Inner Workings of the Immune System Filmed from Science Daily
Forget what's No. 1 at the box office this week. The most exciting new film features the intricate workings of the body, filmed by scientists using ground-breaking technology. For the first time in Australia, scientists at Sydney's Centenary Institute have filmed an immune cell becoming infected by a parasite and followed the infection as it begins to spread throughout the body. More
New Breast Imaging Modalities Reveal Cancers as Small as a Single Millimeter from Medscape Medical News Two imaging modalities that look at breast cancer activity on a cellular level can pick up occult tumors that are only 1 to 3 millimeters in size in women with a history of breast cancer, radiologists reported at the 94th Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting of the Radiological Society of North America reported recently. More
11 New Cholesterol Genes Identified from The Washington Post An international research team that screened the genes of more than 40,000 people has identified 11 more regions that govern levels of blood fats such as LDL cholesterol and triglycerides. More
Gene Therapy Corrects Sickle Cell Disease in Laboratory Study from The Wall Street Journal New St. Jude treatment alleviates long-term anemia and organ damage in mice and paves the way for human applications. Using a harmless virus to insert a corrective gene into mouse blood cells, scientists at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tenn., have alleviated sickle cell disease pathology. More
Tasimelteon Reduces Transient Insomnia After Acute Sleep-Time Shift from Medscape Medical News Randomized trial results with tasimelteon, a melatonin agonist, suggest that the still-investigational agent improves sleep initiation and maintenance in concert with an acute shift in endogenous circadian rhythms after an abrupt advance in sleep time. The findings suggest that tasimelteon might be useful in treating transient insomnia associated with circadian-rhythm sleep disorders, such as that caused by jet lag or in night-shift work, the researchers conclude. More
Poor Children's Brain Activity Resembles that of Stroke Victims from Science Daily University of California, Berkeley, researchers have shown for the first time that the brains of low-income children function differently from the brains of high-income kids. Brain function was measured by means of an electroencephalograph – basically, a cap fitted with electrodes to measure electrical activity in the brain – like that used to assess epilepsy, sleep disorders and brain tumors. More
Zimbabwe Urges Residents to Skip Handshakes in Cholera Outbreak from Bloomberg Zimbabwe advised residents to avoid handshakes and body contact in an effort to curb the spread of a cholera epidemic that has killed at least 565 people. Soap, along with most basic commodities, is also in short supply in the southern African nation, now in its 10th year of economic recession. More
Blood Tests on Heels of Workout Can Be Off from The Columbus Dispatch The 40-year-old man, having just finished a 10-kilometer run, seemed perfectly healthy. After he fainted, though, he was rushed to an emergency room – where the levels of a heart protein, troponin, in his blood tested as sky-high. Was he having a heart attack? More
Avoiding Dengue Fever from The Washington Post Dengue fever, a flulike virus that's spread through mosquito bites, has become a major public health problem in the tropical world. That includes St. Maarten/St. Martin, which share the same island in the Netherlands Antilles. An October outbreak there sickened 72 people and resulted in two deaths. More
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