BOSTON – November 28, 2012 – As part of their ongoing research on the role of genes in the development of type 1 diabetes, Joslin Diabetes Center scientists, in collaboration with scientists at the University of Würzburg, have demonstrated how a genetic variant associated with type 1 diabetes and other autoimmune diseases influences susceptibility to autoimmunity. The findings appear in the upcoming issue of Diabetes. Recent studies of the human genome have identified genetic regions associated with autoimmune diseases such as type 1 diabetes. Joslin scientists in the ...

A jet of X-rays from a supermassive black hole 12.4 billion light years from Earth has been detected by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory. This is the most distant X-ray jet ever observed and gives astronomers a glimpse into the explosive activity associated with the growth of supermassive black holes in the early universe. The jet was produced by a quasar named GB 1428+4217, or GB 1428 for short. Giant black holes at the centers of galaxies can pull in matter at a rapid rate producing the quasar phenomenon. The energy released as particles fall toward the black hole ...

Savana Inc CEO Michael Sanchez, was one of several financial services industry executives invited to speak at the recently held IMPACT 2012 Venture Summit Mid-Atlantic hosted by the Greater Philadelphia Alliance for Capital and Technologies (PACT). Sanchez joined a panel to share his insight on trends in Fin-Tech and how the financial services industry is changing to support new business models through the use of software-based innovation. Over a thousand attendees participated in the two day summit which featured speakers including former AOL Chairman Steve Case, former ...

In older adults, antipsychotic drugs are commonly prescribed off-label for a number of disorders outside of their Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved indications – schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. The largest number of antipsychotic prescriptions in older adults is for behavioral disturbances associated with dementia, some of which carry FDA warnings on prescription information for these drugs. In a new study – led by researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, Stanford University and the University of Iowa, and funded by the ...

When herbivores such as caterpillars feed, plants may "call for help" by emitting volatiles, which can indirectly help defend the plants. The volatiles recruit parasitoids that infect, consume and kill the herbivores, to the benefit of the plant. However, such induced plant odours can also be detected by other organisms. A new study published November 27 in the open access journal PLOS Biology shows how secondary parasitoids ('hyperparasitoids') can take advantage of these plant signals to identify parasitoid-infected caterpillars, and duly infect the primary parasitoid, ...

CHICAGO – An analysis of two heart failure therapies finds differing outcomes regarding improvement in survival, according to two studies appearing in the November 28 issue of JAMA. In one study, Adrian F. Hernandez, M.D., M.H.S., of the Duke Clinical Research Institute, Durham, N.C., and colleagues examined the clinical effectiveness of aldosterone antagonist therapy and associations with long-term outcomes of older patients discharged from a hospitalization for heart failure. "Aldosterone antagonist therapy [a diuretic drug] for heart failure and reduced ejection ...

DURHAM, N.C. – A large study addressing the effectiveness and safety of aldosterone antagonist therapy for older heart failure patients has found notable differences between the drug's results in clinical trial vs. what occurs in actual practice, according to researchers at Duke Medicine. Those differences have been noted anecdotally by doctors, and likely contributed to the slow adoption of aldosterone antagonists in clinical practice, but they had not been confirmed in a large study examining the drugs in real-world situations. The Duke-led research, published Nov. ...

CHICAGO – In an examination of cases of childhood pertussis in California, researchers found that children with pertussis had lower odds of having received all 5 doses of the diphtheria, tetanus, and acellular pertussis vaccine (DTaP) vaccine series; however the odds increased as the time since last DTaP dose lengthened, which is consistent with a progressive decrease in estimated vaccine effectiveness each year after the final dose of DTaP vaccine, according to a study in the November 28 issue of JAMA. "Pertussis remains a poorly controlled vaccine-preventable disease ...

CHICAGO – Although current guidelines recommend 3 months of anticoagulation treatment after bioprosthetic aortic valve replacement surgery, a study that included more than 4,000 patients found that patients who had warfarin therapy continued between 3 and 6 months after surgery had a lower rate of cardiovascular death, according to a study in the November 28 issue of JAMA. "Biological prostheses are preferred to mechanical valves for aortic valve replacement (AVR) surgery in elderly patients older than 65 years because of shorter life expectancy and lack of a need to ...

SALT LAKE CITY, Nov. 27, 2012 – A University of Utah study produced new mathematical support for a theory that explains why men in some cultures often feed and care for their sisters' children: where extramarital sex is common and accepted, a man's genes are more likely to be passed on by their sister's kids than by their wife's kids. The theory previously was believed valid only if a man was likely to be the biological father of less than one in four of his wife's children – a number that anthropologists found improbably low. But in the new study, University of ...

Coasts and estuaries are among the most rapidly developing areas on Earth. Night-time satellite images of the planet show that except Antarctica, continents are ringed with halos of brightly-lit human development. But coasts are also key wildlife sites. Every year, millions of waterbirds arrive from the Arctic to overwinter on UK coasts, yet scientists remain largely in the dark about how these birds respond to the bright lights of coastal cities and industry. To shed light on the issue, Dr Ross Dwyer and colleagues from the University of Exeter investigated how artificial ...

Sea-levels are rising 60 per cent faster than the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) central projections, new research suggests. While temperature rises appear to be consistent with the projections made in the IPCC's fourth assessment report (AR4), satellite measurements show that sea-levels are actually rising at a rate of 3.2 mm a year compared to the best estimate of 2 mm a year in the report. The researchers, from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Tempo Analytics and Laboratoire d'Etudes en Géophysique et Océanographie Spatiales, ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — About 70 percent of women who have both breasts removed following a breast cancer diagnosis do so despite a very low risk of facing cancer in the healthy breast, new research from the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center finds. Recent studies have shown an increase in women with breast cancer choosing this more aggressive surgery, called contralateral prophylactic mastectomy, which raises the question of potential overtreatment among these patients. The study found that 90 percent of women who had surgery to remove both breasts reported ...

Heart failure affects 3 per cent of the overall population, and exists in two forms: reduced ability to contract the heart and reduced ability to relax the heart. The former affects younger patients, mostly men, and is treatable. The latter, called HFPEF (heart failure with preserved ejection fraction), affects older patients and women, and until now there has not been any treatment available against the disease. In the present study, a team comprising researchers at Karolinska Institutet, Linköping University, Stockholm South General Hospital and Karolinska University ...

Digoxin, a drug that has been used worldwide for centuries to treat heart disease, is associated with a significant increase in deaths in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF), according to results from a study published online today (Wednesday) in the European Heart Journal [1]. Digoxin is extracted from the foxglove plant (digitalis) and it helps the heart beat more strongly and with a more regular rhythm. It is commonly used in AF patients, and also in patients with heart failure. However, it can be problematic to use successfully as there is a narrow dose range at ...

People with an overactive thyroid gland (hyperthyroidism) carry a greater risk of developing irregular heart rhythm (known as atrial fibrillation) than those with normal thyroid function, finds a study published on bmj.com today. As such, the researchers suggest there should be an increased focus on atrial fibrillation in patients with raised thyroid function. Hyperthyroidism occurs when the thyroid gland makes too much thyroxine (thyroid hormone), causing many of the body's functions to speed up. About 1 in 100 women and 1 in 1,000 men develop hyperthyroidism at some ...

Women who develop pre-eclampsia during their first pregnancy (known as preterm pre-eclampsia) - and who don't go on to have any more children – are at greater risk of dying from heart disease in later life than women who have subsequent children, finds a study published on bmj.com today. Women who develop the condition only in the final weeks of pregnancy (known as term pre-eclampsia) are at less risk. This high risk to one child mothers has not been previously reported and suggests that these women need special monitoring, especially if their pre-eclampsia was preterm. ...

That sea level is rising faster than expected could mean that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) sea-level rise projections for the future may be biased low as well, their results suggest. Sea-level rise potentially affects millions of people all around the world in coastal areas as well as megacities like Tokyo. "Global temperature continues to rise at the rate that was projected in the last two IPCC Reports. This shows again that global warming has not slowed down or is lagging behind the projections," Rahmstorf says. Five global land and ocean ...

Fresh insight into the parasite that causes malaria suggests a new way to develop drugs and vaccines to tackle the disease. Research into malaria parasites – which exist in male and female forms, and mate to spread the disease – suggests that treatments would be more likely to succeed if designed to target female forms of the parasite. Scientists found that male parasites can adapt to new surroundings faster than the females. When malaria infects the bloodstream after a mosquito bite, the male parasites are better able to react quickly to repeated attacks by the immune ...

Every kid knows that giant carnivores like Tyrannosaurus rex dominated the Cretaceous period, but they weren't the only big guys in town. Giant plant-eating theropods – close relatives of both T. rex and today's birds – also lived and thrived alongside their meat-eating cousins. Now researchers have started looking at why dinosaurs that abandoned meat in favor of vegetarian diets got so big, and their results may call conventional wisdom about plant-eaters and body size into question. Scientists have theorized that bigger was better when it came to plant eaters, because ...

LA JOLLA, Calif., November 27, 2012 – Herbs widely used throughout history in Asian and early European cultures have received renewed attention by Western medicine in recent years. Scientists are now isolating the active compounds in many medicinal herbs and documenting their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities. In a study published in the journal Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science, Stuart A. Lipton, M.D., Ph.D. and colleagues at Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute (Sanford-Burnham) report that carnosic acid, a component of the herb rosemary, promotes ...

WASHINGTON - The hydraulic system of trees is so finely-tuned that predicted increases in drought due to climate change may lead to catastrophic failure in many species. A recent paper co-authored by George Washington University Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences Amy Zanne finds that those systems in plants around the globe are operating at the top of their safety threshold, making forest ecosystems vulnerable to increasing environmental stress. In the current issue of the journal Nature, Dr. Zanne and lead authors from the University of Western Sydney in Australia ...

Boulder, Colorado, USA - Social and physical scientists have long been concerned about the effects of humans on Earth's surface -- in part through deforestation, encroachment of urban areas onto traditionally agricultural lands, and erosion of soils -- and the implications these changes have on Earth's ability to provide for an ever-growing population. The December 2012 GSA Today science article presents examples of land transformation by humans and documents some of the effects of these changes. Researchers Roger Hooke of the University of Maine, USA, and José F. Martín-Duque ...

ROCHESTER, Minn. -- It's one of the toughest questions patients and their loved ones can discuss with physicians: When is further medical treatment futile? The conversation can become even more difficult if patients or their families disagree with health care providers' recommendations on end-of-life care. Early, clear communication between patients and their care teams, choosing objective surrogates to represent patients and involving third parties such as ethics committees can help avoid or resolve conflicts, Mayo Clinic experts Christopher Burkle, M.D., J.D., and Jeffre ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- You've already decided that you're going to pop the question. Now comes another quandary: Where to get the ring, if you're buying one? The holidays are a busy time for engagements, and Trina Hamilton, a University at Buffalo expert in corporate responsibility, says socially minded consumers have a lot to think about when it comes to finding the right rock. In recent years, shoppers have turned to Canadian diamonds as news reports and movies exposed the diamond trade's role in fueling armed conflicts in developing countries. (Think "Blood Diamond," the ...