A research collaboration between the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University and Children's Hospital Boston has created a microfluidic device that can harvest rare circulating tumor cells (CTCs) from blood to enable their expansion in culture for analysis. These cells, which have detached from a primary cancer site and often create a secondary—or metastasized—tumor, hold an extraordinary amount of information regarding patient-specific drug sensitivity, cancer progression, and patient response to therapy. Such information could help clinicians ...

SAN DIEGO, April 24, 2012—A preliminary 16-person study suggests that eating pistachios may help alter levels of potentially beneficial bacteria in the gut, a finding that holds promise for supporting digestive health(1). The research, presented as an abstract this week at the Experimental Biology conference, is the first study of pistachios and almonds and their modulating role on the gut microbiota composition. "Gut microbiota, or the microbial environment in the gastrointestinal tract, provides important functions to the human host," said Volker Mai, PhD, lead study ...

City streets can be mean, but somewhere near Brooklyn, a tree grows far better than its country cousins, due to chronically elevated city heat levels, says a new study. The study, just published in the journal Tree Physiology, shows that common native red oak seedlings grow as much as eight times faster in New York's Central Park than in more rural, cooler settings in the Hudson Valley and Catskill Mountains. Red oaks and their close relatives dominate areas ranging from northern Virginia to southern New England, so the study may have implications for changing climate and ...

Women's charity Engender launched the Who Counts? campaign this month as a result of research from women's groups across Scotland highlighting the number of women forced into poverty because of low-pay, poor health and housing and/or a lack of access to childcare and education. The campaign is funded by the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, and aims to persuade public bodies to address poverty among women now before government efficiency savings drive down wages even further and condemn thousands more women and children to the poverty trap. Niki Kandirikirira, Engender's ...

Edinburgh and Glasgow account for nearly 1 in 10 of all referrals for enforcement action, topping the list of UK authorities, with almost six million cases being passed to bailiffs over the last three years. In total 27 local authorities in Scotland revealed figures that accounted for 20% of all UK referral cases. Big Brother Watch, a civil liberties and privacy spin-off from lobby group The TaxPayer's Alliance, revealed the figures following its freedom of information request of the UK's 433 councils. A spokesperson for Debt Solutions Company, Trust Deed Scotland, ...

TORONTO, April 24, 2012—A new study has found huge variations in what ophthalmologists charge for a device used in one of the most common surgeries in Ontario. While universal insurance covers the cost of cataract surgery and implanting an artificial lens, some ophthalmologists charge extra for implanting a special lens deemed not "medically necessary" or for related tests. This would include lenses that correct refractive issues such as farsightedness. Those "add-on" fees varied substantially, with some ophthalmologists charging as much as eight times as much as others ...

Funding cuts for malaria control are the single most common reason for the resurgence of the deadly disease, according to a new study that has linked overall weakened malaria control programs to the majority of global resurgences since 1930. The study, published in the April 24 issue of the open-access Malaria Journal, analyzed the causes of 75 documented episodes of malaria resurgence throughout the world over the past 80 years, both in countries that were close to eliminating the disease and those with higher transmission rates that were attempting to control it. Among ...

The Voice Over Cafe brings you the latest news from the voiceover industry! Full-time voice talents Terry Daniel and Trish Basanyi host this fun and informative show, bringing on a guest and features for every episode including "The Legal Minute" with VO artist and lawyer Rob Sciglimpaglia, The Voice Over Cafe Mailbag, and who knows what else! Average running time is 30 minutes. A few years back, Trish Basanyi and Terry Daniel recorded twenty episodes of "Voice Overs on Demand", a podcast that quickly earned a steady following of voice over pros and ...

Check out the advertisement that Spin and Win has released on some of the UKs most watched TV channels. It is a nice, modern and simple ad that highlights the GBP20 free with no deposit necessary for new players in order to try the games that the casino provides. It actually stands out from the norm. Have a peek at the advertisement itself and the website of the casino (https://www.spinandwin.com/). It is a sure thing that this casino will not disappoint you as both the team that built it, and the team that is behind the customer service department, have many years of experience. ...

Spin and Win casino has entered the UK online casino market with a number of unique features. Players at the new venue can wander around a small city full of casinos. Spin and Win 3D World is a small virtual city with various casinos where players can find more than 120 casino games such as slot machines, roulette, black jack and poker games. Players can navigate their alias through the 3D World and enter various rooms/casinos to try out the games. Games on one of these virtual building might include the likes of Double Bonus Spin Roulette while popping into the next ...

In a shock announcement the humble cup cake has been declared dead. Wanted for questioning for this shocking crime is the latest trend to arrive in Australia, the Bake Pop. Cake Pops are the new sensation that has swept America by storm that are made easily with the Bake Pop kit; available in Australia from today. Trend spotters have declared the cup cake fad is over with an astonishing 3.6 million Bake Pops sold in just three months last year in America. Cake pops are the new cup cake and they seem to be everywhere you look, taking over food blogs, replacing cup cakes ...

This week began with a bang for one lucky Crazy Vegas player when she hit a jackpot-sized win while playing at the casino. Crazy Vegas has revealed that M.W. from the Netherlands won a total of EUR14,000 playing the video slot game Mermaid Millions. The game is a 5-reel slot game with a progressive jackpot, which means bigger payouts and bigger rewards. M.W. has been a member at Crazy Vegas Online Casino for just over a year and has now joined the ranks of the many lucky players who can call themselves big winners at Crazy Vegas. The game Mermaid Millions has an underwater ...

SAN DIEGO— Over the past three decades, researchers have firmly established that the omega-3 fatty acids in fish oil, including eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), have healthy effects on the heart. Omega-3 fatty acids seem to help both in preventing cardiovascular disease as well as in preventing future heart attacks, strokes, and other adverse events in people who have established cardiovascular disease. These findings have been so strong that the American Heart Association now recommends eating fish or taking fish oil as a preventive measure both ...

Night-time departures, early morning arrivals, and adjusting to several time zones in a matter of days can rattle circadian rhythms, compromise attention and challenge vigilance. And yet, these are the very conditions many pilots face as they contend with a technically challenging job in which potentially hundreds of lives are at stake. In an article to be published in a forthcoming issue of Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, John A Caldwell, a psychologist and senior scientist at Fatigue Science, a Honolulu ...

Boston Law Firm Provides Seminar on Reverse Mortgages The cost of reverse mortgages has fallen dramatically, as the use of reverse mortgages has expanded greatly. This seminar will discuss aspects and uses of reverse mortgages, including using reverse mortgages to stretch a retirement portfolio, convert home equity into a tax-free income source, and financing long term care. Come and learn about options for your future financial planning. Featured Speakers: Leo J. Cushing, Esq., CPA, LLM Cushing & Dolan, PC Attorneys at Law Ellen J. Connors Reverse ...

If you walk into a cloud at the top of a mountain with a cup to slake your thirst, it might take a while for your cup to fill. The tiny, barely-there droplets are difficult to see, and for scientists they, along with rain and snow, are among the hardest variables to measure in Earth Science, says Ana Barros, professor of engineering at Duke University. As part of the Science Team for NASA's Precipitation Measurement Missions (PMM) that measure rainfall from space, Barros and her research team trekked into the Great Smoky Mountains and other areas of the southern Appalachian ...

The New York State Consumer Protection Board has issued a directive urging consumers to make sure their children and loved ones are protected from extremely painful and possibly fatal scalding burns. If you or someone you love has been scarred, disfigured, or disabled due to burn injuries, contact a New York litigation lawyer to learn more about your legal rights. Here are some helpful hints: - Home water temperature should be set at 120 degrees Fahrenheit or lower. - All domestic hot water lines should have an anti-scald device installed to interrupt the flow of hot ...

Research Now, the leading global online sampling and data collection company, has announced that it has recently received the well-respected TRUSTe Email and Website Privacy Seal of Approval for its Valued Opinions panel in the United Kingdom. Research Now joins over 5,000 companies committed to building consumer trust online through participation in the TRUSTe Privacy Seal programme. "The new certification is evidence of our commitment to not only be compliant with European privacy laws and meet all necessary requirements for safely collecting personal data and ...

The coolest new nanomaterial of the 21st century could boost the efficiency of the next generation of solar panels, a team of Michigan Technological University materials scientists has discovered. Graphene, a two-dimensional honeycomb of carbon atoms, is a rising star in the materials community for its radical properties. One of those properties is electrical conductivity, which could make it a key ingredient in the next generation of photovoltaic cells, says Yun Hang Hu, a professor of materials science and engineering. Dye-sensitized solar cells don't rely on rare ...

Macdonald Hotels & Resorts, the UK's largest privately owned hotel group, with a portfolio of over forty-five 4 and 5 star hotels and resorts throughout the UK and Spain, has announced two new appointments to its senior management team: Debbie Milburn joins the group as Head of Marketing and Stephen Dodman joins as Revenue Director. Stephen joins Macdonald Hotels & Resorts to oversee all revenue management, including distribution and pricing. His appointment follows several years spent with von Essen Hotels where he was most recently Sales & Marketing Director. ...

Saturn's giant moon Titan hides within a thick, smoggy atmosphere that's well-known to scientists as one of the most complex chemical environments in the solar system. It's a productive "factory" cranking out hydrocarbons that rain down on Titan's icy surface, cloaking it in soot and, with a brutally cold surface temperature of around minus 270 degrees Fahrenheit, forming lakes of liquid methane and ethane. However the most important raw ingredient in this chemical factory - methane gas, a molecule made up of one carbon atom joined to four hydrogen atoms – should not ...

Wallis has announced that Louise Redknapp, singer, TV presenter and wife of footballer Jamie Redknapp, will be the face of its petite clothing collection. The collection features a range of garments specifically designed for women with a smaller frame. As a confident, petite woman, Redknapp understands the importance of dressing for one's shape and is therefore an ideal ambassador for Wallis' petite clothing collection. As one of the UK's most relatable and friendly media personalities, Redknapp has organically become a style icon for British women. By modelling Wallis' ...

Eurostar, the high speed rail service between the UK and mainland Europe, has reported a good start to the year, with continued growth in sales revenues and passenger numbers. It reported that sales revenues are up 7% to GBP211 million from GBP197 million in Q1 2011. Passenger numbers are also up 4% to 2.24 million in Q1 2012 from 2.15 million in the same quarter in 2011. The growth over the last three months has been driven by an increase in leisure travel with business travel in the first quarter of the year remaining broadly flat compared with 2011. In addition to ...

For centuries, women have been reporting engorgement of the upper, anterior part of the vagina during the stage of sexual excitement, despite the fact the structure of this phenomenon had not been anatomically determined. A new study published in The Journal of Sexual Medicine documents that this elusive structure does exist anatomically. Adam Ostrzenski, M.D., Ph.D., of the Institute of Gynecology in St. Petersburg, FL, conducted a stratum-by-stratum anterior vaginal wall dissection on an 83-year-old cadaver. The dissection established the presence of the G-spot, a ...

For intended parents that can't conceive children, adoption is a common option. Surrogacy has been seen as more expensive, but with the benefit that the child is biologically related. A third option has emerged with the best of both worlds. Surrogacy in India is a path to parenthood that costs about the same as adoption and still has the benefit of a genetic relationship. What's more, many parents find that they can't adopt abroad because of age restrictions, bias against singles or gay couples, or other rules. There are no such restrictions governing surrogacy in India. ...