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BOSTON – Doctors in the Department of Pathology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) have issued "A Call to Action" for the medical profession to catch up with the technology and business communities in the application of genomics to personalized health care.

PITTSBURGH, June 30 – Newborns of non-smoking moms exposed to secondhand smoke during pregnancy have genetic mutations that may affect long-term health, according to a University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health study published online in the Open Pediatric Medicine Journal. The abnormalities, which were indistinguishable from those found in newborns of mothers who were active smokers, may affect survival, birth weight and lifelong susceptibility to diseases like cancer.

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Fast-food restaurants can supersize French fries and drinks, but Mother Nature has found a way to supersize a type of apple.

Those looking for a new treatment for a range of inflammatory diseases like arthritis, multiple sclerosis, inflammatory bowel disease, and lupus may need to look no further than a drug already available for treating cancer.

Sweet news for those looking for new antibiotics: A new research published in the July 2010 print edition of the FASEB Journal (http://www.fasebj.org) explains for the first time how honey kills bacteria. Specifically, the research shows that bees make a protein that they add to the honey, called defensin-1, which could one day be used to treat burns and skin infections and to develop new drugs that could combat antibiotic-resistant infections.

European mountains have experienced a decline in forestry, agricultural and livestock operations over the past 50 years, due to the exodus of rural populations and socioeconomic changes. These areas have become covered by scrubland. Burning has become a common tool used to regain the landscape of olden times and maintain grazing areas at altitudes of between 1,400 and 2,100 metres above sea level in the Pyrenees.

A group of 85 international experts, amongst whom are two scientists from NEIKER-Tecnalia, believe that the illness known as bovine paratuberculosis or Johne's disease can be eradicated by means of control programmes, new vaccines or the sacrifice of infected animals. This was the main conclusion from the meeting between scientists last February in the Scottish town of Inverness, within the framework of the European Commission (ParaTBTools) project on the mentioned illness.

Lack of sufficient iron may be a significant factor in controlling massive blooms of Emiliania huxleyi, a globally important species of marine algae or phytoplankton, according to research led by researchers at the National Oceanography Centre (NOC) in Southampton.

A gene that encodes a protein responsible for determining whether certain immune cells live or die shows subtle differences in some people with asthma, a team led by Johns Hopkins researchers reports in the June European Journal of Human Genetics.

Rome, Italy: A review of studies of babies born after in vitro maturation (IVM) fertility treatment has suggested that they are more likely to be born larger than normal and to have more difficult births requiring more obstetric interventions such as caesareans.

Dr Mahesh Masand, consultant paediatrician at Dr Grays Hospital in Elgin, Scotland, recounts the day when a 22-month-old girl was rushed to A&E after her mother found the toddler hanging from the looped cord of a Venetian blind in her bedroom. The little girl was kept on a ventilator for three days and discharged with no complications after seven days.

New research shows increased muscle performance in sub-maximal activities, which in humans can range from everyday activities to running a marathon.

With no current regulations in place, the scientists from Coventry University believe their findings may have implications for the use of caffeine in sport to improve performance.

The scientists present their work at the Society for Experimental Biology Annual Meeting in Prague on Wednesday 30th June 2010.

This is surprising as with large naked wings and the energy they expend in flight, bats are expected to have high rates of water loss by evaporation, say the scientists from the Ben-Gurion University in Israel.

This may provide significant insight into how bats might respond to a future changing climate.

'Pythons are renowned for their ability to fast for many months and ingest very large meals', explained Kasper Hansen, from the Aarhus University in Denmark. Modern scanning techniques have shown how extreme adaptations of the internal organs allow the snake to accommodate this 'feast and famine' lifestyle.