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It is estimated that between 5% and 10% of breast and ovarian cancers are familial in origin, which is to say that these tumours are attributable to inherited mutations from the parents in genes such as BRCA1 or BRCA2. In patients with these mutations, PARP inhibitors, which are currently in clinical trials, have shown encouraging results that make them a new option for personalised cancer treatment, an alternative to standard chemotherapy.

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (JUNE 18, 2013). The effects of long-term cigarette smoking on morbidity and mortality have long been known. In a more immediate sense, smoking in the days and weeks before surgery can lead to morbidity and complications for many surgical procedures. In this review, researchers from the University of California San Francisco and Yale University examined the surgical literature and, specifically, the neurosurgical literature to characterize the impact of active smoking on neurosurgical outcomes.

LA, London (18 June 2013). A team of internationally recognized feline experts including veterinarians and feline scientists co-chaired by Dr Sarah Ellis from the University of Lincoln, U.K. and Dr Ilona Rodan, Director of Cat Care Clinic, Wisconsin, U.S.A. were invited by the International Society of Feline Medicine (ISFM) and the American Association of Feline Practitioners (AAFP) to compile guidelines for veterinarians, owners and those working with cats on how to meet the environmental needs of the domestic cat.

Like a stealthy enemy, blast disease invades rice crops around the world, killing plants and cutting production of one of the most important global food sources. Now a study by an international team of researchers has shed light on how the rice blast fungus, Magnaporthe oryzae, invades plant tissue. The finding is a step towards learning how to control the disease, which by some estimates destroys enough rice to feed 60 million people annually.

Methylation refers to a chemical modification of DNA and this modification can occur in millions of positions in the DNA sequence. Until now, scientists believed that this epigenetic phenomenon actively reduced the expression of certain genes. Today, a team of researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE), Switzerland, led by Emmanouil Dermitzakis, Louis-Jeantet Professor at the Faculty of Medicine, reveals that this is not always the case and that DNA methylation may play both a passive and active role in gene regulation.

The scientific cooperation between chemists, biotechnologists and physicists from various Catalan institutes, headed by Pau Gorostiza, from the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), and Ernest Giralt, from the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona), has led to a breakthrough that will favor the development of light-regulated therapeutic molecules.

PORTLAND, Ore. — An analysis by the Evidence-based Practice Center at Oregon Health & Science University has found that previously published clinical trial studies about a controversial bone growth product used in spinal surgeries overstated the product's effectiveness.

The OHSU analysis found the product offered no real benefit over bone grafts traditionally used in such surgeries and also found that previous studies had underreported harms that occurred in the studies. All but one of those studies were funded by the product's manufacturer, Medtronic.

Newly published research from a University of Texas at Arlington communication team offers a groundbreaking perspective on the controversial use of unmanned aerial vehicles in journalism and mass communication, or "drone journalism."

The remotely guided aircraft gained prominence in the military's hunt for suspected terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Such drones can be large, some about the size of small planes, which operate at higher altitudes and serve various functions.

Aspirin is known to lower risk for some cancers, and a new study led by a UC San Francisco scientist points to a possible explanation, with the discovery that aspirin slows the accumulation of DNA mutations in abnormal cells in at least one pre-cancerous condition.

University of Leicester scientists have discovered a potential genetic contributor to the increased risk of heart disease among men.

A team of researchers including clinicians and scientists have made an important step forward in search of the mechanisms underlying increased risk of coronary artery disease in men who carry a particular type of the Y chromosome (haplogroup I).

(Washington, DC) – A new language has been discovered in a remote Indigenous community in northern Australia that is generated from a unique combination of elements from other languages. Light Warlpiri has been documented by University of Michigan linguist Carmel O'Shannessy, in a study on "The role of multiple sources in the formation of an innovative auxiliary category in Light Warlpiri, a new Australian mixed language," to be published in the June, 2013 issue of the scholarly journal Language.

A new social media initiative helped to boost organ donor registration rates, according to a new study published in the American Journal of Transplantation. The findings suggest that social media might be an effective tool for tackling a variety of problems related to public health in which communication and education are essential.

Patients in Vietnam and other locations with central nervous system infections may well be suffering from the effects of a newly discovered virus, according to a study to be published in mBio®, the online open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology. Researchers have detected the virus in spinal fluid from 4 percent of 642 patients with central nervous system infections of unknown cause, and in an average of 58 percent of fecal samples from pigs and poultry, suggesting animals may serve as reservoirs for transmission to humans.

A social media push boosted the number of people who registered themselves as organ donors 21-fold in a single day, Johns Hopkins researchers found, suggesting social media might be an effective tool to address the stubborn organ shortage in the United States.

Using drugs to treat an infection could allow other co-existing conditions to flourish, a study in wild animals has shown.

Researchers studying wild mice – which typically carry multiple parasitic infections at once – found that when these animals were treated for one type of bug, other infections they had tended to worsen.