroke, according to research in the American Heart Association journal Stroke. About 10 percent of strokes occur in 18- and 50-year-olds. "Even if patients seem relatively well recovered with respect to motor function, there may still be immense 'invisible' damage that leads to loss of independence," said Frank-Erik de Leeuw, Ph.D., senior author of the study and associate professor of neurology at the Radboud University ...

Australian astronomers have discovered what makes some spiral galaxies fat and bulging while others are flat discs — and it's all about how fast they spin. The research, led by the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) in Perth, found that fast-rotating spiral galaxies are flat and thin while equally sized galaxies that rotate slowly are fatter. The study was published today in the prestigious Astrophysical Journal and was part of "The Evolving Universe" research theme of the ARC Centre of Excellence for All-sky Astrophysics (CAASTRO). ICRAR Research ...

Researchers at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH)/Harvard Medical School, Drs. Beste Kinikoglu and Yawei Kong, led by Dr. Eric C. Liao, cultured and characterized for the first time multipotent neural crest cells isolated from zebrafish embryos. This important study is reported in the February 2014 issue of Experimental Biology and Medicine. Neural crest is a unique cell population induced at the lateral border of the neural plate during embryogenesis and vertebrate development depends on these multipotent migratory cells. Defects in neural crest development result ...

HOUSTON, Feb. 27, 2014 – A University of Houston (UH) scientist and his team are working to develop the next generation of prostate cancer therapies, which are targeted at metabolism. With approximately one out of six American men being diagnosed and nearly a quarter of a million new cases expected this year, prostate cancer is the most common malignancy among men in the U.S. Since prostate cancer relies on androgens for growth and survival, androgen ablation therapies are the standard of care for late-stage disease. While patients initially respond favorably to this ...

University of Adelaide researchers have developed a new web-based tool to help unlock the complex genetics and biological processes behind grapevine development. Published in the journal BMC Genomics, the researchers describe their online database that can be used to examine how almost 30,000 genes work together in groups and networks to produce the vine and its grapes. "The complexity of plants is easily overlooked when we're enjoying a glass of wine," says project leader Associate Professor Christopher Ford at the University's School of Agriculture, Food and Wine. ...

For more than half a century, the American Bar Association has vetted the nation's judicial nominees, certifying candidates as "well qualified," "qualified," or "not qualified" and in the process rankling conservatives and liberals alike when nominees earn less than stellar marks. Now a new study suggests that the sometimes-controversial ratings could be tilted against minorities and women. An analysis of 1,770 district court nominations from 1960 to 2012 finds that the ABA systematically awards lower ratings to minorities and women than to white or male candidates. However, ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – A molecule in cells that shuts down the expression of genes might be a promising target for new drugs designed to treat the most frequent and lethal form of brain cancer, according to a new study by researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James). The findings, published in the journal Cancer Research, show that high levels of the enzyme PRMT5 are associated with aggressive growth of the brain cancer glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). The malignancy ...

CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. (Feb. 27, 2014) — Social workers will see their roles in patient care expand as hospitals and other providers draw on a range of professionals to meet the demands of the Affordable Care Act, experts told the Boston College Graduate School of Social Work Forum "Health Care Reform: From Policy to Practice." Former Harvard Pilgrim Health Care CEO Charles D. Baker Jr., the keynote speaker, said social workers bring an expansive view of care options and can play crucial roles, particularly under a "team-based care" approach. "When I think of social workers, ...

A new study from the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Services (APHIS) and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) demonstrates that it is possible to qualify bison coming from an infected herd as free of brucellosis using quarantine procedures. These bison can then be used to seed conservation herds in other landscapes without the threat of spreading the disease. In response to Interagency Bison Management Plan (IBMP) guidelines on federal and state bison management actions, the USDA, APHIS Brucellosis Eradication: Uniform Methods and Rules protocol for the quarantine ...

SALT LAKE CITY, Feb. 27, 2014 – Genetic and environmental evidence indicates that after the ancestors of Native Americans left Asia, they spent 10,000 years in shrubby lowlands on a broad land bridge that once linked Siberia and Alaska. Archaeological evidence is lacking because it drowned beneath the Bering Sea when sea levels rose. University of Utah anthropologist Dennis O'Rourke and two colleagues make that argument in the Friday, Feb. 28, issue of the journal Science. They seek to reconcile existing genetic and paleoenvironmental evidence for human habitation on ...

BOSTON -- In biology, as in real estate, location matters. Working copies of active genes -- called messenger RNAs or mRNAs -- are positioned strategically throughout living tissues, and their location often helps regulate how cells and tissues grow and develop. But to analyze many mRNAs simultaneously, scientists have had to grind cells to a pulp, which left them no good way to pinpoint where those mRNAs sat within the cell. Now a team at the Wyss Institute of Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University and Harvard Medical School, in collaboration with ...

NEW YORK (February 27, 2014) -- A new study led by Weill Cornell Medical College scientists shows that the most common genetic form of mental retardation and autism occurs because of a mechanism that shuts off the gene associated with the disease. The findings, published today in Science, also show that a drug that blocks this silencing mechanism can prevent fragile X syndrome – suggesting similar therapy is possible for 20 other diseases that range from mental retardation to multisystem failure. Fragile X syndrome occurs mostly in boys, causing intellectual disability ...

A new study led by the University of Colorado Boulder bolsters the theory that the first Americans, who are believed to have come over from northeast Asia during the last ice age, may have been isolated on the Bering Land Bridge for thousands of years before spreading throughout the Americas. The theory, now known as the "Beringia Standstill," was first proposed in 1997 by two Latin American geneticists and refined in 2007 by a team led by the University of Tartu in Estonia that sampled mitrochondrial DNA from more than 600 Native Americans. The researchers found that ...

Researchers have discovered how Native Americans may have survived the last Ice Age after splitting from their Asian relatives 25,000 years ago. Academics at Royal Holloway, University of London, and the Universities of Colorado and Utah have analysed fossils which revealed that the ancestors of Native Americans may have set up home in a region between Siberia and Alaska which contained woody plants that they could use to make fires. The discovery breaks new ground as until now no-one had any idea of where the native Americans spent the next 10,000 years before they appeared ...

In 2007, in an article published in Nature Neuroscience, scientists at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona) headed by Joan Guinovart, an authority on glycogen metabolism, reported that in Lafora Disease (LD), a rare and fatal neurodegenerative condition that affects adolescents, neurons die as a result of the accumulation of glycogen—chains of glucose. They went on to propose that this accumulation is the root cause of this disease. The breakthrough of this paper was two-sided: first, the researchers established a possible cause of LD and therefore ...

New research by UC Santa Barbara's Kenneth S. Kosik, Harriman Professor of Neuroscience, reveals some very unique evolutionary innovations in the primate brain. In a study published online today in the journal Neuron, Kosik and colleagues describe the role of microRNAs — so named because they contain only 22 nucleotides — in a portion of the brain called the outer subventricular zone (OSVZ). These microRNAs belong to a special category of noncoding genes, which prevent the formation of proteins. "It's microRNAs that provide the wiring diagram, dictating which genes ...

A big step in the development of next-generation fuel cells and water-alkali electrolyzers has been achieved with the discovery of a new class of bimetallic nanocatalysts that are an order of magnitude higher in activity than the target set by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for 2017. The new catalysts, hollow polyhedral nanoframes of platinum and nickel, feature a three-dimensional catalytic surface activity that makes them significantly more efficient and far less expensive than the best platinum catalysts used in today's fuel cells and alkaline electrolyzers. This ...

A team of French investigators has discovered viruses containing genes for antibiotic resistance in a fossilized fecal sample from 14th century Belgium, long before antibiotics were used in medicine. They publish their findings ahead of print in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology. "This is the first paper to analyze an ancient DNA viral metagenome," says Rebecca Vega Thurber of Oregon State University, Corvallis, who was not involved in the research. The viruses in the fecal sample are phages, which are viruses that infect bacteria, rather than infecting ...

VIDEO: A comparative analysis shows that stethoscope diaphragms are more contaminated than the physician's own thenar eminence (group of muscles in the palm of the hand) following a physical examination. Click here for more information. Rochester, MN, February 27, 2014 – Although healthcare workers' hands are the main source of bacterial transmission in hospitals, physicians' stethoscopes appear to play a role. To explore this question, investigators at the University of ...

NEW YORK, NY, February 27, 2014 — New research from Memorial Sloan Kettering provides fresh insight into the biologic mechanisms that individual cancer cells use to metastasize to the brain. Published in the February 27 issue of Cell, the study found that tumor cells that reach the brain — and successfully grow into new tumors — hug capillaries and express specific proteins that overcome the brain's natural defense against metastatic invasion. Metastasis, the process that allows some cancer cells to break off from their tumor of origin and take root in a different tissue, ...