Body

COLUMBIA, Mo. – Vitamin D deficiency is common in Americans, and especially in overweight and obese adolescents, according to the National Institutes of Health. University of Missouri researchers have found that providing obese adolescents with a high daily dose of vitamin D3 is safe and effective in improving their vitamin D status.

New Orleans, LA – Research conducted by Dr. Jayne S. Weiss, Professor and Chair of Ophthalmology at LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans, and colleagues has found that a defect in a gene involved in a rare disease of the cornea also contributes to the progression of invasive bladder cancer. The findings are published in the November 2011 issue of the peer-reviewed journal, DNA and Cell Biology. It is the featured research of the issue, selected for the cover.

KANSAS CITY, MO—After more than a century of study, mysteries still remain about the process of meiosis—a special type of cell division that helps insure genetic diversity in sexually-reproducing organisms. Now, researchers at Stowers Institute for Medical Research shed light on an early and critical step in meiosis.

When obese men take a relatively small dose of resveratrol in purified form every day for a month, their metabolisms change for the better. In fact, the effects appear to be as good for us as severe calorie restriction. Resveratrol is a natural compound best known as an ingredient in red wine.

"We saw a lot of small effects, but consistently pointing in a good direction of improved metabolic health," said Patrick Schrauwen of Maastricht University in The Netherlands. The findings in Cell Metabolism are the first to report the clinical effects of resveratrol.

New Rochelle, NY, November 1, 2011—Clinicians often face the challenge of trying to make sense of conflicting reports from parents, teachers, and children about a child's behavioral problems. However, a better understanding of the source and nature of these disagreements may provide important information that could improve treatment and outcomes. A group of articles in the current issue of Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology, a peer-reviewed journal published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.

Article Highlights from the November issue of The American Naturalist:

• The singer not the song: Why some birds think simple songs are sexy
• How global warming could cause animals to shrink
• How historic climate change drove modern species diversity
• Hatching from a cold egg could lead to permanent problems

For the complete table of contents for the November issue, go to www.journals.uchicago.edu/an.

PHILADELPHIA, PA - For the first time in the Delaware Valley Region, a patient has undergone a complex and intricate bilateral hand transplant that could significantly enhance the quality-of-life for persons with multiple limb loss. The procedure was performed by Penn's Hand Transplant Program which operates under the leadership of the Penn Transplant Institute and in collaboration with Gift of Life Donor Program, the nonprofit organ and tissue donor program which serves the eastern half of Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey and Delaware.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - An international team of scientists, including biologists from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, may have pinpointed for the first time the mechanism responsible for cell polyploidy, a state in which cells contain more than 2 paired sets of chromosomes.

When it comes to human chromosomes and the genes they carry, our tissue cells prefer matched pairs. Bundled within the nucleus of our cells are 46 chromosomes, one set of 23 inherited from each of our parents. Thus, we are known from a cellular standpoint as "diploid" creatures.

Much as people can exchange information instantaneously in the digital age, bacteria associated with humans and their livestock appear to freely and rapidly exchange genetic material related to human disease and antibiotic resistance through a mechanism called horizontal gene transfer (HGT).

Bethesda, MD—With cold and flu season almost here, the next time you're sick, think twice before taking something for your fever. That's because scientists have found more evidence that elevated body temperature helps certain types of immune cells to work better. This research is reported in the November 2011 issue of the Journal of Leukocyte Biology (https://www.jleukbio.org).

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Researchers report they have figured out how thecancer-causing bacterium Helicobacter pylori attacks a cell's energy infrastructure, sparking a series of events in the cell that ultimately lead it to self-destruct.

H. pylori are the only bacteria known to survive in the human stomach. Infection with H. pylori is associated with an increased risk of gastric cancer, the second-leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide.

London, UK (November 1st, 2011) – Policy decisions and poor management have substantially undermined the US Los Alamos National Laboratory—and, consequently, national security, according to an article available today in the current issue of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, published by SAGE. The article calls into question media and government stereotypes that have blamed Los Alamos's scientists for the decline.

The next time you take aspirin for a headache, thank a willow tree. Salicylic acid, a compound chemically similar to aspirin, is found in willow tree bark and is made by the plant as a chemical defense against pathogens. By mimicking the chemical production processes of plants, scientists have been able to synthetically produce and engineer many important alkaloid drug products, including caffeine, atropine (an anti-spasmodic used to treat heart arrhythmia), nicotine, morphine and quinine.

Mice are often used to test whether substances in food are harmful to humans. This requires that mice and humans metabolise substances in the same way. Humans have certain enzymes in more parts of the body than mice. The health risk associated with harmful substances in food may therefore be underestimated.

Scientists at Warwick Medical School have uncovered the molecular process of how cells are by-passing the body's inbuilt 'health checkpoint' with cells that carry unequal numbers of chromosomes that have a higher risk of developing cancer.

Studying simple yeast cells, scientists now understand the mechanism by which cells ensure their daughter cells receive the correct number of chromosomes.