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In England, a country with a universal access health care system, there is wide variation between local populations in the rate of death from coronary heart disease, which is largely explained by population characteristics such as low socioeconomic factors, white ethnicity, levels of smoking, and diabetes, according to a study in the November 10 issue of JAMA.

Your postcode could affect your risk of dying from a heart attack, a new study from the University of Leicester has discovered.

Medical researchers from the University set out to determine why death rates from coronary heart disease (heart attacks) varied around the country and found that living in a deprived area contributed to your risk.

The study has for the first time established an association at national level between detection of hypertension and death rates from coronary heart disease.

Between 20 and 30 percent of women who undergo in vitro fertilization (IVF) procedures suffer from significant symptoms of depression. Many practitioners believe that the hormone therapy involved in IVF procedures is primarily responsible for this. But new research from Tel Aviv University shows that, while this is true, other factors are even more influential.

A gene thought to be responsible for initiating human cancer has been identified by researchers at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry. The study - published online today (9 November) in the journal Cancer Research - paves the way for developing early cancer diagnostic tests, and finding new treatments that prevent or stop the spread of cancer cells at an early stage.

PHILADELPHIA — Women being treated for breast cancer with aromatase inhibitors may experience extremely low estrogen levels resulting in a wide variety of side effects that a typical postmenopausal woman without cancer may not experience.

Data presented at the Ninth Annual AACR Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Conference, held here Nov. 7-10, 2010, showed that women assigned to take aromatase inhibitors had increases in side effects such as hot flashes, decreased appetite, fatigue, fever, breast sensitivity, etc.

PHILADELPHIA — Women who exercise for 150 minutes a week or more may see a reduced risk of endometrial cancer, despite whether or not they are overweight, according to data presented at the Ninth Annual AACR Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research Conference, held here Nov. 7-10, 2010.

"This study is consistent with other studies that strongly support the association between physical activity and lower risk of endometrial cancer," said Hannah Arem, a doctoral student at Yale School of Public Health.

A new study using a pig model of cystic fibrosis (CF) suggests that low levels of a growth promoting hormone at or before birth may contribute to growth defects in patients with CF.

The study, led by University of Iowa researchers and published online the week of Nov. 8 in the Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could help predict the severity of the disease in patients and may lead to new therapies for growth defects in people with CF.

Charles Darwin's theory of gradual evolution is not supported by geological history, New York University Geologist Michael Rampino concludes in an essay in the journal Historical Biology. In fact, Rampino notes that a more accurate theory of gradual evolution, positing that long periods of evolutionary stability are disrupted by catastrophic mass extinctions of life, was put forth by Scottish horticulturalist Patrick Matthew prior to Darwin's published work on the topic.

The number of Americans who report being aware of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, or COPD, increased by 4 percentage points between 2008 and 2010, but many people at risk are still unaware of the disease, according to mailed survey results released today by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), part of the National Institutes of Health.

Swiss researchers studying the projected effects of climate change on alpine plant species have discovered that mountain ranges may represent a 'safer' place to live during changing climate conditions. The research, published in the Journal of Biogeography, finds that the habitat diversity of mountain ranges offer species 'refuge habitats' which may be important for conservation.

Washington, D.C. (November 9, 2010) -- Current medical techniques for monitoring the heart rate and other vital signs use electrodes attached to the body, which are impractical for patients who want to move around. Plasma physicist Atsushi Mase, a scientist at Kyushu University in Japan, and colleague Daisuke Nagae have developed a new technique to disconnect people from their electrodes by using microwaves.

Washington, D.C. (November 9, 2010) -- Microscopically porous polymer membranes have numerous applications in microfluidics, where they can act as filters, masks for surface patterning, and even as components in 3D devices in which the perforations in stacked membranes are aligned to form networks of channels for the flow of fluids.

At the current pace of research and development, global oil will runout 90 years before replacement technologies are ready, says a newUniversity of California, Davis, study based on stock marketexpectations.

The forecast was published online Monday (Nov. 8) in the journalEnvironmental Science & Technology. It is based on the theory thatlong-term investors are good predictors of whether and when newenergy technologies will become commonplace.