Body

07/07/11, Clearwater Beach, FL. Research to be presented at the upcoming annual meeting of the Society for the Study of Ingestive Behavior (SSIB), the foremost society for research into all aspects of eating and drinking behavior, finds that alterations of meal-related gut hormone signals may contribute to the overall effects of exercise to help manage body weight.

LOMBOK, INDONESIA (12 July 2011)— New research released today at a high-level forestry conference in Indonesia—opened by Vice President Boediono—suggests that Asia’s largest forest nation is paying a high price for failing to give local communities enforceable rights to contested forests, causing significant economic losses owing to its highly undervalued forestland, and leading it to lose out to regional competitors.

Vegetation in towns and cities can make a significant contribution to carbon storage and, ecologists say, could lock away even more carbon if local authorities and gardeners planted and maintained more trees. The study, published this week in the British Ecological Society's Journal of Applied Ecology, is the first to quantify how much carbon is stored in vegetation within an urban area of Europe.

Missing or deformed limbs, clubfoot, facial disorders and gastrointestinal problems are some of the most common birth defects found to be associated with smoking during pregnancy, according to a major new report led by scientists at UCL.

The study, published today in Human Reproduction Update, is the first comprehensive review to identify the specific birth defects (malformations) most associated with smoking.

Social mobility - upwards - seems to curb the risk of developing high blood pressure among those born on the lower rungs of the ladder, suggests research published online in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.

Being born into poor or disadvantaged backgrounds has been linked with an increased risk of high blood pressure, which is a known contributory factor to an increased risk of heart disease and stroke.

The authors wanted to see if that risk was affected by climbing up the social ladder across generations.

Contact allergies (reactions caused by direct contact with substances like common metals and chemicals) may help prime the immune system to ward off certain types of cancer, suggests research published today in the online only title BMJ Open.

Previous research has indicated that people with type 1 allergies, which include pollen and house dust mites, may be more or less likely to develop cancer. But it is not known if those with contact allergies to common metals such as nickel, and chemicals, might also be afforded protection against the disease.

ST. PAUL, Minn. – Osteoporosis and low bone density are common in people in the early stages of multiple sclerosis (MS), according to a new study published in the July 12, 2011, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

Researchers have discovered that a protein found in the walls of blood vessels plays a key role in maintaining healthy blood pressure; a discovery that could one day lead to new treatments for people with high blood pressure.

The research, funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and the British Heart Foundation (BHF), shows that malfunction of the protein – a potassium channel called Kv7.4 – contributes to the maintenance of high blood pressure. The discovery is published this evening (2100hrs, 11 July) in the journal Circulation.

LEXINGTON, Ky. − A team of researchers led by University of Kentucky College of Agriculture Professor Joe Chappell is making a connection from prehistoric times to the present that could result in being able to genetically create a replacement for oil and coal shale deposits. This could have fundamental implications for the future of the earth's energy supply.

Toronto, ON - When it comes to how they respond to the environment, trees may not be that different from humans.

Recent studies showed that even genetically identical human twins can have a different chance of getting a disease. This is because each twin has distinct personal experiences through their lifetime.

It turns out that the same is likely true for forest trees as well, according to new research from the University of Toronto Scarborough (UTSC).

A genome-wide survey by researchers at The Wistar Institute shows how our cells create alternate versions of mRNA transcripts by altering how they "read" DNA. Many genes are associated with multiple gene promoters, the researchers say, which is the predominant way multiple variants of a given gene, for example, can be made with the same genetic instructions.

Researchers at the NYU Cancer Institute, an NCI-designated cancer center at NYU Langone Medical Center, identified for the first time the key role specific microRNAs (miRNAs) play in melanoma metastasis to simultaneously cause cancer cells to invade and immunosuppress the human body's ability to fight abnormal cells. The new study is published in the July 11, 2011 issue of the journal Cancer Cell.

Researchers from Rigshospitalet – Copenhagen University Hospital – and the University of Copenhagen have discovered why malaria parasites are able to hide from the immune defences of expectant mothers, allowing the parasite to attack the placenta. The discovery is an important part of the efforts researchers are making to understand this frequently fatal disease and to develop a vaccine.

Genetic instructions for developing limbs and digits were present in primitive fish millions of years before their descendants first crawled on to land, researchers have discovered.