Body

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Using genetic methods to count endangered eagles, a group of scientists showed that traditional counting methods can lead to significantly incorrect totals that they believe could adversely affect conservation efforts.

Durham, NC —For the vast majority of plants and animals, the 'bigger is better' view of evolution may not be far off the mark, says a new broad-scale study of natural selection. Organisms with bigger bodies or faster growth rates tend to live longer, mate more and produce more offspring, whether they are deer or damselflies, the authors report.

A new study published in The Journal of Sexual Medicine reveals that, for the first time, 5a-reductase inhibitors commonly used to treat urinary problems in patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and found in popular medications to treat hair loss, can produce, persistent erectile dysfunction (ED), depression and loss of libido, even after the medication has been discontinued.

HOUSTON-(March 7, 2011)- Children without previous iron deficiencies or anemia who remained infected with Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) had significantly lower levels of iron compared to children who had the infection eradicated, according to researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth).

Columbia, MO -- It's a corn plant only a geneticist could love, but an MU researcher has found a way to help scientists love it.

Instead of the characteristic fan-like tassel that waves majestically atop the stalk, this corn plant sends up a cartoonishly skinny stick. Its ears -- if it makes them at all -- resemble small, chubby, lime-green caterpillars, not exactly something you want to dig your teeth into. To top it off, the corn plant stands only about three feet tall, at full maturity, and has few leaves.

If you can't stop the beta-amyloid protein plaques from forming in Alzheimer's disease patients, then maybe you can help the body rid itself of them instead. At least that's what scientists from New York were hoping for when they found a drug candidate to do just that. Their work appears in a research report online in The FASEB Journal (http://www.fasebj.org), and shows that a new compound, called "SMER28" stimulated autophagy in rat and mice cells.

GALVESTON, Texas — Researchers have identified a critical part of the process by which one of the world's most common and dangerous early childhood infections, respiratory syncytial virus, causes disease.

The discovery could lead to badly needed new therapies for RSV, which in 2005 was estimated to have caused at least 3.4 million hospitalizations and 199,000 deaths among children under five worldwide.

For the past few years, one of the most common questions facing the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) hasn't been over contentious water rights or proposed water projects; it's been from homeowners wanting to know what type of roofing material is most suitable for collecting rainwater for indoor domestic use.

AURORA, Colo. (March 7, 2011) - A discovery at University of Colorado Cancer Center shows testing lung cancer on a molecular level can produce new insights into this deadly disease.

Cancer Center member D. Ross Camidge, MD, PhD, director of the thoracic oncology clinical program at University of Colorado Hospital (UCH), turned a chance clinical observation into a new field of discovery in lung cancer.

New research reveals vast tracts of wetlands along the upper Gulf Coast are more hydrologically connected to Galveston Bay and other waters of the U.S. than previously thought, suggesting immediate implications for how they are preserved, managed and regulated, according to Texas AgriLife scientists.

Patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) suffer a specific loss of dopaminergic neurons from the midbrain region that controls motor function. The exact mechanism of this selective neurodegeneration is unclear, though many lines of evidence point to dysfunctional mitochondrial complex I as one root cause of the disease. Yet new research now suggests that defective regulation of microtubules may be responsible for at least some cases of PD. The study appears in the March 7 issue of The Journal of Cell Biology (www.jcb.org).

The immune system is capable of recognizing tumor growth, and naturally mounts an anti-cancer defense. Dendritic cells (DCs) can take up tumor-derived molecules (antigens) and present them to T cells, and those "primed" T cells are then able to recognize and kill tumor cells. In recent years, researchers have attempted to capitalize upon these natural immune responses to develop new therapies- namely, by generating a pool of tumor antigen-pulsed DCs that might be used as vaccines to augment the T-cell responses of cancer patients.

Glaucoma is the second-most common cause of blindness in the US, and occurs due to loss of retinal ganglion cells and degeneration of the optic nerve. Although it is known that high levels of pressure within the eye predispose individuals to the development of glaucoma, the molecular mechanisms involved are poorly defined.

An important discovery in mice may make a big difference in people's waistlines thanks to a team of Harvard scientists who found that reducing the function of a transmembrane protein, called Klotho, in obese mice with high blood sugar levels produced lean mice with reduced blood sugar levels. This protein also exists in humans, suggesting that selectively targeting Klotho could lead to a new class of drugs to reduce obesity and possibly Type 2 diabetes for people.

OAK RIDGE, Tenn., March 7, 2011 – In the quest for inexpensive biofuels, cellulose proved no match for a bioprocessing strategy and genetically engineered microbe developed by researchers at the Department of Energy's BioEnergy Science Center.