PASADENA, Calif.—In 1969, an exploding fireball tore through the sky over Mexico, scattering thousands of pieces of meteorite across the state of Chihuahua. More than 40 years later, the Allende meteorite is still serving the scientific community as a rich source of information about the early stages of our solar system's evolution. Recently, scientists from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) discovered a new mineral embedded in the space rock—one they believe to be among the oldest minerals formed in the solar system. Dubbed panguite, the new titanium oxide ...

(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) — A new study published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) found that the federal government made about $13 billion in duplicative payments to provide health-care services to veterans who were simultaneously enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans from 2004-2009. The study was conducted by researchers at Brown University, VA Palo Alto Medical Center and the Institute for Population Health Improvement at UC Davis Health System. Some veterans are entitled to health-care coverage through both the U.S. Department of Veterans ...

As the Supreme Court prepares to issue its ruling on Thursday, Americans are divided along party, ideology and gender lines on a key provision of the healthcare law. A new National Agenda Opinion Poll by the University of Delaware's Center for Political Communication reveals women are significantly more likely to support health insurance requirements than men. Additionally, Democrats and liberals overwhelmingly favor insurance mandates, whereas large majorities of Republicans and conservatives oppose them. The national telephone survey of 906 Americans was conducted ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Drug traffickers who want to leave the "game" behind often struggle to do so because they fear loss of power and status, a new study shows. Those who do leave the illegal drug trade often do so because of a complex mixture of issues including fatherhood, drug use and abuse, and threat of punishment by authorities or fear of retaliation. Researchers concluded that traffickers need ways that allow them to leave the drug business without surrendering their entire identity. The new article, now online in the International Journal of Drug Policy, is one ...

Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center have conducted a clinical trial aimed at preventing graft vs. host disease (GVHD) in patients who have received hematopoietic (blood) cell transplants (HCT). The study, comparing the drug tacrolimus (TAC) in combination with either methotrexate (MTX ) or sirolimus (SIR), found that the sirolimus/tacrolimus (SIR/TAC) combination was more effective in preventing grades II-IV acute GVHD and moderate-severe chronic GVHD after allogeneic blood cell transplantation. The study randomized 74 patients, ages 16 to 70, to receive either SIR/TAC ...

A patient registry is proving invaluable in cataloging the clinical features, symptoms, severity, and outcomes of fibromuscular dysplasia (FMD), a non-inflammatory vascular disease that can cause narrowing of arteries in the carotid (neck) and renal (kidney) arteries, which can result in headache, strokes, and aneurysms. Registry data revealed that 91 percent of patients are women diagnosed in the prime of their lives. As a result, physicians are developing best practices that can lead to early diagnosis and treatment with the goal of improved outcomes and fewer adverse ...

How do denser neighborhoods affect property values? And what's the economic value of walkable neighborhoods? A study conducted by researchers at the University of Washington College of Built Environments and a South Korean university shows that, contrary to popular belief, there's a positive association between higher neighborhood density and the value of single-family residential properties. Researchers modeled the values of single-family homes, multifamily rental buildings, commercial spaces and offices in King County, Wash., which includes Seattle. They used ...

(Boston) – Researchers from Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) have found that the incidence of gout and hyperuricemia (high uric acid levels) in the U.S. has risen significantly over the last 20 years and is associated with major medical disorders like hypertension and chronic kidney disease. The study, which is published in the American Journal of Medicine, was led by Hyon Choi, MD, DrPH, professor of medicine in the section of rheumatology and the clinical epidemiology unit at BUSM and rheumatologist at Boston Medical Center (BMC). Gout is a common inflammatory ...

Modern research tools like supercomputers, particle colliders, and telescopes are generating so much data, so quickly, many scientists fear that soon they will not be able to keep up with the deluge. "These instruments are capable of answering some of our most fundamental scientific questions, but it is all for nothing if we can't get a handle on the data and make sense of it," says Surendra Byna of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's (Berkeley Lab's) Scientific Data Management Group. That's why Byna and several of his colleagues from the Berkeley Lab's Computational ...

Putnam Valley, NY. (June 26 , 2012) – Optimal stem cell therapy delivery to damaged areas of the heart after myocardial infarction has been hampered by inefficient homing of cells to the damaged site. However, using rat models, researchers in France have used a magnet to guide cells loaded with iron oxide nanoparticles to key sites, enhancing the myocardial retention of intravascularly delivered endothelial progenitor cells. The study is published in a recent issue of Cell Transplantation (21:4), now freely available on-line at http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/cog/ct/, ...

Putnam Valley, NY. (June 26 , 2012) –Researchers in Japan who evaluated the risks and efficacy of transplanting two varieties of stem cells into mouse cochlea have concluded that both adult-derived induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells and mouse embryonic stem (ES) cells demonstrate similar survival and neural differentiation capabilities. However, there is a risk of tumor growth associated with transplanting iPS cells into mouse cochleae. Given the potential for tumorigenesis, they concluded that the source of iPS cells is a critical issue for iPS cell-based therapy. Their ...

LEXINGTON, Ky. (June 26, 2012) — A new study by the University of Kentucky Markey Cancer Center shows that patients reported significant improvement in side effects of cancer treatment following just one Jin Shin Jyutsu session. Jin Shin Jyutsu is an ancient form of touch therapy similar to acupuncture in philosophy. Presented at the 2012 Markey Cancer Center Research Day by Jennifer Bradley who is the Jin Shin Jyutsu integrative practitioner at Markey, the study included 159 current cancer patients. Before and after each Jin Shin Jyutsu session, Bradley asked patients ...

ROCHESTER, Minn. -- Preventive mammography rates in women in their 40s have dropped nearly 6 percent nationwide since the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommended against routine mammograms for women in this age group, a Mayo Clinic analysis shows. That represents a small but significant decrease since the controversial guidelines were released, the researchers say. Their findings are being presented at the Academy Health Annual Research Meeting, June 24-26, in Orlando, Fla. "The 2009 USPSTF guidelines resulted in significant backlash among patients, physicians ...

Wedding DJs everywhere should be worried about job security now that a new robot is on the scene. Shimi, a musical companion developed by Georgia Tech's Center for Music Technology, recommends songs, dances to the beat and keeps the music pumping based on listener feedback. The smartphone-enabled, one-foot-tall robot is billed as an interactive "musical buddy." "Shimi is designed to change the way that people enjoy and think about their music," said Professor Gil Weinberg, director of Georgia Tech's Center for Music Technology and the robot's creator. He will ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---A lab-on-a-chip technology that measures trace amounts of air contaminants in homes was successfully field-tested by researchers at the University of Michigan. Even in the presence of 50 other indoor air contaminants, the U-M-built microsystem found levels of the targeted contaminant so low that it would be analogous to finding a particular silver dollar in a roll stretching from Detroit to Salt Lake City. "This is the first (known) study of its kind," said Ted Zellers, professor in the U-M School of Public Health and the Department of Chemistry, ...

Another tropical depression was born in the western North Pacific, and NASA's Terra satellite captured an infrared image of the newborn cyclone. Tropical depression Doksuri, known in the Philippines as Dindo, was born during the early hours of June 26, 2012 in the western North Pacific Ocean. The Moderate Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument onboard NASA's Terra satellite as captured an infrared image of the newborn storm on June 26 at 0228 UTC. The image revealed higher thunderstorms around the center of Tropical Depression Doksuri that were casting shadows on ...

Nearly half of the United States' airborne fire suppression equipment was operating over Colorado on June 25, 2012, CNN reported, as tens of thousands of acres burned. Fires raged in southwestern Colorado, northeastern Colorado, and multiple locations in between. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite captured this natural-color image on June 23, 2012. Red outlines approximate the locations of actively burning fires. The High Park and Weber Fires produced the largest plumes of smoke. The High Park Fire continued to burn west ...

WORCESTER, MA – Organisms employ a fascinating array of strategies to identify and restrain invasive pieces of foreign DNA, such as those introduced by viruses. For example, many viruses produce double-stranded (ds)RNA during their life cycle and the RNA interference (RNAi) mechanism is thought to recognize this structural feature to initiate a silencing response. Now, UMass Medical School researchers have identified a mechanism related to RNAi that scans for intruders not by recognizing dsRNA or some other aberrant feature of the foreign sequence, but rather by comparing ...

Seeing is believing, except when you don't believe what you see. Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have found a puzzling arc of light behind an extremely massive cluster of galaxies residing 10 billion light-years away. The galactic grouping, discovered by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, was observed when the universe was roughly a quarter of its current age of 13.7 billion years. The giant arc is the stretched shape of a more distant galaxy whose light is distorted by the monster cluster's powerful gravity, an effect called gravitational lensing. The ...

Scientists now have clues to how a gene mutation discovered in families affected with congenital heart disease leads to underdevelopment of the walls that separate the heart into four chambers. A Nationwide Children's Hospital study appearing in PLoS Genetics suggests that abnormal development of heart cells during embryogenesis may be to blame. When babies are born with a hole in their heart (either between the upper or lower chambers), they have a septal defect, the most common form of congenital heart disease. Although it's not clear what causes all septal defects, ...

Richmond, Va. (June 22, 2012) – A recent Phase I/II clinical trial has shown that a new combination of radiation therapies developed at Virginia Commonwealth University Massey Cancer Center escalates radiation doses to safely and effectively treat prostate cancer and lower the risk of recurrence with minimal radiation exposure to nearby healthy tissue and organs. Recently published in the journal Brachytherapy, a novel treatment protocol designed by Michael Hagan, M.D., Ph.D., radiation oncologist at VCU Massey Cancer Center, that combines intensity-modulated radiation ...

Chicago (June 27, 2012, 12:01 am [CDT]): Investigators at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, have reported on a new approach to treating previously inoperable complex pancreatic adenocarcinoma that has significantly increased long-term survival for some patients. Pancreatic adenocarcinoma is one of the most devastating forms of pancreatic cancer with survival rates of only 5 percent at five years. Surgical removal of these tumors offers a chance for cure, but it is estimated that only about 20 percent of patients can undergo this treatment. The ...

Chicago (June 27, 2012, 12:01 am [CDT]): Obese patients who need to have their appendixes removed fare better after a minimally invasive surgical procedure rather than an open operation, according to a new study published in the July issue of the Journal of the American College of Surgeons. While the traditional open operation (appendectomy) and minimally invasive procedure (laparoscopic appendectomy) are known to have similar outcomes for people of normal weight, surgeons at the University of Southern California's Keck School of Medicine found that obese patients had ...

In a recent Journal of Biological Chemistry "Paper of the Week," research led by Ayae Kinoshita at the Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine in Japan reveals the benefits of exercise in combating Alzheimer's disease. The most common cause of dementia, Alzheimer's disease results in the loss of cognitive faculty. In the majority of cases, Alzheimer's disease occurs after age 65, and factors such as diet and exercise appear to play a role in its development, with high-fat diets as a risk factor. Kinoshita's research compared the effects of 1) diet control, ...

An international team led by human genetic researchers at the University of British Columbia and Vancouver Coastal Health has identified the latest gene associated with typical late-onset Lewy body Parkinson's disease (PD), with the help of a Canadian Mennonite family of Dutch-German-Russian ancestry. Twelve of the 57 members of the Saskatchewan family who participated in the study had previously been diagnosed with PD. UBC Medical Genetics Prof. Matthew Farrer, who led the research, notes that unequivocal confirmation of the gene's linkage with PD required DNA samples ...