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Off-label prescription of a drug is generally legal, but promotion of off-label uses by a drug manufacturer is illegal. In an article in this week's PLoS Medicine, two physician researchers describe the techniques that drug companies use to covertly promote off-label use, even when such promotion is illegal.

STANFORD, Calif. - Stanford University School of Medicine researchers have uncovered what appears to be an extensive, but until now barely noticed, network of regulatory interactions that influence what proteins are made inside a cell, and when and where.

Washington, D.C. – Researchers are asking for tougher penalties and fines for pharmaceutical companies that market drugs for "off label" promotion, according to a study published in the October 28 issue of the open access journal PLoS Medicine.

NEW YORK (EMBARGOED UNTIL OCTOBER 27, 2008 – 8:00 P.M. U.S. EASTERN TIME) – Why did the elephant cross the road? It didn't according to a new study by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and Save the Elephants that says endangered forest elephants are avoiding roadways at all costs. The authors of the study believe that these highly intelligent animals now associate roads with danger – in this case poaching, which is rampant in Central Africa's Congo Basin.

Drugs widely used to treat type 2 diabetes may be more likely to keep working if they are used in moderation, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found in a study using an animal model.

The drugs, sulfonylureas, help type 2 diabetics make more insulin, improving control of blood sugar levels. But in most patients the effects of sulfonylureas are lost after several years of use, causing insulin secretion to shut down. This typically forces patients to switch to regular insulin injections.

COLUMBIA, Mo. – Health Literacy Month, recognized in October, promotes the importance of ensuring access to understandable health information. According to the National Assessment of Adult Literacy, only 12 percent of adults have proficient health literacy - skills needed to manage their health. Improving health literacy for at-risk populations is the focus of an ongoing study at the University of Missouri Health Communication Research Center (HCRC). Recently, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) awarded an $8.6 million grant to HCRC, in partnership with Washington University in St.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – October 27, 2008 – Scientists at the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease (GICD) and the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) have identified a genetic factor critical to the formation of chambers in the developing heart. The discovery of the role of a microRNA called miR-138, could offer strategies for the treatment of congenital heart defects.

Measuring an electrical current in an organism is pretty straightforward. All you need is an electrode. Measuring the flow of chemicals in cells or live tissue, however, is much more difficult because the molecules diffuse, mix with one another, and interact with their surroundings.

So to help understand biological processes, university researchers have invented a new device, the "chemistrode," that makes it possible to stimulate, record, and analyze molecular signals at high resolution—in terms of precisely when, where, and in what sequence the signals occurred.

MADISON — The teeth and bones of mammals, the protective shells of mollusks, and the needle-sharp spines of sea urchins and other marine creatures are made-from-scratch wonders of nature.

Used to crush food, for structural support and for defense, the materials of which shells, teeth and bones are composed are the strongest and most durable in the animal world, and scientists and engineers have long sought to mimic them.

Berkeley -- Ants prefer salty snacks to sugary ones, at least in inland areas that tend to be salt-poor, according to a new study published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

(Boston) Boston University and Harvard University researchers have established for the first time that a study of evolutionary relatedness among plant populations is critical when considering the patterns of species loss due to climate change. Rapid changes in temperature which have led to changes in the timing of seasonal activities, such as flowering, make some closely related groups of species – notably orchids, dogwoods, lilies and many sunflower relatives -- more susceptible to swift declines than others.

A University of Alberta researcher has found a possible treatment for the E.coli strain that killed seven people in Walkerton, Ontario, in 2000 and has just been linked to more than 200 illnesses in North Bay, Ontario.

David Bundle, chemistry professor and director of the Alberta Ingenuity Centre for Carbohydrate Science, has developed a polymeric drug that binds a naturally-occurring protein in the body with the E.coli toxin, preventing it from affecting the kidneys. The effect of E.coli 0157.H7 on the kidneys can be life-threatening.

STANFORD, Calif. - The annual cost of prescription diabetes drugs nearly doubled to $12.5 billion between 2001 and 2007, according to a study by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine and the University of Chicago. The researchers say the findings raise questions about whether the higher cost actually translates into improved care and better outcomes.

Because of the increased number of patients, growing reliance on multiple medications and the shift toward more expensive new medicines, the annual cost of diabetes drugs nearly doubled in only six years, rising from $6.7 billion in 2001 to $12.5 billion in 2007 according to a study in the Oct. 27, 2008, issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Since more then one-tenth of all health care expenditures in the United States in 2002 were attributable to diabetes, this finding raises important questions about whether the higher cost actually translates into improved care.

Individuals who take cholesterol-lowering statins before being hospitalized with pneumonia appear less likely to die within 90 days afterward, according to a report in the October 27 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.