Body

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – Carrying extra weight earlier in life increases the risk of developing problems with mobility in old age, even if the weight is eventually lost, according to new research out of the Sticht Center on Aging at Wake Forest University School of Medicine.

The study, funded by the National Institute on Aging and the Wake Forest University Claude D. Pepper Older Americans Independence Center, appears in the April 15 issue of the American Journal of Epidemiology.

A new standardized tool for the assessment of chronic pain can differentiate between pain subtypes and may help tailor treatment. The new tool is published in this week's open-access journal PLoS Medicine.

Killing only older mosquitoes could be a more sustainable way of controlling malaria, and has the potential to lead to evolution-proof insecticides that never become obsolete, according to an article in this week's issue of PLoS Biology. Each year, malaria – spread through mosquito bites – kills around a million people, and many of the chemicals used to kill the insects become ineffective as the mosquito's resistance to them evolves.

A simple and inexpensive method of assessing pain, developed by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers, is better than currently used techniques for distinguishing neuropathic pain – pain caused by damage to the nervous system – from other types of chronic back pain. Being able to more precisely determine the underlying nature of the pain is essential to choosing the best treatment. The report appears in the April 7 issue of the open-access journal PLoS Medicine.

A cancer scientist from Johns Hopkins has convinced an international group of colleagues to delay their race to find new cancer biomarkers and instead begin a 7,000-hour slog through a compendium of 50,000 scientific articles already published to assemble, decode and analyze the molecules that might herald the furtive presence of pancreatic cancer.

Caused by a mutation of the SMN gene, spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) is an infantile and juvenile neurodegenerative disorder where motor neuron loss causes progressive paralysis. A new study published in the open access journal BMC Medicine details the first research focused on human muscle tissue atrophied due to a genetic condition, and sheds light on two distinct mechanisms at work in different forms of SMA.

Wanted: stems cells. Just like those absconders chased by police all over the world, everybody can tell about their good deeds but none really knows how to recognize them. Yet, as of today, thanks to a study just published in the Proceedings of the National Accademy of Sciences (PNAS) and authored by Nobel Laureate for Medicine in 2007 Mario Capecchi and by the researcher from the Catholic University of Rome Eugenio Sangiorgi, we now know how to reveal the stem cells camouflaged in the pancreas.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., April 6, 2009 – AVEO Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company leveraging breakthrough discoveries in cancer biology to discover, develop and commercialize targeted oncology therapies, today announced findings from its novel human-in-mouse (HIM) cancer model system, in which AVEO successfully created invasive human tumors from primary human breast tissue that develop over time in mice and mimic human tumor behaviors and response. The findings were published this week in the Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

ST. PAUL, Minn. – A new study shows both obesity and a large belly appear to increase the risk of developing restless legs syndrome (RLS), a common sleep disorder characterized by an irresistible urge to move your legs. The research is published in the April 7, 2009, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

It is estimated that 5-10 percent of adults in the United States have RLS and the disorder often has a substantial impact on sleep, daily activities and quality of life.

Reducing sugar intake by the equivalent of one can of soda per day and increasing fiber intake by the amount equivalent to one half cup of beans per day appears to improve risk factors associated with type 2 diabetes in Latino adolescents, according to a report in the April issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

(SEATTLE) – The use of Avastin alone to treat a subgroup of recurrent Grade 3 brain tumors showed it was safe and effective at delaying tumor progression, according to a retrospective study of 22 patients conducted by a researcher at the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance.

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – New research at Wake Forest University School of Medicine evaluated the link between a common class of drugs used to prevent bone fractures in osteoporosis patients and the development of irregular heartbeat.

The study's findings appear in the current issue of Drug Safety, a publication of the International Society of Pharmacovigilance covering the safe and proper use of medicines.

Biomedical engineers have developed a new type of probe that allows them to visualize single ribonucleic acid (RNA) molecules within live cells more easily than existing methods. The tool will help scientists learn more about how RNA operates within living cells.

Techniques scientists currently use to image these transporters of genetic information within cells have several drawbacks, including the need for synthetic RNA or a large number of fluorescent molecules. The fluorescent probes developed at the Georgia Institute of Technology circumvent these issues.

Scientists of the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine (MDC) Berlin-Buch and Charité – University Medical School, Berlin, Germany, in collaboration with researchers from the Klinikum rechts der Isar of Technical University Munich and Christian Albrecht University, Kiel, have identified a gene variant on chromosome 11 that is associated with an increased risk of atopic dermatitis. In a large genome-wide association study the researchers scanned the genomes of more than 9600 participants from Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic.

A new study identifies a protein that modifies the androgen receptor (AR) and influences its ability to regulate target genes linked with the progression of prostate cancer. The research, published by Cell Press in the April 7th issue of the journal Cancer Cell, may also drive creation of new strategies for the treatment of advanced prostate cancer that no longer responds to traditional anti-hormone therapies.