Body

'Fantastic 4' of breast procedures leave women extremely satisfied

CHICAGO – Breast augmentation, lift, combination lift/augmentation and reduction achieve high satisfaction rates; enhance self-esteem and quality of life; and 99 percent of women would have their surgery again, according to a first-of-its-kind study to be presented at the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) Plastic Surgery 2008 conference, Oct. 31 – Nov. 5, in Chicago. The study found breast lift and lift/augmentation to have a high level of patient satisfaction that rivals breast augmentation and reduction.

Fat injections can improve breast reconstruction -- jury's out on augmentation

CHICAGO – Injecting fat after breast reconstruction to correct implant wrinkling or dimpling may be safe and effective to improve breast shape, according to a study to be presented at the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) Plastic Surgery 2008 conference, Oct. 31 – Nov. 5, in Chicago. Using fat injections for cosmetic breast enhancement; however, is still controversial and will be the subject of a panel discussion.

Selecting appropriate massive weight loss patients for body contouring critical

CHICAGO – The importance of pre-operative screening for patients seeking body contouring after massive weight loss will be assessed in three studies presented at the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) Plastic Surgery 2008 conference, Oct. 31 – Nov. 5, in Chicago. These studies examine demographic factors that could affect complication rates; specifically, those who have not yet attained their goal body mass index (BMI); those who lost weight through diet and exercise and those who are male.

Deflated 'pancake' breasts restored after pregnancy, weight loss, aging

CHICAGO – Women who desire a mommy-makeover, have had major weight loss, or are unhappy with the toll age has taken on their breasts can breathe easier. An innovative procedure to correct severely deflated, sagging breasts left looking like "pancakes" will be presented at the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) Plastic Surgery 2008 conference, Oct. 31 – Nov. 5, in Chicago. The procedure corrects misshapen breasts by lifting and restoring them to a more natural, full shape and position without the use of breast implants.

'Smile doctors' create, restore and enhance patients' smiles

CHICAGO – Imagine not having the ability to return the smile of a loved one or being too embarrassed by your mouth's appearance to display a smile. At the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) and American Society of Maxillofacial Surgeons (ASMS) Plastic Surgery 2008 conference, Oct. 31 – Nov. 5, in Chicago, plastic surgeons or "smile doctors" will reveal state-of-the-art "facial reanimation" procedures that give people, who previously were unable, the ability to smile. Additionally, ways to rejuvenate an aged smile and enhance the often overlooked mouth region will be discussed.

Pollution from livestock farming affects infant health

Wellesley, MA – October 8, 2008 – A new study in the American Journal of Agricultural Economics explores the effects of pollution from livestock facilities on infant health and finds that production is associated with an increase in infant mortality.

Stacy Sneeringer of Wellesley College utilized data on spatial variation in livestock operations from the past two decades to identify the relationship between industry location and infant health. As livestock production has become more concentrated in larger farms, production has become more concentrated in certain areas.

Ecological restoration as a tool for reversing ecosystem fragmentation

Ecosystem fragmentation, along with many other global trends, is causing the natural world to undergo profound changes at all spatial scales from the micro-habitat to the continental. The widespread and unprecedented human impact upon nature has adversely affected ecosystem health and resilience, biodiversity, and the provision of ecological goods and services that all species depend on (e.g. clean air, fresh water and healthy soils).

Protection for stressed-out bacteria identified

An international team of researchers is a step closer to understanding the spread of deadly diseases such as listeriosis, after observing for the first time how bacteria respond to stress.

The research, published in the October issue of the prestigious international journal Science, details how a huge molecule called a stressosome protects bacterial cells from external stress and danger.

Scientists from the University of Newcastle in Australia, and Newcastle University and Imperial College in the United Kingdom, collaborated on the discovery.

Using living cells as nanotechnology factories

In the tiny realm of nanotechnology, scientists have used a wide variety of materials to build atomic scale structures. But just as in the construction business, nanotechnology researchers can often be limited by the amount of raw materials. Now, Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University researcher Hao Yan has avoided these pitfalls by using cells as factories to make DNA based nanostructures inside a living cell.

The results were published in the early online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

A new material could act as a nanofridge for microchips

In the past few years, the design and manufacturing of circuits at nanoscopic scale for integrated devices has become one of the frontier fields in new material science and technology. The significant reduction achieved in these devices often is accompanied by new discoveries in how they behave precisely when the systems are of extremely small dimensions. Understanding this new physics at nanoscopic scale at the same time has enabled researchers to study the possibility of designing new materials with innovative characteristics.

Hodgkin lymphoma -- new characteristics discovered

Researchers are still discovering new characteristics of Hodgkin lymphoma, a common form of cancer of the lymphatic system. The malignant cells are derived from white blood cells (B cells), but have lost a considerable part of the B cell-specific gene expression pattern. The phenotype and the characteristics of Hodgkin lymphoma cells are therefore unique. Björn Lamprecht and Dr.

Diversity of plant-eating fishes may be key to recovery of coral reefs

For endangered coral reefs, not all plant-eating fish are created equal.

A report scheduled to be published this week in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that maintaining the proper balance of herbivorous fishes may be critical to restoring coral reefs, which are declining dramatically worldwide. The conclusion results from a long-term study that found significant recovery in sections of coral reefs on which fish of two complementary species were caged.

Tracking down the cause of mad cow disease

The cause of diseases such as BSE in cattle and Creutzfeld–Jakob disease in humans is a prion protein. This protein attaches to cell membranes by way of an anchor made of sugar and lipid components (a glycosylphosphatidylinositol, GPI) anchor. The anchoring of the prions seems to have a strong influence on the transformation of the normal form of the protein into its pathogenic form, which causes scrapie and mad cow disease. A team headed by Christian F. W. Becker at the TU Munich and Peter H. Seeberger at the ETH Zurich has now "recreated" the first GPI-anchored prion in the laboratory.

Climate change will affect public health -- a call to action

San Diego, October 7, 2008 – Extreme heat events (EHE), or heat waves, are the most prominent cause of weather-related human mortality in the United States, responsible for more deaths annually than hurricanes, lightning, tornadoes, floods and earthquakes combined. These events, and other climate-related changes in the worldwide environment that directly affect public health, are examined in the November issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

New invention that could change design of future memory storage devices

A research team at Singapore A*STAR's Data Storage Institute (DSI) has invented a new phase change material that has the potential to change the design of future memory storage devices.

Phase change materials are substances that are capable of changing their structure between amorphous and crystalline at high speed. Currently, these materials are used to make Phase change memory (PCM), the most promising alternative to replace FLASH memory.