Simple, low-cost steps enhance adolescents' health

Simple, low-cost measures such as wearing a pedometer to inspire walking and spending a few minutes a day meditating can put adolescents on the track toward better health, researchers report.

These types of side-effect-free steps can quickly help lower important numbers like blood pressure, heart rate and even weight, counteracting today's unhealthy, upward trends among young people, said Dr. Vernon Barnes, physiologist at the Medical College of Georgia's Georgia Prevention Institute.

3-D cell culture: Making cells feel right at home

HOUSTON -- (March 15, 2010) -- The film "Avatar" isn't the only 3-D blockbuster making a splash this winter. A team of scientists from Houston's Texas Medical Center this week unveiled a new technique for growing 3-D cell cultures, a technological leap from the flat petri dish that could save millions of dollars in drug-testing costs. The research is reported in Nature Nanotechnology.

A new system makes household communication networks more versatile

The attacks in Europe did not affect the stability of the market in the USA

Researchers at the University of Valencia (UV) and the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) state that the terrorist attack which happened in New York on 11 September 2001 had an effect on the volatility of the stock market in the Eurozone. However, the attacks in Madrid and London -on 11 March 2004 and 7 July 2005 respectively- did not have any effect on the volatility of the market in the USA.

Wine vine: Microscopic photography reveals bacteria destroying grape plant cell wall

Young Britons see significantly more smoking in movies than US peers

Young Britons see significantly more on-screen smoking in movies than their US peers, finds research published ahead of print in the journal Tobacco Control.

The UK film classification system, which rates more films as suitable for young people than its US counterpart, is to blame, say the authors.

The research team assessed the number of on-screen smoking/tobacco occurrences in 572 top grossing films in the UK, which included 546 screened in the US plus 26 high earning films released only in the UK.

Trauma of war doubles asthma risk among civilians

Living through the trauma of war seems to increase the risk of developing asthma, suggests research published ahead of print in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.

Those who are most traumatised are twice as likely to develop the condition as those who are least traumatised by their experiences of war, the research suggests.

The authors base their findings on a random sample of just over 2000 Kuwaiti civilians who endured the Iraqi invasion and seven month occupation of their country in 1990, and were aged between 50 and 69 at the time.

Studies reveal substantial increases in nonmelanoma skin cancers

Both new diagnoses and a history of non-melanoma skin cancer appear to have become increasingly common, and the disease affects more individuals than all other cancers combined, according to two reports in the March issue of Archives of Dermatology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

Late-stage melanoma results in economic burden

In an article published in the March 2010 Archives of Dermatology, researchers report that in the United States, melanoma treatment in late stages of the disease is of significant cost in the population 65 years and older.

3-D cell culture: Making cells feel right at home

HOUSTON - The film "Avatar" isn't the only 3-D blockbuster making a splash this winter. A team of Houston scientists this week unveiled a new technique for growing 3-D cell cultures, a technological leap from the flat petri dish that could save millions of dollars in drug-testing costs. The research is reported in Nature Nanotechnology.