Dog owners everywhere know that one of the toughest jobs they have as pet owners is to provide a safe contained area for their pet that provides them the freedom to roam and play. Exercise is such an important part of a pet's life that finding the right pet containment solution to protect them is essential. Havahart Wireless recognizes the importance of safety for your pet and continues to help solve this ongoing problem for dog owners, by bringing the latest generation of wireless dog fencing technology to the marketplace. In 2011, Havahart Wireless was the first ...

Gardeners love growing tomatoes; so much so that 93% of gardeners say they grow this popular vegetable. (Yes, it's a vegetable, declared so by the United States Supreme Court in 1893. See this infographic for more details: http://www.avantgardendecor.com/resources/planting-articles/growing-tomatoes) The dilemma most tomato growers face, though, is the spreading of the tomato vines. Figuring out how to contain or control a tomato for best vertical, not horizontal, growth, is one of the biggest problems. Gardener's Blue Ribbon has studied this problem for many years ...

A new, free, online magazine titled "Love Your Yard," is now available for gardeners who are passionate about their yard and are looking for resources and inspiration as they begin the spring season of pruning, potting and planting. The magazine can be viewed at http://www.avantgardendecor.com/AGflipbook/loveyouryard.html. The magazine, displayed online in a digital page-turning format, is an interactive publication that allows readers to engage with the content and click through for additional information, education and product photos. "We are eager ...

In many neurodegenerative diseases the neurons of the brain are over-stimulated and this leads to their destruction. After many failed attempts and much scepticism this process was finally shown last year to be a possible basis for treatment in some patients with stroke. But very few targets for drugs to block this process are known. In a new highly detailed study, researchers have discovered a previously missing link between over-stimulation and destruction of brain tissue, and shown that this might be a target for future drugs. This research, led by the A. I. Virtanen ...

The composition of gut microbiota in a new-born baby's gut has been linked to the rate of early infant growth, reports research published this week in PLOS Computational Biology. The findings support the assertion that the early development of "microbiota" – the body's microbial ecosystem - in an infant can influence growth and thereby the likelihood of obesity. The sterile gut of a new-born baby is quickly populated by a variety of different microbes. This study identified connections between different bacteria and both expected and reduced infant growth rates. The ...

Doctors should not have the right or responsibility to force-feed their patients with genomic information about their future health risks, according to bioethicists writing on May 9 in Trends in Biotechnology, a Cell Press publication. They write in response to controversial recommendations from the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics (ACMG) on the reporting of incidental findings in clinical genome sequencing. "A lot of people in this field would agree that no one has a right to withhold your health information from you," said Megan Allyse from the Stanford ...

Coral reefs are in decline, but their collapse can still be avoided with local and global action. That's according to findings reported in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on May 9 based on an analysis that combines the latest science on reef dynamics with the latest climate models. "People benefit by reefs' having a complex structure—a little like a Manhattan skyline, but underwater," said Peter Mumby of The University of Queensland and University of Exeter. "Structurally complex reefs provide nooks and crannies for thousands of species and provide the habitat ...

Heart failure is one of the most debilitating conditions linked to old age, and there are no specific therapies for the most common form of this condition in the elderly. A study published by Cell Press May 9th in the journal Cell reveals that a blood hormone known as growth differentiation factor 11 (GDF11) declines with age, and old mice injected with this hormone experience a reversal in signs of cardiac aging. The findings shed light on the underlying causes of age-related heart failure and may offer a much-needed strategy for treating this condition in humans. "There ...

HOUSTON -- (May 9, 2013) – Amoeba eat bacteria and other human pathogens, engulfing and destroying them – or being destroyed by them, but how these single-cell organisms distinguish and respond successfully to different bacterial classes has been largely unexplained. In a report in the journal Current Biology, researchers from Baylor College of Medicine use the model of the social amoeba – Dictyostelium discoideum – to identify the genetic controls on how the amoeba differentiate the different bacteria and respond to achieve their goal of destruction. "No one has looked ...

Cambridge, MA, May 9, 2013 - Two Harvard Stem Cell Institute researchers – one a stem cell biologist and one a practicing cardiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital – have identified a protein in the blood of mice and humans that may prove to be the first effective treatment for the form of age-related heart failure that affects millions of Americans. When the protein, called GDF-11, was injected into old mice, which develop thickened heart walls in a manner similar to aging humans, the hearts were reduced in size and thickness, resembling the healthy hearts of younger ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Doctors often diagnose tuberous sclerosis complex (TSC) based on the abnormal growths the genetic disease causes in organs around the body. Those overt anatomical structures, however, belie the microscopic and mysterious neurological differences behind the disease's troublesome behavioral symptoms: autism, intellectual disabilities, and seizures. In a new study in mice, Brown University researchers highlight a role for a brain region called the thalamus and show that the timing of gene mutation during thalamus development makes a huge ...

SALT LAKE CITY—Researchers from Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah have discovered that while the genes provided by the father arrive at fertilization pre-programmed to the state needed by the embryo, the genes provided by the mother are in a different state and must be reprogrammed to match. The findings have important implications for both developmental biology and cancer biology. In the earliest stages, embryo cells have the potential to develop into any type of cell, a state called totipotency. Later, this potency becomes restricted through ...

Researchers from the RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Sciences have identified a gene that when mutated is responsible for a spectrum of disorders affecting the bones and connective tissue. This finding opens new avenues for research into a diagnosis and treatment for these until now incurable diseases. The study is published today in the American Journal of Human Genetics. Spondyloepimetaphyseal dysplasia with joint laxity, type I or SEMD-JL1 is a disorder of the skeleton resulting in short stature and spinal problems starting from birth, and worsening with age. ...

At the University of Geneva (UNIGE), the team led by Professor Jean Gruenberg has long been interested in the movement of lysosomes, the sub-compartments of cells to where endocytic vesicles deliver their waste content and the molecules destined to be destroyed. Within this context, researcher Christin Bissig, along with her international colleagues, carried out a detailed study of the route taken by Alix which is lodged inside the endosomal membrane. This tailing has highlighted how protein contributes to avoiding cellular digestion, like a door opening into the endosomal ...

DENVER, May 9, 2013 – A new Canadian study shows that operating without interrupting warfarin treatment at the time of cardiac device surgery is safe and markedly reduces the incidence of clinically significant hematomas compared to the current standard of care. The new findings were released today at Heart Rhythm 2013, the Heart Rhythm Society's 34th Annual Scientific Sessions, and will be published online today in The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). At least a quarter of patients that require pacemaker or implantable defibrillator surgery are taking warfarin ...

LA JOLLA, CA – May 9, 2013 – A team led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) has found how to boost or inhibit a gene-silencing mechanism that normally serves as a major controller of cells' activities. The discovery could lead to a powerful new class of drugs against viral infections, cancers and other diseases. "Learning to control natural gene silencing processes will allow an entirely new approach to treating human disease," said Ian J. MacRae, assistant professor in TSRI's Department of Integrative Structural and Computational Biology and principal ...

Cold Spring Harbor, NY – Two teams of investigators led by Professor Gregory Hannon of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) today publish studies revealing many previously unknown components of an innate system that defends sex cells – the carriers of inheritance across generations – from the ravages of transposable genetic elements. When activated, these troublesome segments of DNA, also called jumping genes or transposons, can copy and insert themselves at random spots across the chromosomes. In sperm and egg cells the proliferation of transposons can be particularly ...

Many medical issues affect nerves, from injuries in car accidents and side effects of chemotherapy to glaucoma and multiple sclerosis. The common theme in these scenarios is destruction of nerve axons, the long wires that transmit signals to other parts of the body, allowing movement, sight and sense of touch, among other vital functions. Now, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found a way the body can remove injured axons, identifying a potential target for new drugs that could prevent the inappropriate loss of axons and maintain ...

Often, it's not what you know, but who you know when it comes to business and research success and that still applies even in the age of online social networking, according to results to be published in the International Journal of Organisational Design and Engineering. Peter Gloor, Pierre Dorsaz, Hauke Fuehres and Manfred Vogel of the MIT Center for Collective Intelligence, in Cambridge, Massachusetts have compared the success of startup entrepreneurs and innovators with their activity on the social networking sites LinkedIn and Facebook as well as email networks including ...

Toddlers living in socially-deprived areas are at the greatest risk of suffering a scald in the home, researchers at The University of Nottingham have found. The study, published in the journal Burns, showed that boys aged between one and two years old and those with multiple siblings were statistically more likely to suffer a hot water-related injury, while children born to mothers aged 40 years and over were at less risk than those with teenage mums. The results could help GPs and Health Visitors identify those children most at risk of a scald and prevent injuries ...

Scientists at the University of Liverpool have shown that some atomic nuclei can assume the shape of a pear which contributes to our understanding of nuclear structure and the underlying fundamental interactions. Most nuclei that exist naturally are not spherical but have the shape of a rugby ball. While state-of-the-art theories are able to predict this, the same theories have predicted that for some particular combinations of protons and neutrons, nuclei can also assume very asymmetric shapes, like a pear where there is more mass at one end of the nucleus than the ...

In a joint project between the Universities of Strathclyde and Glasgow, Imperial College London and the National Physical Laboratory, researchers have developed a portable way to produce ultracold atoms for quantum technology and quantum information processing. Their research has been published in the journal Nature Nanotechnology, where it is featured on the front cover. Many of the most accurate measurement devices, including atomic clocks, work by observing how atoms transfer between individual quantum states. The highest precision is obtained with long observation ...

Different brain areas are activated when we choose to suppress an emotion, compared to when we are instructed to inhibit an emotion, according a new study from the UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Ghent University. In this study, published in Brain Structure and Function, the researchers scanned the brains of healthy participants and found that key brain systems were activated when choosing for oneself to suppress an emotion. They had previously linked this brain area to deciding to inhibit movement. "This result shows that emotional self-control involves ...

The understanding of how a powerful protein called p53 protects against cancer development has been upended by a discovery by Walter and Eliza Hall Institute researchers. More than half of human cancers carry defects in the gene for p53, and almost all other cancers, with a normal p53 gene, carry other defects that somehow impair the function of the p53 protein. Inherited mutations in the p53 gene put people at a very high risk of developing a range of cancers. The p53 protein's functions are normally stimulated by potentially cancer-causing events, such as DNA damage ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. — Men who experience high levels of sexual harassment are much more likely than women to induce vomiting and take laxatives and diuretics in an attempt to control their weight, according to a surprising finding by Michigan State University researchers. Their study is one of the first to examine the effects of sexual harassment on body image and eating behaviors in both women and men. As expected, women reported more sexual harassment and greater overall weight and shape concerns and disordered eating behavior (such as binge eating) in response to that ...