Body

TORONTO, October 7, 2014 – Health technology company Infonaut, a MaRS client, has released a study showing that hospital patients may be at significant risk of infection due to their own poor hand hygiene. The findings were measured in a Toronto hospital using Infonaut's Hospital Watch Live™ system, innovative technology designed to assist hospitals in monitoring and controlling the spread of infections by analyzing the movement and behaviour of hospital staff, patients and equipment.

ATLANTA – October 08, 2014 – A study from American Cancer Society researchers finds the increased risk of premature death associated with a higher body mass index (BMI) is similar for African Americans and whites, in contrast to previous, smaller studies that indicated the association may be weaker for African Americans. The study, published in the open-access, online publication PLOS ONE, finds that among never smokers without prevalent disease, overweight and obesity are strongly associated with subsequent risk of mortality in every race.

Four families likely influenced violin shape over four centuries, with many imitating famous designs like Stradivarius, according to a study published October 8, 2014 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Daniel Chitwood from Donald Danforth Plant Science Center in Missouri.

The discovery of new bones from a large land mammal that lived about 48 million years ago has led scientists to identify a new branch of mammals closely related to modern horses, rhinos, and tapirs, according to a study published October 8, 2014 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Lisa Noelle Cooper from Northeast Ohio Medical University and colleagues.

Healthier foods and beverages have been consistently more expensive than unhealthier ones from 2002-2012, with a gap that's growing, according to a study published October 8, 2014 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Nicholas Jones from University of Cambridge, UK, and colleagues.

Berkeley — Fad diets come and go, but might there be something to the ones that involve consuming grapefruit and grapefruit juice? New research at the University of California, Berkeley, suggests that a closer look at grapefruit juice is warranted.

Cut off by freeways and human development, mountain lions in southern California are facing a severe loss of genetic diversity, according to a new study led by the University of California, Davis in partnership with The Nature Conservancy.

The study, published today in the journal PLOS ONE, represents the largest genetic sampling of mountain lions, or pumas, in southern California. It raises concerns about the current status of mountain lions in the Santa Ana and Santa Monica mountains, as well as the longer-term outlook for mountain lions across southern California.

(PHILADELPHIA) – Transfer RNAs (tRNAs) are ancient workhorse molecules and part of the cellular process that creates the proteins, critical building blocks of life that keep a cell running smoothly. A new discovery suggests that the number of human genomic loci that might be coding for tRNAs is nearly double what is currently known. Most of the newly identified loci resemble the sequences of mitochondrial tRNAs suggesting unexpected new links between the human nuclear and mitochondrial genomes, links that are not currently understood.

Lebanon, NH, 10/8/14 —To reduce false positives when identifying genetic variations associated with human disease through genome-wide association studies (GWAS), Dartmouth researchers have identified nine traits that are not dependent on P values to predict single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) reproducibility as reported in Human Genetics on October 2, 2014.

Reproducibility rates of SNPs based solely on P values is low. Dartmouth authors' analysis of GWAS studies published in Nature Genetics showed a 1-5 percent replication rate.

New Haven, Conn. - HIV is adept at eluding immune system responses because the protein it uses to infect cells is constantly changing.

Now a team of researchers including scientists from Yale have stripped the cloak from this master of disguise, providing a high resolution image of this surface spike protein and monitoring how it constantly changes its shape, information that suggests new ways to attack the virus through drugs and vaccines.

NEW YORK — (October 8, 2014) -- Researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College have developed technologies that allow investigators, for the first time, to watch what they call the "dance" of HIV proteins on the virus' surface, which may contribute to how it infects human immune cells. Their discovery is described in the Oct. 8 issue of Science, and is also a part of a study published the same day in Nature.

This news release is available in German.

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Researchers at the University of Missouri School of Medicine have identified epigenetic protein changes caused by binge drinking, a discovery that could lead to treatments for alcohol-related liver diseases.

"We know that chronic alcohol use is damaging to the liver, but binge drinking amplifies that damage," said Shivendra Shukla, Ph.D., Margaret Proctor Mulligan Professor at the MU School of Medicine and lead author of the study.

A government program to provide health insurance for catastrophic illness to households below the poverty line in Karnataka, lowered both mortality rates and out-of-pocket expenses for the residents, according to a recent evaluation published in the leading global health journal The BMJ.

The program is implemented by the Karnataka government with support from the World Bank Group.

Using a high-throughput screening assay, EPFL scientists have discovered two small molecules that could overcome the multidrug resistance of the bacterium that causes tuberculosis.