Piccadilly Backpackers has just been announced as a finalist in this year's National Business Awards UK. The London based hostel will feature in the Santander Small to Medium Sized Business of the Year Award. The Santander Small to Medium Sized Business of the Year Award is open to any organisation with no more the GBP25 million turnover in the last financial year. The award is designed to show a company that shows an established position in the market as well as growth, innovation and good business results. Piccadilly Backpackers has been shortlisted for the award ...

Topshop has announced it will be welcoming Ashish back for another collection of his printed t-shirts this January. Inspired by the fast-food industry, mixed with a touch of Ashish's trademark comic style, the collection is made up of two oversized t-shirts and two sweatshirts with images of convenience food featured on the front. These include an ice cream sundae, a fried breakfast in the shape of a smiley face, a hotdog 'happy meal' and a colourful iced doughnut. The bright pictures stand out against the plain white, navy and black backgrounds. Affectionately known ...

Tracesmart, one of the UK's leading data specialists, has entered into a three-year agreement to support the charity Missing People. Tracesmart will give practical support and financial investment to help Missing People provide a lifeline to the 250,000 people who run away and go missing each year. Founded in 1999, the Cardiff-based tracing company has helped many people to find friends and relatives who they have lost contact with. Tracesmart's online people search tool provides a fast and convenient way to find people as well as allowing users to use their address ...

A fun, interactive social media experiment has been launched today to map minor injuries and see which parts of the body Brits hurt most - the world's first Ouch Map has been launched by UK online health insurance provider Health365.com. Whilst data on more serious accidents and injuries involving hospitals and GPs is more readily available, less is known about the more frequent and often annoying bumps and bruises, grazes and scuffs that do not require medical assistance. The Ouch Map has been launched to monitor those minor injuries - from paper cuts and stubbing ...

Consumers are looking for honest information about debt relief, but the right information is often hard to find. TV and radio ads often contain bold promises that are not attainable for the average person, or are not the right type of solution for most people. Getting out of debt is one of the most common New Year's Resolutions, so this is an important time of year to learn the truth about the different ways to get out of debt. Most people do not realize that there are several different types of debt reduction programs, so they are sometimes surprised when their debt ...

January 11, 2011 – (BRONX, NY) – Intrauterine devices (IUDs) for contraception are safe and effective, but only a small fraction of women in the United States use them. Now, a national survey of family physicians conducted by researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University, has found that family physicians typically have gaps in knowledge about IUDs, are often uncomfortable discussing them with patients, and frequently believe that their patients would not be receptive to talking about IUDs. The findings are published in the December 3 online ...

January 11, 2011 — (BRONX, NY) — A researcher at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University has helped to develop the first genetic blood test for predicting the chances that in vitro fertilization (IVF) will lead to a successful pregnancy. The test, reported in the online medical journal PLoS One, is based on the finding that different subtypes of the FMR1 gene (also known as the fragile X mental retardation gene) in potential mothers are associated with significantly different chances of conceiving with IVF. "This is the first evidence that a specific ...

COLLEGE STATION, Jan. 11, 2011 – Biologists at Texas A&M University have made an important step toward understanding human mating behavior by showing that certain genes become activated in fruit flies when they interact with the opposite sex. Their research, published in the January 2011 issue of the journal GENETICS, shows that courtship behaviors may be far more influenced by genetics than previously thought. In addition, this new understanding as to why and how these genes become activated within social contexts may also lead to insight into disorders such as autism. "Be ...

GALVESTON, Texas — When most people in the developed world think of measles, what comes to mind is only a dim memory of a vaccination at a pediatrician's office. But while childhood vaccination has virtually eliminated measles from North America and much of Europe, researchers remain interested in the virus. This fascination persists partly because improving the measles vaccine could help eliminate the more than 10 million measles infections and 150,000 measles-caused deaths that still occur worldwide. But it also has another source: Scientists believe that modified ...

Some disorders of the brain are obvious — the massive death of brain cells after a stroke, the explosion in the growth of cells that marks a tumor. Other disorders, such as autism, schizophrenia and mental retardation show no physical signs of damage and are believed to be caused by problems in how brain cells communicate with one another. To understand the root of the problem of these latter diseases, visualizing brain activity is key. But even the best imaging devices available — fMRIs and PET scans — can only give a "coarse" picture of brain activity. UCLA neuroscientists ...

Morgantown, WV, January 11, 2011 – A Blanchette Rockefeller Neurosciences Institute (BRNI) study published today in the Journal of Neuroscience reveals underlying causes for the degeneration of synapses in Alzheimer's Disease and identifies promising pharmaceutical solutions for the devastating condition that affects more than 5 million people in the United States. The BRNI study is the first to achieve fundamental molecular understanding of how synapses are lost in Alzheimer's Disease before the plaques and tangles develop. At the same time, it is the first study to ...

The estimated total cost of cancer care in the United States in 2020 is expected to be $158 billion assuming the most recent observed patterns of incidence, survival, and cost remain the same. This represents a 27% increase from 2010 due only to the projected aging and growth of the US population, according to a study published online January 12th in The Journal of the National Cancer Institute. However, the authors also note the cost of cancer care could rise even more quickly under some reasonable assumptions such as a 2% annual increase in costs of the initial and final ...

Washington, DC – Tinnitus appears to be produced by an unfortunate confluence of structural and functional changes in the brain, say neuroscientists at Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC). The phantom ringing sounds heard by about 40 million people in the U.S. today are caused by brains that try, but fail to protect their human hosts against overwhelming auditory stimuli, the researchers say in the January 13th issue of Neuron. They add that the same process may be responsible for chronic pain and other perceptual disorders. The researchers say that the absence ...

Based on growth and aging of the U.S. population, medical expenditures for cancer in the year 2020 are projected to reach at least $158 billion (in 2010 dollars) – an increase of 27 percent over 2010, according to a National Institutes of Health analysis. If newly developed tools for cancer diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up continue to be more expensive, medical expenditures for cancer could reach as high as $207 billion, said the researchers from the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the NIH. The analysis appears online, Jan. 12, 2011, in the Journal of the National ...

(PHILADELPHIA) –The discovery that high levels of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol (the "good cholesterol") is associated with reduced risk of cardiovascular disease has fostered intensive research to modify HDL levels for therapeutic gain. However, recent findings have called into question the notion that pharmacologic increases in HDL cholesterol levels are necessarily beneficial to patients. Now, a new study from researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine shows that a different metric, a measure of HDL function called cholesterol efflux ...

A new study identifies a molecule that is a critical regulator of neuron survival after ischemic brain injury. The research, published by Cell Press in the January 13 issue of the journal Neuron, may lead to new therapies that reduce damage after a stroke or other injuries that involve an interruption in blood supply to the brain. Ischemic brain injury is damage caused by a restriction in blood supply. Neuronal death after an interruption in the supply of oxygen and glucose involves a complex cascade of pathological events and, although previous research has identified ...

NIH-funded researchers were able to eliminate tinnitus in a group of rats by stimulating a nerve in the neck while simultaneously playing a variety of sound tones over an extended period of time, says a study published today in the advance online publication of the journal Nature. The hallmark of tinnitus is often a persistent ringing in the ears that is annoying for some, debilitating for others, and currently incurable. Similar to pressing a reset button in the brain, this new therapy was found to help retrain the part of the brain that interprets sound so that errant ...

SEATTLE – Astronomers who survey galaxies in the distant universe are getting some unexpected help from gravity, according to a new study. In a presentation at the American Astronomical Society meeting this week and a related paper in the current issue of the journal Nature, researchers say that as many as 20 percent of the most distant galaxies currently detected appear brighter than they actually are, because of an effect called "strong gravitational lensing." The discovery could change astronomers' notions of how galaxies formed in the early universe. Haojing Yan, ...

Teeth and bone are important and complex structures in humans and other animals, but little is actually known about their chemical structure at the atomic scale. What exactly gives them their renowned toughness, hardness and strength? How do organisms control the synthesis of these advanced functional composites? Now, using a highly sophisticated atomic-scale imaging tool on a sea creature's tooth, two Northwestern University researchers have peeled away some of the mystery of organic/inorganic interfaces that are at the heart of tooth and bone structure. They are the ...

New British-led research shows that starting treatment of blood pressure with two medicines rather than the one produces better and faster results and fewer side effects – findings that could change clinical practice world-wide. The study, published in the Lancet, challenges popular medical practice for the treatment of high blood pressure. The research was led by Cambridge in collaboration with the Universities of Dundee, Glasgow and the British Hypertension Society. Doctors usually start treatment with one medicine and then add others over a period of months, if needed, ...

Targeted nerve stimulation could yield a long-term reversal of tinnitus, a debilitating hearing impairment affecting at least 10 percent of senior citizens and up to 40 percent of military veterans, according to an article posted in the Jan. 12 online edition of Nature. Researchers Dr. Michael Kilgard and Dr. Navzer Engineer from The University of Texas at Dallas and University-affiliated biotechnology firm MicroTransponder report that stimulation of the vagus nerve paired with sounds eliminated tinnitus in rats. A clinical trial in humans is due to begin in the next ...

WHAT: Adding new evidence to the debate on the best treatment for middle-ear infections, or acute otitis media, in young children, clinical researchers at the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center have found antibiotics to be more effective than a placebo in relieving symptoms. These findings appear in the January 13th issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. The study was funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health. Most American children with middle-ear ...

PASADENA, Calif.—Astronomers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), and University of Hawaii (UH) have discovered 16 close-knit pairs of supermassive black holes in merging galaxies. The discovery, based on observations done at the W. M. Keck Observatory on Hawaii's Mauna Kea, is being presented in Seattle on January 12 at the meeting of the American Astronomical Society, and has been submitted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal. These black-hole pairs, also called binaries, are about a hundred ...

In the late 1950s, Richard Feynman famously imagined a science where researchers and engineers could achieve remarkable feats by manipulating matter and creating structures all the way down to the level of individual atoms. Now, over fifty years after "There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom," four prominent researchers -– David Awschalom, Angela Belcher, Donald Eigler, and Michael Roukes -– are sharing their thoughts about the future of nanoscience and nanotechnology. In a special dialogue ahead of a Kavli Futures Symposium on the same topic, the scientists focused on ...

Most babies can reach out for and eat finger food by six to eight months, according to a study in the January issue of Maternal and Child Nutrition. However baby-led weaning - which advocates babies feeding themselves solid foods, rather than being spoon fed purees - could lead to nutritional problems for the small number of children who develop later than average. That is why UK researchers - led by child health specialist Professor Charlotte M Wright from the University of Glasgow, Scotland - recommend combining self-feeding with solid finger food with traditional ...