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CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — A commodity market that has long helped wheat growers and processors manage price risks could lose its relevance unless the Chicago Board of Trade bridges a wide gap between futures and cash prices, a new University of Illinois study warns.

U. of I. economists say outdated grain delivery locations in CBOT futures contracts are likely behind wheat futures prices that have topped the simultaneous cash price by as much as $2 a bushel since the disconnect emerged in late 2005, clouding the market's value as a hedging tool.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – A researcher at UC Riverside has discovered a new species of lichen – a plant-like growth that looks like moss or a dry leaf – and named it after President Barack Obama.

"I discovered the new species in 2007 while doing a survey for lichen diversity on Santa Rosa Island in California," said Kerry Knudsen, the lichen curator in the UCR Herbarium. "I named it Caloplaca obamae to show my appreciation for the president's support of science and science education."

Despite rapid strides in minimally invasive surgical techniques -- most notably, laparoscopy -- traditional open surgery remains the most common surgical option across the United States for people with diseases of the rectum and colon.

PHILADELPHIA (April 15, 2009) -- Researchers from the Monell Center report that the red panda is the first non-primate mammal to display a liking for the artificial sweetener aspartame. This unexpected affinity for an artificial sweetener may reflect structural variation in the red panda's sweet taste receptor.

The findings may shed light on how taste preferences and diet choice are shaped by molecular differences in taste receptors.

COLLEGE PARK, MD, April 14, 2009 -- Sleep is such an essential part of human existence that we spend about a third of our lives doing it -- some more successfully than others. Sleep disorders afflict some 50-70 million people in the United States and are a major cause of disease and injury. People who suffer from disturbed sleep have an increased risk of heart attack, stroke, hypertension, obesity, depression, and accidents. Nearly a fifth of all serious car crashes, in fact, are linked to sleeplessness.

Researchers at Children's Hospital Boston have developed a slow-release anesthetic drug-delivery system that could potentially revolutionize treatment of pain during and after surgery, and may also have a large impact on chronic pain management. In NIH-funded work, they used specially designed fat-based particles called liposomes to package saxitoxin, a potent anesthetic, and produced long-lasting local anesthesia in rats without apparent toxicity to nerve or muscle cells. The research was published online April 13 by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

According to a recent survey by the American Academy of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery (AAO-HNS), the association representing America's ear, nose, and throat (ENT) doctors, many Americans believe that "keeping their voice healthy" is the biggest obstacle a singer on American Idol has to overcome, over dealing with the judges or overcoming stage fright. Americans also strongly agree about the steps necessary to maintaining a healthy voice. The survey results coincide with World Voice Day, which is celebrated on April 16.

Scientists at MIT and Brown University studying how marine bacteria move recently discovered that a sharp variation in water current segregates right-handed bacteria from their left-handed brethren, impelling the microbes in opposite directions.

This finding and the possibility of quickly and cheaply implementing the segregation of two-handed objects in the laboratory could have a big impact on industries like the pharmaceutical industry, for which the separation of right-handed from left-handed molecules can be crucial to a drug's safety.

CHESTNUT HILL, MA (April 15, 2009) -- A new theory about early human adaptation suggests that our ancestors capitalized on their capacities for play to enable the development of a highly cooperative way of life.

Writing in the current edition of the interdisciplinary American Journal of Play, Boston College developmental psychologist Peter Gray suggests that use of play helped early humans to overcome the innate tendencies toward aggression and dominance which would have made a cooperative society impossible.

Carotenoids have important physiological functions, including antioxidant, immunomodulating, and photoprotectant properties. Carotenoid pigments are also used by many bird species as colorants, and are responsible for most of their red, orange and yellow coloration. In particular, carotenoid-red coloration in birds has been shown to act as an ornament, signaling the nutritional and health status of the individual and its ability to locate high quality resources.

The AIDS-causing HIV specifically counteracts the mechanisms of human cells that protect these against viral infections – a special viral protein marks protective cellular proteins for their rapid destruction and thus diminishes the cell's supply. A team of researchers in Heidelberg under supervision of virologist Dr. Oliver Keppler demonstrated this mechanism for the first time in cell cultures, thus discovering a target for a novel treatment strategy.

People with the ability to stave off AIDS for years after initial infection by HIV have been called "long-term non-progressors" or "elite controllers."

One component of this remarkable resistance comes from an individual's HLA genes. Long-term non-progressors tend to have HLA genes that help the immune system recognize and fight HIV more efficiently.

A team of researchers from the Emory Vaccine Center studying HIV-infected people with particularly effective HLA genes has observed how the virus mutates and evolves in response to immune pressure.

A novel, minimally invasive surgical approach to treat stomach cancer has been shown to have advantages that may make it a preferable treatment for some patients.

Calgary, AB- The most disabling aspect of Tourette syndrome is that in 90% of cases, it exists in conjunction with another disorder. The most frequent co-occurring condition in people with Tourette is attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), though the cause of this association is uncertain. Having one disorder can be disabling enough, but having two means coping with more than twice the disability.

Whether people with Alzheimer's disease benefit in the long term from non-drug treatment interventions remains an unanswered question. This unsatisfactory finding is mainly due to the fact that convincing studies are lacking so far. For individual approaches, the studies provide indications of a benefit, but also of harm. This is the conclusion of a report by the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care, Cologne, which was published in March 2009 and for which an English-language summary is now available.