DALLAS – Feb. 6, 2012 – An endocrine hormone used in clinical trials as an anti-obesity and anti-diabetes drug causes significant and rapid bone loss in mice, raising concerns about its safe use, UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers have shown. The hormone, fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF21), promotes bone loss by enhancing the activity of a protein that stimulates fat cells but inhibits bone cells, researchers report in a study available online in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. “This hormone is a very potent regulator of bone mass,” said Dr. ...

This pioneering and remarkable community was created in 2008 in France to provide these people the chance to meet others of a similar mindset, who want a baby independently. Coparents.com has a comprehensive range of search options allows people to find the favoured person you require. Whether an individual or couple are looking for a co-parent, sperm donor or a surrogate mother, Coparents.com connects those who wish to have a baby, but haven't found the right person yet. The wonderful thing about Coparents.com is that it provides everyone who can't have a child ...

Montreal (Canada), February 6, 2012 – In a study published last week in the prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, a team led by Dr. Vincent Poitout of the University of Montreal Hospital Research Centre (CRCHUM)* has made an important step forward in understanding how insulin secretion is regulated in the body. This discovery has important implications for drugs currently in development to treat Type 2 diabetes, a disease which is diagnosed every 10 seconds somewhere throughout the world. Poitout's team studies the ...

New evidence-based guidelines from the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP) address the many risk factors for developing a deep vein thrombosis (DVT), or blood clot, as the result of long-distance travel. These risk factors include the use of oral contraceptives, sitting in a window seat, advanced age, and pregnancy. The Antithrombotic Therapy and Prevention of Thrombosis, 9th ed: American College of Chest Physicians Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Guidelines, published in the February issue of the journal CHEST, also suggest there is no definitive evidence to support ...

Savers in the Lancashire area have established themselves as the luckiest in the country as another 79 entrants into the Halifax Savers Prize Draw picked up a prize this month. A total of GBP10,600 is heading into the county in prizes this month, bringing the total amount Lancashire savers have won in the draw to GBP26,100 in just two months. A total of 153 local savers have won a prize of GBP100 or GBP1000 in the December and January draws. With over 560,000 registrations, the unique Halifax Savers Prize Draw has grown even further in popularity with UK savers in January. ...

Mapping the ancestry of sheep over the past 11,000 years has revealed that our woolly friends are stars among domestic animals, boasting vast genetic diversity and substantial prospects for continued breeding to further boost wool and food production for a rising world population. An international research team has provided an unprecedented in-depth view of the genetic history of sheep, one of the world's most important livestock species. The study, published February 7 in the online, open-access journal PLoS Biology, maps out how humans have moulded sheep to suit diverse ...

New evidence-based guidelines from the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP) recommend considering individual patients' risk of thrombosis when deciding for or against the use of preventive therapies for deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and venous thromboembolism (VTE). Specifically, the Antithrombotic Therapy and Prevention of Thrombosis, 9th ed: American College of Chest Physicians Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Guidelines, published in the February issue of the journal CHEST, focus on risk stratification of patients, suggesting clinicians should consider a patient's ...

CINCINNATI—An editorial authored by University of Cincinnati (UC) diabetes researchers to be published in the Feb. 7, 2012, issue of the journal Cell Metabolism sheds light on the biological factors contributing to rising rates of obesity and discusses strategies to reduce body weight. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, about one-third of U.S. adults are obese, a number that continues to climb. "While we don't usually think of it this way, body weight is regulated. How much we weigh is influenced by a number of biological systems, and this is part ...

One way to tackle a tumor is to take aim at the metabolic reactions that fuel their growth. But a report in the February Cell Metabolism, a Cell Press Publication, shows that one metabolism-targeted cancer therapy will not fit all. That means that metabolic profiling will be essential for defining each cancer and choosing the best treatment accordingly, the researchers say. The evidence comes from studies in mice showing that tumors' metabolic profiles vary based on the genes underlying a particular cancer and on the tissue of origin. "Cancer research is dominated now ...

Contrary to current convention by which infection with the organism Clostridium difficile is regarded as an infection that is acquired by contact with symptomatic patients known to be infected with C. difficile, these may account for only a minority of new cases of the infection. These findings are important as they indicate that C. difficile infection, which can be fatal especially in older people, may not be effectively controlled by current hospital infection strategies. In a study led by Professor Tim Peto of the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, UK, and published ...

In low- and middle-income countries, mild cognitive impairment—an intermediate state between normal signs of cognitive aging, such as becoming increasingly forgetful, and dementia, which may or may not progress—is consistently associated with higher disability and with neuropsychiatric symptoms but not with most socio-demographic factors, according to a large study published in this week's PLoS Medicine. The established 10/66 Dementia Research Group interviewed approximately 15 000 people over 65 years of age who did not have dementia in eight low- and middle-incomes ...

Online parcel delivery specialist Parcel2Go has applauded the drive and will to succeed of the thousands of people across the UK who decide to start their own businesses. In the face of rising unemployment across Britain and the threat of a double-dip recession, entrepreneurs of all kinds are grasping the opportunity to take control of their own future. Figures released last month by the Office for National Statistics showed the number of people registered as self-employed in the UK increased by 101,000 during the three months to November 2011, representing a 3.5 per ...

Edward Mills of the University of Ottawa, Canada and colleagues argue in this week's PLoS Medicine that the HIV/AIDS response in Africa needs a more balanced approach to gender, so that both men and women are involved in HIV treatment and prevention. Traditionally, targeted efforts at reducing the impact of the HIV epidemic have focused on women and children while men have received considerably less attention. The authors say: "The epidemiological evidence is accumulating, and indicates that males in sub-Saharan Africa are not accessing HIV services as often as their ...

The average person in the UK has had their main bank account for more than 20 years, according to new research from Halifax. In figures that demonstrate the average person's reluctance to move bank account providers, the bank found that: - 1 in 10 adults still use the account that they opened between the ages of 1 and 15 years old as their main account today - A third of adults opened their main current account between the ages of 16-24 - Over a quarter of people (26%) have held their current main account for more than 26 years Parent and student account define ...

CHICAGO – Administration of routine infant immunizations with a vaccine for serogroup B Neisseria meningitidis, a bacterium that is a cause of serious disease such as sepsis and meningitis, was effective against meningococcal strains and produced minimal interference with the response to the routine vaccinations, according to a study in the February 8 issue of JAMA. Certain serogroup B Neisseria meningitidis (MenB) vaccines proved effective in clinical trials and controlled a clonal MenB outbreak in New Zealand; however, the high strain specificity of these vaccines ...

CHICAGO – Among postmenopausal women with hormone receptor-positive breast cancer, increasing age was associated with a higher risk of death from breast cancer, according to a study in the February 8 issue of JAMA. "Breast cancer is the leading contributor to cancer incidence and cancer mortality in women worldwide, with 1,383,500 new cases in 2008. In the United States in 2008, 41 percent of these women were aged 65 years or older at diagnosis. Because breast cancer incidence increases with increasing age, changing demographics and continuously increasing life expectancy ...

CHICAGO – Although some data have suggested a possible increased risk of intussusception (when a portion of the small or large intestine slides forward into itself, like a telescope) after administration of the pentavalent rotavirus vaccine in infants, an analysis that included almost 800,000 doses administered to U.S. infants found no increased risk of this condition following vaccination, according to a study in the February 8 issue of JAMA. "In 1999, the rhesus tetravalent rotavirus vaccine (RRV, Rotashield) was withdrawn from the U.S. market due to a significantly ...

CHICAGO – Short-term use of the antibiotic cefpodoxime for the treatment of women with uncomplicated cystitis (bladder infection) did not meet criteria for noninferiority for achieving clinical cure compared with ciprofloxacin, a drug in the fluoroquinolone class of antibiotics for which there have been concerns about overuse and a resulting increase in resistance rates, according to a study in the February 8 issue of JAMA. The criteria for noninferiority was if the efficacy of cefpodoxime had been shown to be within a pre-specified margin of 10 percent of the efficacy ...

For all those who have wondered where they'd be without their mothers, a study reported in the February Cell Metabolism, a Cell Press publication, puts a whole new spin on the question. Mice whose mothers pass along a mutant copy of a single imprinted gene can't keep themselves warm and die soon after leaving the comfort of the nest. The findings also reveal that the babies require a second round of heat-generating brown fat to survive. "When that second wave is delayed, it gets them in the end," said Anne Ferguson-Smith of the University of Cambridge. The findings ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Parkinson's disease researchers at the University at Buffalo have discovered how mutations in the parkin gene cause the disease, which afflicts at least 500,000 Americans and for which there is no cure. The results are published in the current issue of Nature Communications. The UB findings reveal potential new drug targets for the disease as well as a screening platform for discovering new treatments that might mimic the protective functions of parkin. UB has applied for patent protection on the screening platform. "This is the first time that human ...

The aviation accident attorneys at Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman are representing the families of the two men killed in Robinson Helicopter Company's first R66 crash which occurred on July 12, 2011 near Flandes, Colombia. Jose Ricardo Cabrera Killed in the crash, was the owner of the R66 aircraft, Juan Pablo Gaviria, former president of the Colombian Civil Air Patrol, and Jose Ricardo Cabrera, his dear friend and a skilled helicopter pilot. The R66 crashed shortly after take-off from Girardot Airport in Colombia. According to the National Transportation Safety ...

HOUSTON -- (Feb. 8, 2012) -- A protein kinase known as ROCK1 can exacerbate an important process called fission in the mitochondria, the power plants of cells, leading to diabetic kidney disease, said researchers from Baylor College of Medicine in a report that appears online today in the journal Cell Metabolism. (ROCK1 stands for (Rho-associated coiled-coil containing protein kinase 1.) "We have shown the connection between ROCK1 and the progression to kidney disease through the effect of ROCK1 on the mitochondria," said Dr. Farhad R. Danesh, association professor ...

Visitors to Statuary Hall in the U.S. Capitol Building may have experienced a curious acoustic feature that allows a person to whisper softly at one side of the cavernous, half-domed room and for another on the other side to hear every syllable. Sound is whisked around the semi-circular perimeter of the room almost without flaw. The phenomenon is known as a whispering gallery. In a paper published in Nature Communications, a team of engineers at Stanford describes how it has created tiny hollow spheres of photovoltaic nanocrystalline-silicon and harnessed physics to do ...

While epilepsy surgery is a safe and effective intervention for seizure control, medical therapy remains the more prominent treatment option for those with epilepsy. However, a new 26-year study reveals that following epilepsy surgery, nearly half of participants were free of disabling seizures and 80% reported better quality of life than before surgery. Findings from this study—the largest long-term study to date—are now available in Epilepsia, a journal published by Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE). More than 50 million ...

### Additional authors on the study include: Elie Ghanem, MD and Bahar Adeli, BA, both with the Rothman Institute at Jefferson. About Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals (TJUH) are dedicated to excellence in patient care, patient safety and the quality of the healthcare experience. Consistently ranked by U.S. News & World Report among the nation's top hospitals, Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, established in 1825, has over 900 licensed acute care beds with major programs in a wide range of clinical specialties. ...