Body

Does eating a big breakfast help weight loss or is it better to skip breakfast altogether? Available information is confusing but new research published in BioMed Central's open access journal Nutrition Journal clears a path through these apparently contradictory reports.

Dr Volker Schusdziarra, from the Else-Kröner-Fresenius Center of Nutritional Medicine, conducted a study on over 300 people who were asked to keep a journal of what they usually ate. Within the group sometimes people ate a big breakfast, sometimes small, and sometimes skipped it all together.

A pill containing a mix of essential oils has been shown to significantly reduce the symptoms of premenstrual syndrome (PMS). Researchers writing in BioMed Central's open access journal Reproductive Health tested the tablets by carrying out a randomised, controlled trial in 120 women.

An 18-year study of Kenya's coral reefs by the Wildlife Conservation Society and the University of California at Santa Cruz has found that overfished reef systems have more sea urchins—organisms that in turn eat coral algae that build tropical reef systems.

January 16, 2011 – (BRONX, NY) – In a technique that could eventually shed light on how gene expression influences human disease, scientists at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have for the first time ever successfully visualized single molecules of naturally-occurring messenger RNA (mRNA) transcribed in living mammalian cells. The scientific achievement is detailed in the January 16 online edition of Nature Methods.

Scientists have identified a protein that acts as a "master switch" in certain white blood cells, determining whether they promote or inhibit inflammation. The study, published in the journal Nature Immunology, could help researchers look for new treatments for diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis that involve excessive inflammation.

HOUSTON – A small slice of RNA inhibits prostate cancer metastasis by suppressing a surface protein commonly found on prostate cancer stem cells. A research team led by scientists at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reported today in an advance online publication at Nature Medicine.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 15, 2011 — In research described as "a stark warning" to those tempted to start smoking, scientists are reporting that cigarette smoke begins to cause genetic damage within minutes — not years — after inhalation into the lungs.

Their report, the first human study to detail the way certain substances in tobacco cause DNA damage linked to cancer, appears in Chemical Research in Toxicology, one of 38 peer-reviewed scientific journals published by the American Chemical Society.

Rice bred to perform well in the toughest conditions where the poorest farmers grow rice is a step away from reaching farmers thanks to a major project led by the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI).

AURORA, Colo. (Jan. 14, 2011) - Acute inflammation of the lung is a poorly recognized human disease that develops in surprising and unexpected ways. The acute lung injury (ALI) or adult respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a vital new concern for soldiers, but it can develop in anyone during a systemic infection, after severe trauma, as a result of bone fracture, following severe burns and in many other ways as well-- the initial cause may have nothing apparent to do with the lung itself.

PITTSBURGH, Jan. 14 – A gene from the measles virus plays a key role in the development of Paget's disease of bone, according to a team of researchers led by the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Their findings, recently published in Cell Metabolism, confirm a long-held speculation that the childhood infection is an environmental trigger for the disease and reveal how the viral gene contributes to the development of its characteristic bone lesions.

Eating blueberries can guard against high blood pressure, according to new research by the University of East Anglia (UEA) and Harvard University.

High blood pressure – or hypertension – is one of the major cardiovascular diseases worldwide. It leads to stroke and heart disease and costs more than $300 billion each year. Around a quarter ofthe adult population is affected globally – including 10 million people in the UK and one in three US adults.

New findings are bringing scientists closer to an effective HIV vaccine. Researchers from Seattle Biomedical Research Institute (Seattle BioMed), Vanderbilt University and the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard report findings showing new evidence about broadly-reactive neutralizing antibodies, which block HIV infection. Details are published January 13 in the open-access journal PLoS Pathogens.

TORONTO, Ont., Jan. 13, 2011—Patients who must return to dialysis after a kidney transplant failure survive just as well on home dialysis as hospital dialysis, but few choose that option, according to new research by Dr. Jeffrey Perl, a nephrologist at St. Michael's Hospital.

Conservation paleobiologists--scientists who use the fossil record to understand the evolutionary and ecological responses of present-day species to changes in their environment--are putting the dead to work.

Initially, Riedel-Kruse said, the researchers just wanted to see whether they could design such biotic games at all, so this first round of development produced fairly simple games.