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Feeding birds in winter is a most innocent human activity, but it can nonetheless have profound effects on the evolutionary future of a species, and those changes can be seen in the very near term. That's the conclusion of a report published online on December 3rd in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, showing that what was once a single population of birds known as blackcaps has been split into two reproductively isolated groups in fewer than 30 generations, despite the fact that they continue to breed side by side in the very same forests.

Researchers at the UC San Diego School of Medicine have pinpointed a mechanism that may help explain how chromosomal translocations – the supposedly random shuffling of large chunks of DNA that frequently lead to cancer – aren't so random after all. They have developed a model of such chromosomal mix-ups in prostate cancer which indicates that the male sex hormone (androgen) receptor unexpectedly plays a key role in driving specific translocations in the development of cancer.

The extinction of plant and animal species can be likened to emptying a museum of its collection, or dumping a cabinet full of potential medicines into the trash, or replacing every local cuisine with McDonald's burgers.

But the decline of species and their habitats may not just make the world boring. New research now suggests it may also put you at greater risk for catching some nasty disease.

In the 1980s, Harald zur Hausen and his co-workers discovered that specific types of human papillomavirus (HPV) cause cervical cancer. Scientists soon found out how these pathogens cause cells to degenerate. It is known today that the main culprits are viral proteins E6 and E7. Both proteins switch off different cellular control functions, thus promoting cell growth.

A special issue of Deutsches Ärzteblatt International contains the first scientific presentation of clinical experience with the novel influenza A virus (H1N1/09) in the German-speaking countries since the start of the pandemic. Ralf Winzer and his coauthors from the Düsseldorf University Hospital retrospectively evaluated data from a large clinical cohort of infected persons in Germany (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2009; 106[47]: 770-6).

UPTON, NY — A team of scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, Harvard University, and the Indian Institute of Science has made a major step in understanding how molecules locate the genetic information in DNA that is necessary to carry out important biological processes.

Grand Rapids, Mich. (Dec. 3, 2009) – Van Andel Research Institute (VARI) researchers have determined precisely how the plant hormone abscisic acid (ABA) works at the molecular level to help plants respond to environmental stresses such as drought and cold. Their findings, published in the journal Nature, could help engineer crops that thrive in harsh environments around the world and combat global food shortages. The findings could also have implications for stress disorders in humans.

Coral reef fish can undergo a personality change in warmer water, according to an intriguing new study suggesting that climate change may make some species more aggressive.

Experiments with two species of young damselfish on Australia's Great Barrier Reef have shown for the first time that some reef fish are either consistently timid, or consistently bold, and that these individual differences are even more marked as water temperatures rise.

Surgeons and other healthcare professionals specialising in solid organ transplants have been issued with expert advice to guide them through the complex clinical issues posed by the global H1N1 (swine flu) pandemic.

The paper, published online by the American Journal of Transplantation, also urges them to stay alert to the significant concerns that swine flu could combine with seasonal flu, and possibly even bird flu (H5N1), to develop into a strain with unpredictable virulence.

ST. LOUIS – The outlook for individuals with type 2 diabetes and coronary artery disease is not as grim as originally believed, according to new Saint Louis University research published in Circulation, the Journal of the American Heart Association.

December 3 2009 (Oakland, Calif.) – Breastfeeding a child may lower a woman’s risk of developing Metabolic Syndrome, a condition linked to heart disease and diabetes in women, according to a Kaiser Permanente study that was published today online ahead of print and will appear in the February issue of Diabetes, a journal of the American Diabetes Association (link: http://dx.doi.org/10.2337/db09-1197).

PHILADELPHIA — Effective prevention of smoking among teenagers, particularly black teenagers, is narrowing the disparity in lung cancer rates between blacks and whites, according to a report published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research. The December issue has a special focus on tobacco.

PHILADELPHIA – Despite popular belief and some marketing claims, researchers have found that Chinese "herbal" cigarettes that combine medicinal herbs with tobacco are just as addictive and no safer than regular cigarettes.

PHILADELPHIA – Children exposed to secondhand cigarette smoke have an increased risk of developing lung cancer in adulthood, even if they never smoked.

Results of this study are published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research, as part of a special tobacco focus in the December issue.