WASHINGTON, D.C., (Oct. 19, 2010) -- In remote, rural areas of southwestern China, villagers cook and dry their clothes by burning pieces of coal they pick up off the ground. This fuel releases a toxin that may be poisoning millions of people, according to an ongoing investigation by chemists at the University at Buffalo in New York. The researchers are presenting their work today at the AVS 57th International Symposium & Exhibition, which takes place this week at the Albuquerque Convention Center in New Mexico. The toxin in question is fluoride, which binds to calcium ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., (Oct. 19, 2010) -- Bacteria have a natural ability to attach themselves to surfaces, both natural and synthetic. Once attached, they often work cooperatively to form biofilms, thin layers of bacterial colonies that can coat the surface of a medical device and introduce the risk of infection. As a result, orthopedic implants, catheters, and even contact lenses can become vehicles for infection. Antibacterial materials on the surface can reduce the risk but generally these materials do not stick well to the devices. A research group at the University of ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., (Oct. 19, 2010) -- In a laboratory at Ohio State University, an ongoing experiment is studying why batteries lose their ability to hold a charge as they age -- specifically lithium-ion batteries, which have generated a lot of buzz for their potential to power the electric cars of the future. Preliminary results presented today at the AVS 57th International Symposium & Exhibition, taking place this week at the Albuquerque Convention Center in New Mexico, suggest that the irreversible changes inside a dead battery start at the nanoscale. Yann Guezennec ...

How parasites use different life-history strategies to beat our immune systems may also provide insight into the control of diseases, such as elephantiasis and river blindness, which afflict some of the world's poorest communities in tropical South-East Asia, Africa and Central America. The research is due to be published next week in the online, open-access journal PLoS Biology. The study, led by Dr Simon Babayan of the University of Edinburgh, showed using a mouse model of parasite infection (for diseases such as elephantiasis) that when the parasitic worms enter the ...

UPTON, NY — Many studies have suggested that genetic differences make some individuals more susceptible to the addictive effects of alcohol and other drugs. Now scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory provide the first experimental evidence to directly support this idea in a study in mice reported in the October 19, 2010, issue of Alcoholism Clinical Experimental Research. The study compared the brain's response to long-term alcohol drinking in two genetic variants of mice. One strain lacked the gene for a specific brain receptor ...

In contrast to the findings of some studies and the recommendations that pregnant women increase their intake of fish oil via dietary docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) because of the possible benefits, a randomized trial that included more than 2,000 women finds that use of DHA supplements did not result in lower levels of postpartum depression in mothers or improved cognitive and language development in their offspring during early childhood, according to a study in the October 20 issue of JAMA. "Epidemiological investigations from the United States and Europe demonstrate ...

Hospitals that had operating room personnel participate in a medical team training program that incorporates practices of aviation crews, such as training in teamwork and communication, had a lower rate of surgical deaths compared to hospitals that did not participate in the program, according to a study in the October 20 issue of JAMA. Adverse events related to surgery continue to occur despite the best efforts of clinicians, according to background information in the article. In 2006, the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), the largest national integrated health ...

Follow-up of about 11 years of participants in the Women's Health Initiative finds that among postmenopausal women, use of estrogen plus progestin is associated with an increased incidence of breast cancers that are more advanced, and with a higher risk of deaths attributable to breast cancer, according to a study in the October 20 issue of JAMA. In the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) randomized, placebo-controlled trial of estrogen plus progestin, after an average intervention time of 5.6 years and an average follow-up of 7.9 years, breast cancer incidence was increased ...

CHAPEL HILL – Researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine have discovered a gene variant that may protect against alcoholism. The variant, in a gene called CYP2E1, is associated with a person's response to alcohol. For the ten to twenty percent of people that possess this variant, those first few drinks leave them feeling more inebriated than the rest of the human population, who harbor a different version of the gene. Previous studies had shown that people who react strongly to alcohol were less likely to become alcoholics ...

Children with permanent hearing impairment who received hearing screening as newborns had better general and language developmental outcomes and quality of life at ages 3 to 5 years compared to newborns who received hearing screening through behavioral testing, according to a study in the October 20 issue of JAMA. Permanent childhood hearing impairment is a serious, relatively common condition. Auditory input is essential for development and social functioning, so early awareness of a child's hearing ability is important in creating opportunities for early amplification ...

Information provided to physicians from the US and around the world directly by pharmaceutical companies can be associated with higher prescribing frequency, higher costs, and lower prescribing quality. Furthermore, exposure to pharmaceutical company information does not improve physician prescribing behavior. These are the findings of a systematic review by Geoffrey Spurling from The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia, and colleagues and published in this week's PLoS Medicine. After doing an extensive literature search, the authors analyze and describe the ...

Intracerebral haemorrhage (ICH) accounts for 10% and 20% of strokes in high and low-to-middle income countries respectively, but ICH incidence and case fatality do not seem to be declining. In a Health in Action paper published in this week's PLoS Medicine magazine, Colin Josephson, Rustam Al-Shahi Salman, and colleagues (from the University of Edinburgh) discuss the effectiveness of treatments for intracerebral haemorrhage. Despite the lack of decline in ICH incidence and case fatality, the authors find that evidence supports organised stroke unit care and secondary prevention ...

Monmouth Junction, NJ (October 19, 2010) – Patients undergoing CIED (Cardiac Implantable Electronic Device) implantation with TYRX, Inc.'s FDA-cleared AIGISRx Antibacterial Envelope enjoyed a 99.5% rate of successful implantation with an overall infection rate of 0.48% in the first 1.9 months following the procedure, as reported in newly published results of TYRX's COMMAND Clinical Study. There were no infections in patients receiving initial implantations of pacemakers, implantable cardioverter-defibrillators, or cardiac resynchronization therapy devices. The infection ...

Why do leopards have rosette shaped markings but tigers have stripes? Rudyard Kipling suggested that it was because the leopard moved to an environment "full of trees and bushes and stripy, speckly, patchy-blatchy shadows" but is there any truth in this just-so story? Researchers at the University of Bristol investigated the flank markings of 35 species of wild cats to understand what drives the evolution of such beautiful and intriguing variation. They captured detailed differences in the visual appearance of the cats by linking them to a mathematical model of pattern ...

MADISON – In cold weather, many children can't resist breathing onto a window and writing in the condensation. Now imagine the window as an electronic device platform, the condensation as a special conductive gas, and the letters as lines of nanowires. A team led by University of Wisconsin-Madison Materials Science and Engineering Professor Chang-Beom Eom has demonstrated methods to harness essentially this concept for broad applications in nanoelectronic devices, such as next-generation memory or tiny transistors. The discoveries were published Oct. 19 by the journal ...

BUFFALO, NY -- Men with prostate cancer should be especially diligent about having routine screening colonoscopies, results of a new study by gastroenterologists at the University at Buffalo indicate. Their findings show that persons diagnosed with prostate cancer had significantly more abnormal colon polyps, known as adenomas, and advanced adenomas than men without prostate cancer. Results of the research were presented Oct. 19 at a 10:30 a.m. session at the American College of Gastroenterology meeting being held Oct. 15-20 in San Antonio, Texas. While most adenomas ...

A University of Adelaide study has found no evidence that taking fish oil capsules during pregnancy can help reduce the risk of post-natal depression, contrary to international recommendations. In an article published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Professor Maria Makrides says a study of 2400 pregnant women in five Australian maternity hospitals between 2005 and 2009 supports this finding. Professor Maria Makrides, who is Professor of Human Nutrition at the University of Adelaide and Deputy Director of the Women's and Children's Health Research ...

A child's likelihood of developing food allergies can be traced back to the season during which s/he completes their first three months of life in the womb, suggests research published online in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health. The Finnish researchers base their findings on just under 6000 children, all of whom were born between 2001 and 2006 and lived in one area of Finland. Out of the total, just under 1000 were tested for sensitisation to food allergens between the ages of 0 and 4 years, with the likelihood of a positive test result rising sharply ...

Low testosterone levels seem to be linked to a heightened risk of premature death from heart disease and all causes, suggests research published online in Heart. The finding refutes received wisdom that the hormone is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. The researchers base their findings on 930 men, all of whom had coronary artery heart disease, and had been referred to a specialist heart centre between 2000 and 2002. Their heart health was then tracked for around 7 years. On referral, low testosterone was relatively common. One in four of the men was classified ...

LA JOLLA, Calif., October 18, 2010 – Lymphoma is a cancer of the immune system. White blood cells divide again and again, spreading abnormally throughout the body. Lymphomas can arise from two types of white blood cells, T cells or B cells, which divide uncontrollably when the molecular mechanisms that keep them in check go awry. A new study led by Robert Rickert, Ph.D., professor and director of the Inflammatory Diseases Program at Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute (Sanford-Burnham), explores the roles of two enzymes, called SHIP and PTEN, in B cell growth and ...

Top sports persons must always perform to their maximum capacity, making them the most vulnerable to the effects of dehydration. Now, a new study conducted by researchers from the Universidad de Castilla la Mancha (UCLM) reveals that 91% of professional basketball, volleyball, handball and football players are dehydrated when they begin their training sessions. "Dehydration negatively affects sporting performance, even when the level of dehydration is low (such as a 2% loss of body weight through perspiration)", UCLM researcher and author of the article Ricardo Mora-Rodríguez ...

Two world experts in micro molluscs, Anselmo Peñas and Emilio Rolán, have made an unprecedented description in a scientific publication of a combined total of 209 snail species. Commissioned by the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, the study was unveiled in September in the French capital, and it covers the most new species from a single genus of any study to date. "Never have so many species from a single genus, nor even from a single family, been described in one single study", Anselmo Peñas, lead author of the collaborative monograph between the National ...

In the largest human study to date on the topic, researchers have uncovered evidence of the possible influence of human sex hormones on the structure and function of the right ventricle (RV) of the heart. The researchers found that in women receiving hormone therapy, higher estrogen levels were associated with higher RV ejection fraction and lower RV end-systolic volume — both measures of the RV's blood-pumping efficiency — but not in women who were not on hormone therapy, nor in men. Conversely, higher testosterone levels were associated with greater RV mass and larger ...

Long term exposure to low-level air pollution may increase the risk of severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), according to researcher s in Denmark. While acute exposure of several days to high level air pollution was known to be a risk factor for exacerbation in pre-existing COPD, until now there had been no studies linking long-term air pollution exposure to the development or progression of the disease. The research was published online ahead of the print edition of the American Thoracic Society's American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. "Our ...

A research team from Emory University School of Medicine investigated the role between adiponectin and leptin in obesity-related carcinogenesis. Their findings, published in the November issue of Hepatology, suggest that the protein hormone adiponectin has potential for inhibiting the oncogenic actions of leptin, namely in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), and could offer a promising therapy for the disease. Obesity is on the rise and is associated with increased risk and progression of a number of cancers including colon, prostate, breast, and liver cancers. The World ...