Body

A new therapy that reduces the risk of mortality and heart failure in patients with mild cardiac disease received a thumb's up this week from an advisory panel to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The panel recommended that the cardiac resynchronization therapy defibrillator (CRT–D), tested extensively nationwide under the leadership of cardiologist Arthur Moss, M.D., professor of Medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center, be approved for use in patients with mild heart failure in the United States.

New Rochelle, NY, March 19, 2010—Researchers around the globe are working on turning microRNAs, over 5,000 of which already have been identified, into novel drugs for a wide range of applications, reports Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News (GEN).

The scramble to find sufficient land for biofuel production has experts eyeing marginal croplands that have been placed in the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP). Now a study by Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists indicates that plant species diversity and composition are key factors in potential energy yield per acre from biomass harvested from CRP land.

WASHINGTON -- Most of the actions proposed by two federal agencies to reduce water diversions in the California Bay-Delta in order to protect endangered and threatened fish species are "scientifically justified," but the basis for the specific environmental triggers that would indicate when water diversions should be reduced is less well-supported by scientific analyses, says a new report from the National Research Council that was requested by Congress and the U.S. Department of the Interior.

The self-assembling properties of the DNA molecule have allowed for the construction of an intriguing range of nanoscale forms. Such nanoarchitectures may eventually find their way into a new generation of microelectronics, semiconductors, biological and chemical sensing devices and a host of biomedical applications. Now Hao Yan and Yan Liu, professors at the Biodesign Institute's Center for Single Molecule Biophysics and their collaborators have introduced a new method to deterministically and precisely position silver nanoparticles onto self-assembling DNA scaffolds.

March 18, 2010—Exposure to the pesticide chlorpyrifos—which is banned for use in U.S. households but is still widely used throughout the agricultural industry—is associated with early childhood developmental delays, according to a study by researchers at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health.

Findings of the study, "Chlorpyrifos Exposure and Urban Residential Environment Characteristics as Determinants of Early Childhood Neurodevelopment," are online in the American Journal of Public Health.

March 18, 2010, Washington, DC—A new study linking funding increases in the global fight against malaria to a drop in deaths from the disease also shows that resources from donor governments still fall short of those needed for maximum impact against the world's fourth-biggest killer of children, according to a global health policy analyst at international aid agency World Vision.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Cancer death rates for African-Americans far exceed non-Hispanic Caucasians in the United States, and only community-driven approaches to reducing health disparities will lessen the gap, says Edward Partridge, M.D., president-elect of the American Cancer Society (ACS) National Board of Directors and director of the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Baltimore, MD, 19 March 2010. – New research has revealed a major breakthrough in the use of cough medicine ingredient noscapine as a prophylactic treatment for prostate cancer.

The study shows that noscapine inhibited tumor growth in mice and also limited the spread of tumors without causing any side effects.

Patient referrals between hospitals influence the rates of hospital-acquired infections such as MRSA, according to a study by researchers based in the Netherlands. The findings, published March 19 in the open-access journal PLoS Computational Biology, explain that referred patients, who have the potential to carry a hospital-acquired infection with them, are more likely to be admitted to University Medical Centers than to teaching or general hospitals.

Pregnant women in Australia and New Zealand who had swine flu were 13 times more likely to be admitted to hospital with a critical illness, according to research published on bmj.com today.

The authors conclude that 11% of mothers and 12% of babies died as a result of being admitted to intensive care with swine flu. However they emphasise that given the small numbers included in their research, there are limits to the conclusions that can be drawn from the results.

Mosquitoes transmit infectious diseases to millions of people every year, including malaria for which there is no effective vaccine. New research published in Insect Molecular Biology reveals that mosquito genetic engineering may turn the transmitter into a natural 'flying vaccinator', providing a new strategy for biological control over the disease.

The research, led by Associate Professor Shigeto Yoshida from the Jichi Medical University in Japan, targets the saliva gland of the Anopheles stephensi mosquitoes, the main vectors of human malaria.

STANFORD, Calif. — The key to human individuality may lie not in our genes, but in the sequences that surround and control them, according to new research by scientists at the Stanford University School of Medicine and Yale University. The interaction of those sequences with a class of key proteins, called transcription factors, can vary significantly between two people and are likely to affect our appearance, our development and even our predisposition to certain diseases, the study found.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — A team of researchers at MIT and the University of California at San Diego has shown how cell division in a type of bacteria known as cyanobacteria is controlled by the same kind of circadian rhythms that govern human sleep patterns.

Previous studies have shown that even though cyanobacteria do not "sleep" in the same way that humans do, they cycle through active and resting periods on a 24-hour schedule. Cyanobacteria depend on sunlight for photosynthesis, so they are most active during the day.

Previously unobservable events occurring between insemination and fertilization are the subject of a groundbreaking new article in Science magazine (March 18) by Mollie Manier, John Belote and Scott Pitnick, professors of biology in Syracuse University's College of Arts and Sciences. By genetically altering fruit flies so that the heads of their sperm were fluorescent green or red, Belote and his colleagues were able to observe in striking detail what happens to live sperm inside the female.