In an article published July 17, 2018 by Nature Communications, a highly collaborative team of researchers at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) and Ohio State University report that normal breast cells can prevent successful radiation treatment of breast cancer due to dysregulation between tumor suppressors and oncogenes. Tumor suppressors act like brakes that stop cells from undergoing uncontrolled growth, while oncogenes are the gas pedal. The tumor suppressor gene of interest in this study is PTEN, which is often mutated in human cancer cells.
Montreal, Aug. 1, 2018 - Treatment of latent tuberculosis is set to transform after a pair of studies from the Research-Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI-MUHC) revealed that a shorter treatment was safer and more effective in children and adults compared to the current standard. These findings are published today in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Think summer holidays and you'll likely call up images of a beautiful beach or a glittering blue lake. But more and more lakes, rivers and coastal areas are plagued by an oversupply of nutrients that causes algae to grow at an explosive rate, which can eventually lead to water bodies that can't support aquatic life.
Scientists call this type of water pollution eutrophication, and it is an enormous problem worldwide: There are more than 400 marine 'dead zones' caused by over-fertilization, covering an estimated 245,000 km2, which is an area six times the size of Switzerland.
Researchers have determined that new mothers exposed to cigarette smoke in their homes, stop breastfeeding sooner than women not exposed to second-hand smoke.
The study, conducted in Hong Kong, involved more than 1,200 women from four large hospitals, explains Professor Marie Tarrant, Director of UBC Okanagan's School of Nursing. Tarrant, whose research focuses on maternal and child health, taught in the faculty of Medicine in the University of Hong Kong before joining UBC.
Rochester, MN, August 1, 2018 - Sauna bathing is an activity used for the purposes of pleasure, wellness, and relaxation. Emerging evidence suggests that beyond its use for pleasure, sauna bathing may be linked to several health benefits.
DURHAM, N.C. -- For a small, reddish-beaked bird called the zebra finch, sexiness is color-coded. Males have beaks that range from light orange to dark red. But from a female's point of view, a male's colored bill may simply be hot, or not, new findings suggest.
Due to a phenomenon called categorical perception, zebra finches partition the range of hues from red to orange into two discrete categories, much like humans do, researchers report August 1 in the journal Nature.
Tsukuba, Japan - Placodes and neural crests are defining features of vertebrates (animals with a spinal cord surrounded by cartilage or bone). Placodes are embryonic structures that develop into sensory organs such as ear, nose, and lens cells, while neural crests develop into various cell lineages such as bone, craniofacial cartilage, and epidermal sensory neurons.
Researchers have identified a rare cell type in airway tissue, previously uncharacterized in the scientific literature, that appears to play a key role in the biology of cystic fibrosis. Using new technologies that enable scientists to study gene expression in thousands of individual cells, the team comprehensively analyzed the airway in mice and validated the results in human tissue.
Washington, DC--Blue diamonds--like the world-famous Hope Diamond at the National Museum of Natural History--formed up to four times deeper in the Earth's mantle than most other diamonds, according to new work published on the cover of Nature.
"These so-called type IIb diamonds are tremendously valuable, making them hard to get access to for scientific research purposes," explained lead author Evan Smith of the Gemological Institute of America, adding, "and it is very rare to find one that contains inclusions, which are tiny mineral crystals trapped inside the diamond."
Soil is full of life, essential for nutrient cycling and carbon storage. To better understand how it functions, an international research team led by EMBL and the University of Tartu (Estonia) conducted the first global study of bacteria and fungi in soil. Their results show that bacteria and fungi are in constant competition for nutrients and produce an arsenal of antibiotics to gain an advantage over one another. The study can also help predict the impact of climate change on soil, and help us make better use of natural soil components in agriculture.