BOSTON -- In the complex chain of molecular events that underlie eating behaviors and body weight, the AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) enzyme has proven to be a critical link. Now, researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) have identified the mechanism responsible for inhibition of AMPK activity in the hypothalamus, a discovery that not only provides a deeper understanding of energy balance but also reveals a critical integration point where multiple signaling pathways, including PI3K-AKT and mTOR converge. Described in the July 3 issue of Cell ...

WASHINGTON, July 3, 2012 — From the hiss of the fuse to the boom and burst of colors, an American Chemical Society (ACS) video, available again this year, explains the science behind the exciting sights and sounds of Fourth of July fireworks. The video is available at www.BytesizeScience.com. The Chemistry of Fireworks describes how these perennial crowd-pleasers represent chemistry-in-action with a demonstration by fireworks expert John A. Conkling, Ph.D. Author of The Chemistry of Pyrotechnics, Basic Principles and Theory, Conkling is an adjunct professor with Washington ...

DARPA's UAVForge, a crowdsourcing competition to design, build and manufacture an advanced small unmanned air vehicle (UAV), set out to determine if a loosely-connected community of UAV enthusiasts could develop a militarily relevant back-pack portable UAV with specific capabilities. By using a crowdsourcing design approach, the effort sought to inspire innovation and creative thought by lowering barriers to entry and increasing the number and diversity of contributors. More than 140 teams and 3,500 individuals from 153 countries and territories participated on UAVForge.net—the ...

Physicists from the Curie Institute, France, explored the relative impact of the mechanical pressure induced by dividing cells in biological tissues. This approach complements traditional studies on genetic and biochemical signalling mechanisms to explain experimental observations of how biological tissues evolve. This work, recently published in European Physical Journal E¹, could have significant implications for the understanding of cancer growth. Jonas Ranft and team created a two-component mathematical model accounting for both the cells and the fluid caught in between. ...

A robot that drives into an industrial disaster area and shuts off a valve leaking toxic steam might save lives. A robot that applies supervised autonomy to dexterously disarm a roadside bomb would keep humans out of harm's way. A robot that carries hundreds of pounds of equipment over rocky or wooded terrain would increase the range warfighters can travel and the speed at which they move. But a robot that runs out of power after ten to twenty minutes of operation is limited in its utility. In fact, use of robots in defense missions is currently constrained in part by power ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. ¬— The most common ailment to affect a horse is lameness. A University of Missouri equine veterinarian has developed a way to detect this problem using a motion detection system called the "Lameness Locator." Now, Kevin Keegan, a professor of equine surgery in the College of Veterinary Medicine at MU, has found that his Lameness Locator can detect lameness earlier than veterinarians using the traditional method of a subjective eye test. The Lameness Locator, which is now in commercial use, places small sensors on the horse's head, right front limb and ...

Cyanobacteria are among the most primitive living beings, aged over 3,500 million years old. These aquatic microorganisms helped to oxygenate the earth´atmosphere. At present their populations are increasing in size without stopping. It appears that global warming may be behind the rise in their numbers and may also lead toan increase in the amount of toxins produced by some of these populations. "Cyanobacteria love warm water, therefore an increase in temperature during this century may stimulate their growth, especially that of the cytotoxic varieties, which could ...

MANHATTAN, KAN. -- A Kansas State University-led quantum mechanics study has discovered a new bound state in atoms that may help scientists better understand matter and its composition. The yet-unnamed bound state, which the physicists simply refer to as "our state" in their study, applies to three identical atoms loosely bound together -- a behavior called three-body bound states in quantum mechanics. In this state, three atoms can stick together in a group but two cannot. Additionally, in some cases, the three atoms can stick together even when any two are trying to ...

WASHINGTON, July 3—Using the compound eyes of the humble moth as their inspiration, an international team of physicists has developed new nanoscale materials that could someday reduce the radiation dosages received by patients getting X-rayed, while improving the resolution of the resulting images. The work, led by Yasha Yi—a professor of the City University of New York, who is also affiliated with Massachusetts Institute of Technology and New York University—was published today in the Optical Society's (OSA) journal, Optics Letters. Like their Lepidopteran cousins ...

July 3, 2012, London, United Kingdom, and Shenzhen, China – The symposium themed "The Era of Next Generation Sequencing in Cancer", co-organized by BGI, the world's largest genomics organization, and Imperial College London, was successfully conducted in London, UK. Around 70 experts, scholars, and representatives from the local colleges, institutes and biotechnology industries attended the meeting with the aim to exchange their insights on high-throughput genomics and accelerate the further development of cancer research. The symposium started with a friendly opening ...

With the 2012 summer Olympic games about to take place in London, children everywhere are looking forward to watching their sports idols and role models take center stage. While the Olympics may inspire some to try a new sport, such as track, parents should be aware that this participation does not come without risk of injury. A new study by researchers at the Center for Injury Research and Policy of The Research Institute at Nationwide Children's Hospital found that from 1991 through 2008 more than 159,000 children and adolescents between 10 and 18 years of age were ...

The objective of this innovation project is to improve the learning environment of the assistant referees with multimedia materials which offer a visual experience that is the most similar to what referees on the pitch experience, and which can train visual perception in decision-making calls on off-side plays. For that purpose, researchers in the UC3M Television-Film group: memory, representation and industry (TECMERIN) are using this 3D recording technique for the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) to use as teaching material in its training courses ...

Zymoseptoria tritici is often a headache for European farmers. This ascomycete originating from the Middle East attacks the leaves of wheat plants triggering "speckled leaf blotch", which can cut crop yields by up to 50 percent. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology in Marburg and Aarhus University in Denmark have now taken a close look at the genome of a close relative, Zymoseptoria pseudotritici and have made a surprising discovery. The fungus which, unlike its more globally active cousin, preferentially attacks grasses in Iran, clearly ...

Baltimore, MD – July 3, 2012. Researchers from the University of Maryland School of Maryland report promising results from using adult stem cells from bone marrow in mice to help create tissue cells of other organs, such as the heart, brain and pancreas - a scientific step they hope may lead to potential new ways to replace cells lost in diseases such as diabetes, Parkinson's or Alzheimer's. The research in collaboration with the University of Paris Descartes is published online in the June 29, 2012 edition of Comptes Rendus Biologies, a publication of the French Academy ...

AURORA, Colo. (July 3, 2012) –Foster kids who receive mentoring and training in skills such as anger management, healthy communication, and problem solving are less likely to move foster homes or to be placed in a residential treatment center, and more likely to reunify with their biological families, according to a study by University of Colorado School of Medicine researchers. Many programs nationwide have tried to help foster children achieve better placement outcomes by working with parents and making system-wide changes. This study, published in Pediatrics, focused ...

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Children who are exposed to community violence continue to exhibit a physical stress response up to a year after the exposure, suggesting that exposure to violence may have long-term negative health consequences, according researchers at Penn State and University College London. "We know that exposure to violence is linked with aggression, depression, post-traumatic stress symptoms and academic and cognitive difficulties in the short term, but little is known about the long-term effects of such exposure," said Elizabeth Susman, Jean Phillips Shibley ...

Most people prefer to live in homes that are airy and flooded with light. Nobody likes to spend much time in a dark and dingy room. That's no surprise, since daylight gives us energy and has a major impact on our sense of wellbeing. It is a real mood lifter. But not everyone is lucky enough to live in a generously glazed home, and office spaces – where we spend many hours of each day – are often not exactly bright and breezy. Modern heat-insulating, sun-protection glazing for offices and housing doesn't make things any better, since it isn't optimized to allow the light ...

The effect on bat populations of a deadly fungal disease known as white-nose syndrome may depend on how gregarious the bats are during hibernation, scientists have discovered. Species that hibernate in dense clusters even as their populations get smaller will continue to transmit the disease at a high rate, dooming them to continued decline, according to results of a new study led by biologists at the University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC). One gregarious species has surprised biologists, however, by changing its social behavior. The joint National Science Foundation ...

DENVER (July 3, 2012) – As the United States confronts the growing epidemic of obesity among children and adults, a team of University of Colorado School of Medicine obesity researchers concludes that what the nation needs is a new battle plan – one that replaces the emphasis on widespread food restriction and weight loss with an emphasis on helping people achieve "energy balance" at a healthy body weight. In a paper published in the July 3 issue of the journal Circulation, James O. Hill, PhD. and colleagues at the Anschutz Health and Wellness Center take on the debate ...

NEW YORK (July 3, 2012) – The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) announced today that the markhor – a majestic wild goat species – is making a remarkable comeback in Pakistan due to conservation efforts. WCS-led community surveys have revealed that markhor populations in northern Pakistan's Kargah region in Gilgit-Baltistan have increased from a low of approximately 40-50 individuals in 1991 to roughly 300 this year. These community surveys suggest that the total markhor population where WCS works in Gilgit-Baltistan may now be as high as 1,500 animals, a dramatic increase ...

A slim waist and normal weight are usually associated with better health outcomes, but that's not always the case with heart failure patients, according to a new UCLA study. Researchers found that in both men and women with advanced heart failure, obesity — as indicated by a high body mass index (BMI) — and a higher waist circumference were factors that put them at significantly less risk for adverse outcomes. The study findings are published in the July 1 online issue of the American Journal of Cardiology. Heart failure affects 5.8 million people, including ...

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA – (July 2, 2012) – Using data from its unique online research platform, 23andMe, a leading personal genetics company, has identified seven single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) significantly associated with breast size, including three SNPs also correlated with breast cancer in a genome-wide association study (GWAS) now published online in BMC Medical Genetics. These findings make the first concrete genetic link between breast size and breast cancer risks. These findings were made analyzing data from 16,175 female 23andMe customers of European ancestry, ...

Mosquitoes are buzzing once again, and with that comes the threat of West Nile virus. Tom Hobman, a researcher with the Li Ka Shing Institute of Virology in the Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry, is making every effort to put an end to this potentially serious infection. West Nile virus infections often result in flu-like symptoms that aren't life-threatening, and some in cases, infected people show no symptoms at all. But a significant percentage of patients develop serious neurological disease that includes inflammation in the brain, paralysis and seizures. In his latest ...

TEMPE, Ariz. – Scientists at Arizona State University have discovered that older honey bees effectively reverse brain aging when they take on nest responsibilities typically handled by much younger bees. While current research on human age-related dementia focuses on potential new drug treatments, researchers say these findings suggest that social interventions may be used to slow or treat age-related dementia. In a study published in the scientific journal Experimental Gerontology, a team of scientists from ASU and the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, led by Gro ...

It's not just our DNA that makes us susceptible to disease and influences its impact and outcome. Scientists are beginning to realize more and more that important changes in genes that are unrelated to changes in the DNA sequence itself – a field of study known as epigenetics – are equally influential. A research team at the University of California, San Diego – led by Gary S. Firestein, professor in the Division of Rheumatology, Allergy and Immunology at UC San Diego School of Medicine – investigated a mechanism usually implicated in cancer and in fetal development, ...