Body

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a fatal neurodegenerative disease that eventually destroys most motor neurons, causing muscle weakness and atrophy throughout the body. There is no cure and the current treatment has only a moderate effect on the march of the disease, which typically kills within three to five years. This week in PNAS, a team of Brandeis scientists reports an innovative approach to treating the most common form of familial ALS, commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease.

Infants are more efficient at digesting and utilizing nutritional components of milk than adults due to a difference in the strains of bacteria that dominate their digestive tracts. Researchers from the University of California, Davis, and Utah State University report on genomic analysis of these strains in the November 2010 issue of the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology identifying the genes that are most likely responsible for this difference.

Direct contact and droplets are the primary ways influenza spreads. Under certain conditions, however, aerosol transmission is possible. In a study published in the current issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases, available online (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/656743), the authors examined such an outbreak in their own hospital in Hong Kong.

BINGHAMTON, NY – Binghamton University researchers recently revived ancient bacteria trapped for thousands of years in water droplets embedded in salt crystals.

For decades, geologists have looked at these water droplets — called fluid inclusions — and wondered whether microbes could be extracted from them. Fluid inclusions have been found inside salt crystals ranging in age from thousands to hundreds of millions years old.

Alexandria, Va. – The American Association for Dental Research (AADR) held its 3rd Fall Focused Symposium on November 12-13, in the Washington, DC, area. This year, the theme was the fast-moving field of Salivary Diagnostics, with a focus on Scientific & Clinical Frontiers. The symposium was sold-out, but AADR also offered a live Webinar broadcast of the oral sessions.

Both the rate and direction of axon growth in the spinal cord can be controlled, according to new research by USC College's Samantha Butler and her collaborators.

New findings by civil engineering researchers in the University of Minnesota's College of Science and Engineering shows that treating municipal wastewater solids at higher temperatures may be an effective tool in the fight against antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

Heating the solid waste to 130 degrees Fahrenheit (55 degrees Celsius) was particularly effective in eliminating the genes that confer antibiotic resistance. These genes are used by bacteria to become resistant to multiple antibiotics, which are then known as "superbacteria" or "superbugs."

The same powerful drugs that have extended the lives of countless people with HIV come with a price – insulin resistance that can lead to diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

Now, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have determined why that happens. Their research shows that HIV protease inhibitors directly interfere with the way blood sugar levels are controlled in the body. This leads to insulin resistance, a condition that occurs when the body produces enough insulin but doesn't use it properly.

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Purdue University scientists have found the last undiscovered gene responsible for the production of the amino acid phenylalanine, a discovery that could lead to processes to control the amino acid to boost plants' nutritional values and produce better biofuel feedstocks.

Biologists have long thought that interactions between plants and pollinating insects hasten evolutionary changes and promote biological diversity. However, new findings show that some interactions between plants and pollinators are less likely to increase diversity than previously thought, and in some instances, reduce it.

A new study challenges the current staging system that determines the extent or severity of prostate cancer that has not metastasized. Published early online in CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, the study found that there is no link between localized prostate cancer's clinical stage and a patient's risk of cancer recurrence after having his prostate removed.

(Boston) - Scientists have discovered 30 new genes that control the age of sexual maturation in women. Notably, many of these genes also act on body weight regulation or biological pathways related to fat metabolism. The study, which appears in Nature Genetics, was a collaborative effort by the international ReproGen consortium, which included 175 scientists from 104 worldwide institutions, including Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) and Boston University School of Public Health.

BOSTON, Mass. (November 21, 2010)—As debilitating as disease can be, sometimes it acts as a teacher.

Researchers at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Dental Medicine have found that by mimicking a rare genetic disorder in a dish, they can rewind the internal clock of a mature cell and drive it back into an adult stem-cell stage. This new "stem cell" can then branch out into a variety of differentiated cell types, both in culture and in animal models.

STANFORD, Calif. — Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have successfully transformed normal human tissue into three-dimensional cancers in a tissue culture dish for the first time. Watching how the cells behave as they divide and invade surrounding tissue will help physicians better understand how human cancers act in the body. The new technique also provides a way to quickly and cheaply test anti-cancer drugs without requiring laboratory animals.

SAN ANTONIO, Texas (Nov. 21, 2010) — What prompts normal cells to transform themselves into cancerous cells? Researchers from Texas institutions, including the UT Health Science Center San Antonio, have identified factors in the very first step of the process and reconstituted this first step in the test tube. The latter accomplishment was reported Sunday [Nov. 21] in the top-tier journal Nature Structural & Molecular Biology.