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, ...

In recent years, palm oil production has come under fire from environmentalists concerned about the deforestation of land in the tropics to make way for new palm plantations. Now there is a new reason to be concerned about palm oil's environmental impact, according to researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder. An analysis published Feb. 26 in the journal Nature Climate Change shows that the wastewater produced during the processing of palm oil is a significant source of heat-trapping methane in the atmosphere. But the researchers also present a possible solution: ...

MADISON – Mahal, the young orangutan who became a star of the Milwaukee County Zoo and an emblem of survival for a dwindling species, led an extraordinary life. It turns out, the young ape died an extraordinary death, too. Rejected by his biological mother at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colo., and eventually flown to Milwaukee aboard a private jet to live with a surrogate mother, Mahal became one of the Milwaukee County Zoo's star attractions. His unexpected death at age 5 in late December 2012 was a shock to the community that came to know him through ...

LA JOLLA, CA—February 26, 2014—Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have mapped key elements of a severe immune overreaction—a "cytokine storm"—that can both sicken and kill patients who are infected with certain strains of flu virus. Their findings, published in this week's online Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, also clarify the workings of a potent new class of anti-inflammatory compounds that prevent this immune overreaction in animal models. "We show that with this type of drug, we can quiet the storm enough to ...

VIDEO: A panda in the Wolong Nature Reserve munches on bamboo -- which comprises 99 percent of the endangered species' diet in the wild. Click here for more information. Pandas, it turns out, aren't celebrating the Year of the Horse. Livestock, particularly horses, have been identified as a significant threat to panda survival. The reason: They're beating the pandas to the bamboo buffet. A paper by Michigan State University panda habitat experts published in this week's Journal ...

PHILADELPHIA — A University of Pennsylvania research team has defined a possible new way to fight a disease that is currently treatable only with the most expensive drug available for sale in the United States. In a study published this month in Blood, the Penn team describes the strategy, based on the oldest part of the human immune system – called "complement" -- that could turn out to be less costly and more effective for the majority of patients with a rare blood disorder. Complement is a network of more than 50 proteins in the blood and on cell surfaces that quietly ...

College Park, Md. -- An international study of children's perceptions of cigarette package warning labels found that the majority of children are unaware that they exist. Children in countries where larger warning labels are used, and which include a compelling graphic image of the negative health impacts of smoking, were more likely to be aware of and understand the health risks of tobacco products. The study, led by Dina Borzekowski, Ed.D, in the University of Maryland School of Public Health (UMD SPH), and Joanna Cohen, PhD, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public ...

HONOLULU – Instruments strapped onto and ingested by sharks are revealing novel insights into how one of the most feared and least understood ocean predators swims, eats and lives. For the first time, researchers at the University of Hawaii and the University of Tokyo outfitted sharks with sophisticated sensors and video recorders to measure and see where they are going, how they are getting there, and what they are doing once they reach their destinations. (Go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHDOAmXRw-0&feature=youtu.be for video). Scientists are also piloting ...

Different brain regions must communicate with each other to control complex thoughts and behaviors, but relatively little is known about how these areas organize into broad neuronal networks. In a study published by Cell Press February 27th in the journal Cell, researchers developed a mouse whole-brain atlas that reveals hundreds of neuronal pathways in a brain structure called the cerebral cortex. The online, open access, interactive image database, called the Mouse Connectome Project, provides an invaluable resource for researchers interested in studying the anatomy and ...

Males are at greater risk for neurodevelopmental disorders, such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), than females, but the underlying reasons have been unclear. A large cohort study published by Cell Press on February 27th in the American Journal of Human Genetics provides compelling evidence in support of the "female protective model," which proposes that females require more extreme genetic mutations than do males to push them over the diagnostic threshold for neurodevelopmental disorders. "This is the first study that convincingly demonstrates a difference at the molecular ...