Designing an effective HIV/AIDS vaccine is something of a paradox: a good vaccine would be safe and look enough like HIV to kick-start the immune system into neutralizing the virus – but the problem is that this is exactly what the human immune system has trouble doing even when it's exposed to the real thing. Now a team of researchers led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif. has developed a strategy for inducing a key part of an effective immune response to HIV. By tracing the evolution of HIV-recognizing molecules called antibodies taken ...

If you squeeze a normal object in all directions, it shrinks in all directions. But a few strange materials will actually grow in one dimension when compressed. A team of chemists has now discovered a structure that takes this property to a new level, expanding more dramatically under pressure than any other known material. The finding could lead to new kinds of pressure sensors and artificial muscles. Andrew Cairns, a graduate student at the University of Oxford and a member of the research team, will discuss the new material and its applications at the American Crystallographic ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Rhode Island Hospital researchers have found that multiple factors contribute to the burden felt by caregivers of people living with Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia. These factors include the direct impact of providing care upon the caregivers' lives, guilt, and frustration or embarrassment. The study is published online in advance of print in American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry. The study, conducted by Beth A. Springate, Ph.D, and Geoffrey Tremont, Ph.D, of the division of neuropsychology in the department of psychiatry at Rhode Island ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Rhode Island Hospital researchers have found that the absence of the Shp-2 enzyme near specialized cartilage cells can lead to the development of multiple benign cartilage tumors in mice, a model that recapitulates the rare human tumor syndrome metachondromatosis. Shp2 is an enzyme in the cell that regulates the activity of other proteins and signaling pathways. Mice lacking Shp2 formed two types of tumors: enchondromas and osteochondromas, and also developed deformed joints. The study is published online in advance of print in the journal Nature. ...

LA JOLLA, CA---- Stem cells are key to the promise of regenerative medicine: the repair or replacement of injured tissues with custom grown substitutes. Essential to this process are induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), which can be created from a patient's own tissues, thus eliminating the risk of immune rejection. However, Shinya Yamanaka's formula for iPSCs, for which he was awarded last year's Nobel Prize, uses a strict recipe that allows for limited variations in human cells, restricting their full potential for clinical application. Now, in this week's issue ...

The risk of catching some nasty germ in the Hudson River just started looking nastier. Disease-causing microbes have long been found swimming there, but now researchers have documented antibiotic-resistant strains in specific spots, from the Tappan Zee Bridge to lower Manhattan. The microbes identified are resistant to ampicillin and tetracycline, drugs commonly used to treat ear infections, pneumonia, salmonella and other ailments. The study is published in the current issue of the Journal of Water and Health. "If you find antibiotic-resistant bacteria in an ecosystem, ...

Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have determined the orbital motion of two distinct populations of stars in an ancient globular star cluster, offering proof they formed at different times and providing a rare look back into the Milky Way galaxy's early days. Researchers led by Harvey Richer of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver combined recent Hubble observations with eight years' worth of data from the telescope's archive to determine the motions of the stars in the globular cluster 47 Tucanae, which is located about 16,700 light-years away ...

As a class, people who don't drink at all have a higher mortality risk than light drinkers. But nondrinkers are a diverse bunch, and the reasons people have for abstaining affects their individual mortality risk, in some cases lowering it on par with the risk for light drinkers, according to a University of Colorado study. Multiple studies have shown that the likelihood of dying for people who drink increases as they consume more alcohol. Those same studies have shown that a person's mortality risk also increases at the other end of the spectrum — among people who choose ...

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is associated with an increased risk of developing cerebral microbleeds, according to a new study from researchers in the Netherlands. Cerebral microbleeds are a marker of cerebral small vessel disease, an important cause of age-related disability and cognitive decline. "The connection between COPD and cerebral small vessel disease was suggested by two earlier studies, but the connection between COPD and cerebral microbleeds, the location of which can help elucidate underlying disease mechanisms, has not been studied," said ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 19, 2013 – Many U.S. universities have no women at all among their physics faculty, and when people talk about gender equity in physics, this fact is often cited as evidence of a hiring bias. But a new analysis by the American Institute of Physics (AIP) Statistical Research Center challenges this argument, finding that the existence of all-male departments is not necessarily evidence of a hiring bias. By comparing the actual distribution of women in physics with simulated results, the report shows, if anything, that today there are more departments ...

Cancer survivors were twice as likely to experience severe menopausal symptoms compared to women who have not had cancer, a new Australian study has found. The study was led by the University of Melbourne and the Royal Women's Hospital Melbourne, with the King Edward Memorial Hospital and the University of Western Australia. The study was published in Menopause, the Journal of the North American Menopause Society. Lead author, Dr Jennifer Marino of the University of Melbourne and the Royal Women's Hospital said the study was the biggest of its kind to assess the impact ...

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– Two types of small beach critters –– both cousins of the beloved, backyard roly-poly –– are suffering localized extinctions in Southern California at an alarming rate, says a new study by UC Santa Barbara scientists. As indicator species for beach biodiversity at large, their disappearance suggests a looming threat to similar sand-dwelling animals across the state and around the world. Led by David Hubbard and Jenifer Dugan of UCSB's Marine Science Institute, the new work reveals a trend toward extirpation that has been growing slowly since ...

Boulder, Colo., USA – Eight new studies posted 26 June and 16 July add to Geosphere's cache of solid research on the nature and structure of North America. Locations studied: Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Colorado; the northern Cascade Mountains, Washington; the Sierra Nevada batholith; the New Jersey shelf; the Appalachian Basin of northwestern Alabama; the Sierra Nevada microplate (Walker Lane rift); and the West Tahoe-Dollar Point fault. A ninth study covers erosion and crustal deformation in central Taiwan. Abstracts for these and other Geosphere papers are available ...

No, those are not cars darting along a busy highway. The glowing specks you're seeing in this video (http://bit.ly/110LTfm) are millions of nuclei flowing through the tube-like filaments, or hyphae, of a single fungus cell. The video was produced as part of a study by UCLA mathematician Marcus Roper's research group that was the first to measure and explain this dynamic movement of nuclei in the cells of a fungus. "It's complex, beautiful and so dynamic," said Roper, an assistant professor of mathematics and the lead author of two new studies that cast light on ...

Asian Indians are one of the fastest growing ethnic groups in the United States, and roughly half a million people of Indian ancestry live in California — more than any other state. Individuals from this group are strongly predisposed to obesity-related conditions such as diabetes and heart disease, due in large part to physical inactivity, diets low in fruit and vegetables, and insulin resistance. Among other racial and ethnic groups, research has shown that religious practices and religiosity have been associated with obesity and greater body weight, but no one had ...

The search for new drugs, including those for cancer, is set to speed up thanks to a new research technique invented by scientists at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU). Named the "Cellular Thermal Shift Assay" (CETSA), scientists can now know for sure if a drug had reached its target protein in the body, which is a critical step in determining the effectiveness of most medicines. Presently, scientists can only hypothesise if a drug has indeed reached its target protein, leading to expensive and prolonged drug development process. CETSA will help scientists ...

SYDNEY -- The so-called trust hormone, oxytocin, may not improve the symptoms of children with autism, a large study led by researchers at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) has found. Professor Mark Dadds, of the UNSW School of Psychology, says previous research suggested that oxytocin -- a hormone with powerful effects on brain activity linked to the formation of social bonds -- could have benefits for children with the disorder. "Many parents of children with autism are already obtaining and using oxytocin nasal spray with their child, and clinical trials of ...

The results of a major international effort to assess the status of dozens of European fish stocks find that many of those stocks in the northeast Atlantic are being fished sustainably today and that, given time, those populations should continue to recover. The findings, reported in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on July 18, come as surprisingly good news amid widespread criticism that the European Union's Common Fisheries Policy is failing, the researchers say. "Contrary to common perception, the status of our fish stocks is improving," says Paul Fernandes of ...

VIDEO: We humans can remember events in our lives that happened years ago, with those memories often surfacing unexpectedly in response to sensory triggers: perhaps a unique flavor or scent. Now,... Click here for more information. We humans can remember events in our lives that happened years ago, with those memories often surfacing unexpectedly in response to sensory triggers: perhaps a unique flavor or scent. Now, researchers reporting in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, ...

Smoking is a well-known risk factor for subsequent alcohol abuse, but the mechanisms underlying this link are unknown. Now researchers reporting in the Cell Press journal Neuron on July 18 show in a study conducted in rats that even a single exposure to nicotine temporarily changes how the brain's reward system responds to alcohol and increases the reinforcing properties of alcohol via stress hormones. "Our findings indicate the mechanisms by which nicotine influences the neural systems associated with alcohol abuse, providing a foundation for conceptualizing strategies ...

The endoplasmic reticulum (ER) is the protein-making factory within cells consisting of tightly stacked sheets of membrane studded with the molecules that make proteins. In a study published July 18th by Cell Press in the journal Cell, researchers have refined a new microscopy imaging method to visualize exactly how the ER sheets are stacked, revealing that the 3D structure of the sheets resembles a parking garage with helical ramps connecting the different levels. This structure allows for the dense packing of ER sheets, maximizing the amount of space available for protein ...

NEW YORK, July 13, 2013 – Experts from the Comprehensive Center on Brain Aging at NYU Langone Medical Center will present new research at the 2013 Alzheimer's Association International Conference on Alzheimer's disease to be held in Boston, MA from July 13th through 18th, 2013. From basic discovery to clinical applications, NYU Langone Medical Center has been at the forefront of the diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer's disease since the 1970s. The Comprehensive Center on Brain Aging is devoted to research and clinical advances toward the treatment and cure of all neurodegenerative ...

Washington, DC (July 15, 2013) – The long-distance relationship has plagued college students and people relocated for work for ages. These relationships are seen as destined to fail, but are they actually creating stronger bonds than a geographically closer relationship? A recent paper published in the Journal of Communication found that people in long-distance relationships often have stronger bonds from more constant, and deeper, communication than normal relationships. Crystal Jiang, City University of Hong Kong and Jeffrey Hancock, Cornell University, asked dating ...

Crop rotation has been used since Roman times to improve plant nutrition and to control the spread of disease. A new study to be published in Nature's 'The ISME Journal' reveals the profound effect it has on enriching soil with bacteria, fungi and protozoa. "Changing the crop species massively changes the content of microbes in the soil, which in turn helps the plant to acquire nutrients, regulate growth and protect itself against pests and diseases, boosting yield," said Professor Philip Poole from the John Innes Centre. Soil was collected from a field near Norwich ...

PENSACOLA, Fla.—Forthcoming research in the journal Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry analyzes the physiological effects of three separate pesticides on honey bees (Apis mellifera). An international research team ¬- Drs. Stephan Caravalho, Luc Belzunces and colleagues from Universidade Federal de Lavras in Brazil and Institut Nationale de la Recherche Agronomique in France - concludes that the absence of mortality does not always indicate functional integrity. Deltamethrin, fipronil and spinosad, widely used pesticides in agriculture and home pest control, were ...