Body

Viruses are insidious creatures. They differ from each other in many ways, and they can mutate — at times seemingly at will, as with HIV — to resist a host of weapons fired at them. Complicating matters further is that new viruses are constantly emerging.

CINCINNATI – Mutation of a gene that helps protect the body from genetic instability leads to cellular and molecular changes in the pregnant uterus that trigger premature birth, according to a study appearing online Feb. 1 in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

JUPITER, FL, February 1, 2010 – The search for new drug compounds is probably worse than looking for a needle in a haystack because scientists are limited in the size of the haystacks they can rummage through—time and money make it virtually impossible to screen or search through super-large libraries of potential compounds. This is a serious problem, because there is enormous interest in identifying synthetic molecules that bind to proteins for applications in drug discovery, biology, and proteomics, and larger libraries should mean higher odds of success.

Addition of the contrast agent gadolinium during magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for primary tumor assessment improved accuracy for detecting lymph node metastases, according to a new study published online February 1 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Gadolinium-enhanced MRI is primarily used to visualize primary tumors, highlight tumor vascularity, and increasingly to detect and evaluate lymph node metastases.

Metformin XR (extended release formulation)—a medication used to treat type 2 diabetes—appears to cause a small but significant decrease in body mass index (BMI) in non-diabetic obese adolescents when combined with a lifestyle intervention program, according to a report in the February issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

Single mutations in genes involved with nerve cell formation and growth appear to be associated with the risk of attempting suicide among individuals with depression, according to a report posted online today that will appear in the April print issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. - Increasing rates of obese and overweight children in the United States may be contributing to a later onset of puberty in boys, say researchers at the University of Michigan Health System.

In a new study published in the February issue of the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, researchers show that a higher body mass index during early and mid-childhood for boys is associated with later onset of puberty. This is one of the first longitudinal studies in the U.S. to examine the association between weight status and timing of puberty in boys.

HAMILTON, ON, February 1, 2010–Researchers excavating an ancient Roman cemetery made a surprising discovery when they extracted ancient mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) from one of the skeletons buried at the site: the 2,000-year-old bones revealed a maternal East Asian ancestry.

The results will be presented at the Roman Archeology Conference at Oxford, England, in March, and published in the Journal of Roman Archaeology.

Johns Hopkins scientists believe they may have figured out how genetic snippets called microRNAs are able to shut down the production of some proteins.

The issue, they say, is important because the more scientists know about how genes — the blueprints for proteins — are regulated, the more likely they are to figure out how to use that information in treating or preventing diseases linked to such regulation, including cancer.

COLD SPRING HARBOR, N.Y. (Mon., Feb. 1, 2010) -- Mapping DNase I hypersensitive sites has long been the standard method for identifying genetic regulatory elements such as promoters, enhancers, silencers, insulators, and locus control regions. Sequences that are nucleosome-depleted, presumably to provide access for transcription factors, are selectively digested by DNase I. Traditional low-throughput methods use Southern blots to then identify these hypersensitive sites.

Los Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore and Washington DC (February 1, 2010) — Through the use of instructional DVDs, parents of children with autism can learn how to teach their child to communicate and improve their behavior, according to research published in the January 2010 issue of The Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions (published by the Hammill Institute on Disabilities and SAGE).

Family members play a central role in the education and treatment of children with autism. However, training parents in appropriate techniques can provide unique challenges.

ALEXANDRIA, VA – Decreased muscle strength is associated with difficulty in performing functional activities such as stooping, crouching, or kneeling (SCK) in older adults, according to an observational study published in the January issue of Physical Therapy (PTJ), the scientific journal of the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA). These researchers found that adults with SCK difficulty had significant decreases in adjusted strength measurements of trunk extensor, knee extensor, and ankle flexion muscles.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – Biologists have known for long that ecology, the interaction between organisms and their environment, plays a significant role in forming new species and in modifying living ones. The traditional view is that ecology shapes evolution. The environment defines a template and the process of evolution by natural selection shapes organisms to fit that template.

Some specialized theory, a few laboratory experiments and studies of natural populations suggest, however, that evolutionary processes reciprocate by influencing ecology in turn.

LOS ANGELES—Feb 1, 2010 --Ground-breaking results from a study to evaluate the effectiveness of the MEND Program (Mind, Exercise, Nutrition, Do it!), a multi-component community-based childhood obesity intervention (www.mendcentral.org), are published today in the US journal Obesity (www.nature.com/oby/journal/v18/n1s/abs/oby2009433a.html).

Severe muscle injuries – such as crush injuries suffered in earthquakes, car accidents and explosions, and muscle damage from excessive exercise or statin drug interactions – can cause life-threatening kidney damage. Treatment has been limited to intravenous fluids and dialysis, but a new study suggests that the commonly used pain reliever acetaminophen may protect the kidneys from damage.