Patients with kidney tumours larger than four centimetres are much more likely to enjoy good long-term renal function if they undergo nephron-sparing surgery rather than radical nephrectomy, according to a study in the February issue of the urology journal BJUI. Researchers from the Department of Urology at Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany, studied 166 patients for up 19 years, with a median follow up of five-and-a-half years. The participants were split into two groups - 81 "younger" patients up to 55 and 85 "older" patients aged 65 and over. They ...

This release is available in Spanish. When we think of rapprochements with science fiction, almost instantly numerous references come to mind in the area of the narrative literature or film. Notwithstanding, since its origins until today, the literature of the theater has given a place to all types of genres and forms, including the genre of science fiction. That is the aim of this research, recently published in Insula, the most widely disseminated literary Hispanist review in the world. The study's author, Julio Enrique Checa, from the Department of Humanities: ...

Jerusalem, February 7, 2011 -- A low cost, nanometer-sized drug to treat chronic wounds, such as diabetic foot ulcers or burns, has been developed by a group of scientists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Harvard Medical School and others in the U.S. and Japan. Diabetes is a rapidly growing medical problem affecting close to 3 percent of the world's population. Poor blood circulation arising from diabetes often results in skin wounds which do not heal, causing pain, infection and at times amputation of limbs. Several proteins, called growth factors, have ...

Tel Aviv — Ask anyone who has ever tried to squash a skittering cockroach — they're masters of quick and precise movement. Now Tel Aviv University is using their maddening locomotive skills to improve robotic technology too. Prof. Amir Ayali of Tel Aviv University's Department of Zoology says the study of cockroaches has already inspired advanced robotics. Robots have long been based on these six-legged houseguests, whose nervous system is relatively straightforward and easy to study. But until now, walking machines based on the cockroach's movement have been influenced ...

Acupuncture and physical exercise improve hormone levels and menstrual bleeding pattern in women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), reveals research from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. PCOS is a common disorder that affects up to 10% of all women of child-bearing age. Women with PCOS frequently have irregular ovulation and menstruation, with many small immature egg follicles in the ovaries. This causes the ovaries to produce more testosterone which, in turn, leads to troublesome hair growth and acne. Obesity, insulin resistance and cardiovascular disease are ...

Why in the United States are the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer? Part of the answer lies in the unique economies of our larger cities, finds a study by Ronni Pavan of the University of Rochester and Nathaniel Baum-Snow of Brown University and the National Bureau of Economic Research. "Our results show that overall up to one-third of the growth in the wage gap between the rich and the poor is driven by city size independent of workers' skills," says Pavan. Using U.S. Census data and American Community Surveys from 1980 to 2007 across the entire ...

Using mathematical concepts, Princeton researchers have developed a method of discovering new drugs for a range of diseases by calculating which physical properties of biological molecules may predict their effectiveness as medicines. The technique already has identified several potential new drugs that were shown to be effective for fighting strains of HIV by researchers at Johns Hopkins University. "The power of this is that it's a general method," said Princeton chemical and biological engineering professor Christodoulos Floudas, who led the research team. "It has ...

Arnhem, The Netherlands, 7 February 2011 -- In the February 2011 issue of European Urology, Jean-Nicolas Cornu and colleagues reported the evaluation of the efficacy of prostate cancer (PCa) detection by trained dogs on human urine samples. In their article, the researchers affirm that volatiles organic compounds (VOCs) in urine have been proposed as cancer biomarkers. In the study, a Belgian Malinois shepherd was trained by the clicker training method (operant conditioning) to scent and recognize urine of people having PCa. All urine samples were frozen for preservation ...

Two new sources of soybean meal are capturing attention throughout the country. University of Illinois research indicates that fermented soybean meal and enzyme-treated soybean meal may replace fish meal in weanling pig diets. "The price of fish meal has exploded and is causing producers to search for new options for weanling pig diets," said Hans H. Stein, U of I professor of animal sciences. "Pigs are traditionally fed diets containing relatively large amounts of animal proteins such as fish meal from weaning up to 40 pounds when they can digest traditional soybean ...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — In two new works, an anthropologist tackles a perplexing question relating to the enormously successful "Body Worlds" exhibits: How does society tolerate – and even celebrate – the public display of human corpses? "Body Worlds – The Original Exhibition of Real Human Bodies" is the most widely attended exhibit in the world, said Jane Desmond, a professor of anthropology at the University of Illinois and author of a paper and book chapter on the subject. While the exhibition has generated some controversy, its promoters have succeeded in presenting it ...

How long your parents lived does not affect how long you will live. Instead it is how you live your life that determines how old you will get, reveals research from the University of Gothenburg recently published in the Journal of Internal Medicine. It is often assumed that people with parents who lived to be very old are more likely to live to a grand old age themselves. "But that's just not true – our study shows that hereditary factors don't play a major role and that lifestyle has the biggest impact," says professor emeritus Lars Wilhelmsen, referring to the 1913 ...

Washington, D.C.—Surprising new research shows that, contrary to conventional belief, remains of chitin-protein complex—structural materials containing protein and polysaccharide—are present in abundance in fossils of arthropods from the Paleozoic era. Previously the oldest molecular signature of chitin-protein complex was discovered in 25 million year old Cenozoic fossils and remnants of structural protein have also been discovered in 80 million-year-old Mesozoic fossils. Carnegie's George Cody and an international team of scientists discovered relicts of protein-chitin ...

A team of researchers at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, has identified an enzyme that protects against inflammation and joint destruction. Made when the researchers blocked production of the enzyme GGTase-I in transgenic mice, this unexpected discovery could lead to the identification of new mechanisms that control the development of inflammatory disorders, as well as new medicines. The article has been published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation (JCI). GGTase-I is found in all cells but is particularly important for the function of so-called CAAX proteins ...

Dengue illness, the most common mosquito-borne viral disease in the world, has expanded from its Southeast Asian origins and is resurgent in countries such as Argentina, Chile and the continental United States. The economic burden of dengue (pronounced DENgee) in the Western Hemisphere, according to a new study from Brandeis University researchers published today in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, is approximately $2.1 billion per year. This surpasses the loss from other viral illnesses on a country-by-country basis including human papillomavirus ...

After analyzing hundreds of proteins produced by the DNA of tumor cells, researchers have identified one protein that may be central to a new treatment for the often-fatal childhood cancer neuroblastoma. Oncologists hope to translate the finding into pediatric clinical trials of a drug that blocks the protein's activity. "Our study implicates this protein as a promising treatment target for high-risk neuroblastoma," said pediatric oncologist Kristina A. Cole, M.D., Ph.D., of the Cancer Center at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. "The fact that drugs acting on this ...

Using a unique and relatively simple cell-based fluorescent assay they developed, scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California (UC), Berkeley have identified a means by which fluoxetine, the active ingredient in Prozac, suppresses the activity of the TREK1 potassium channel. TREK1 activity has been implicated in mood regulation and could be an important target for fluoxetine and other antidepressant drugs. "Whereas the inhibiting of serotonin re-uptake remains fluoxetine's primary ...

WASHINGTON — When people think unpleasant events are over, they remember them as being less painful or annoying than when they expect them to happen again, pointing to the power of expectation to help people brace for the worst, according to studies published by the American Psychological Association. In a series of eight studies exposing people to annoying noise, subjecting them to tedious computer tasks, or asking them about menstrual pain, participants recalled such events as being significantly more negative if they expected them to happen again soon. This reaction ...

Electric power and electronics are playing an ever-increasing role in all kinds of vehicles. Currently copper is the conductive material of choice. But in comparison to aluminum copper is heavy and expensive. In particular for fully electric vehicles the switch to the cheaper and lighter aluminum would be an interesting option. That is why the optimization of intricate power supply networks is now in the focus of engineering research. Scientists from the Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM), in collaboration with BMW engineers, have now found out what tricks make it possible ...

Language may play an important role in learning the meanings of numbers, scholars at the University of Chicago report. A study based on research on deaf people in Nicaragua who never learned formal sign language showed that people who communicate using self-developed gestures, called homesigns, were unable to comprehend the value of numbers greater than three because they had not learned a language containing symbols used for counting. By contrast, deaf people who acquire conventional sign language as children can learn the meaning of large numbers. Researchers believe ...

Defects in the genome are the cause of many diseases. Gene therapy – direct replacement of mutant genes by intact DNA copies – offers a means of correcting such defects. Now a research team based at the Medical Center of the University of Munich, and led by Privatdozent Dr. Carsten Rudolph, has taken a new approach that avoids DNA delivery. The team shows for the first time that chemical modification of mRNAs (the metabolically active molecules derived from genomic DNA that programs protein synthesis) provides a promising alternative to DNA-based procedures. In contrast ...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 7, 2011 — In time for the chocolate-giving and chocolate-noshing fest on Valentine's Day, scientists are reporting discovery of how this treat boosts the body's production of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL) — the "good" form of cholesterol that protects against heart disease. Just as those boxes of chocolates get hearts throbbing and mouths watering, polyphenols in chocolate rev up the activity of certain proteins, including proteins that attach to the genetic material DNA in ways that boost HDL levels. Their report appears in the Journal of ...

A digital signal processing technique long used by statisticians to analyze data is helping Houston scientists understand the roots of memory and learning, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases and stroke. Researchers at Rice University and the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) reported today in the journal Nature Chemical Biology that single molecule fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) techniques combined with wavelet transforms have given them a new view of the AMPA receptor, a glutamate receptor and a primary mediator of fast ...

ITHACA, N.Y. – It's an incendiary topic in academia – the pervasive belief that women are underrepresented in science, math and engineering fields because they face sex discrimination in the interviewing, hiring, and grant and manuscript review processes. In a study, "Understanding Current Causes of Women's Underrepresentation in Science" published Feb. 7 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Cornell University social scientists say it's just not true. It's not discrimination in these areas, but rather differences in resources attributable ...

TEMPE, Ariz. – Despite decades of research and billions of dollars, cancer remains a major killer, with an uncanny ability to evade both the body's defenses and medical intervention. Now an Arizona State University scientist believes he has an explanation. "Cancer is not a random bunch of selfish rogue cells behaving badly, but a highly-efficient pre-programmed response to stress, honed by a long period of evolution," claims professor Paul Davies, director of the BEYOND Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science at ASU and principal investigator of a major research program ...

PHILADELPHIA - So-called barrier sites -- the skin, gut, lung – limit the inner body's exposure to allergens, pollutants, viruses, bacteria, and parasites. Understanding how the immune system works in these external surfaces has implications for understanding such inflammatory diseases as asthma, psoriasis, IBD, and food allergies, all of which occur at the body's barriers. David Artis, PhD, professor of Microbiology and Gregory F. Sonnenberg, a predoctoral fellow in the Artis lab, have identified an immune cell population that acts as the body's border patrol with the ...