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Despite years of research, the genetic factors behind many human diseases and characteristics remain unknown. The inability to find the complete genetic causes of family traits such as height or the risk of type 2 diabetes has been called the "missing heritability" problem.

When fruit flies sense parasitic wasps in their environment, they lay their eggs in an alcohol-soaked environment, essentially forcing their larvae to consume booze as a drug to combat the deadly wasps.

The discovery by biologists at Emory University is being published in the journal Science on Friday, February 22.

The new drug has been proven to be effective in preventing the spread of different strains of influenza in laboratory models – including resistant strains of the virus.

The breakthrough is the result of a global collaboration between scientists from CSIRO, the University of British Columbia and the University of Bath.

University of Adelaide researchers have provided new evidence on the long-debated authorship of two famous texts – the US Federalist Papers and the Letter to the Hebrews in the New Testament.

The results of a 10-year project led by Professor Derek Abbott, School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, was published today in the prestigious journal PLOS ONE.

The team has developed an automatic authorship detection system, using advanced software techniques to analyse author style based on commonly used words.

New Rochelle, NY, February 21, 2013—By targeting the specific mutation that causes the hereditary neuromuscular disease myotonic dystrophy, it is possible to neutralize the mutant RNA toxicity and minimize or even eliminate the disabling symptoms of the disease. New classes of drugs called antisense oligonucleotides are being designed to achieve this.

DENVER – The median age of patients diagnosed with advanced non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) has steadily increased over the recent years and is presently 70 years. Despite this, the elderly are significantly underrepresented in clinical trials. A recent study published in the March 2013 issue of the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer's (IASLC) Journal of Thoracic Oncology, investigated the degree to which exclusion or underrepresentation of elderly occurs in practice-changing clinical trials in advanced NSCLC.

DENVER – Local therapy is not commonly utilized in metastatic lung cancer. Researchers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center investigated the efficacy of local therapy with continued EGFR TKI therapy specifically in patients with acquired resistance to EGFR TKIs.

The first scientific examinations of data recorded during a record-setting expedition have yielded new insights about the diversity of creatures that live and thrive in the cold, dark, and highly pressurized habitats of the world's deepest points and their vastly unexplored ecosystems.

Cincinnati, OH, February 22, 2013 -- In January 2012, the United States Department of Agriculture passed a series of regulations designed to make school lunches more nutritious, which included requiring schools to increase whole grain offerings and making students select either a fruit or vegetable with their purchased lunch. However, children cannot be forced to eat these healthier lunches.

In reef-building corals variations within genes involved in immunity and response to stress correlate to water temperature and clarity, finds a study published in BioMed Central's open access journal BMC Genetics. This information could be used to conserve or rebuild reefs in areas affected by climate change, by changes in extreme weather patterns, increasing sedimentation or altered land use.

Bacteria become resistant to antibiotics when stressed, finds research published in BioMed Central's open access journal BMC Evolutionary Biology. In particular E. coli grown at high temperatures become resistant to rifampicin.

Highlights

Researchers have successfully applied a novel method of vaccine creation for Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) using a technique called large scale random codon re-encoding. Using this approach, a group from the UMR_D 190, Emerging viruses Department in Marseille, France in collaboration with the University of Sydney, Australia, demonstrated that the engineered viruses exhibit a stable phenotype with a significantly decreased viral fitness (i.e., replication capacity), making it a new vaccine candidate for this emerging viral disease.

Sourdough bread resists mold, unlike conventionally leavened bread. Now Michael Gaenzle and colleagues of the University of Alberta, Edmonton, show why. During sourdough production, bacteria convert the linoleic acid in bread flour to a compound that has powerful antifungal activity. The research, which could improve the taste of bread, is published online ahead of print in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.

Simon Fraser University virologist Masahiro Niikura and his doctoral student Nicole Bance are among an international group of scientists that has discovered a new class of molecular compounds capable of killing the influenza virus.

Working on the premise that too much of a good thing can be a killer, the scientists have advanced previous researchers' methods of manipulating an enzyme that is key to how influenza replicates and spreads.