Screen siblings, parents of infants with severe heart abnormalities
HOUSTON (Sept. 7, 2004) Brothers and sisters as well as parents of infants born with severe, life-threatening abnormalities of the left side of the heart should be screened for less severe, but related, heart problems, said researchers at Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) in Houston.... In a new study in the September issue of the journal Pediatrics, Drs. Jeffrey Towbin, BCM professo...Parents are top influence on soft-drink consumption among kids
CHICAGO - Flavored, carbonated drinks have been around for about two hundred years. And their popularity continues to grow--overtaking more nutritious beverages among some age groups, especially children and adolescents. ... ...Researchers from the University of Minnesota surveyed 560 children ages 8 to 13 years old on how often they drank soft drinks and the factors that influence soft drink con...Scientists raise awareness of need for sound science in age of fad diets
Congressional Lunch Briefing: Farming at the Mercy of Fad Diets...... Congressman Tom Latham (R-IA) and Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) in cooperation with scientists representing the Coalition on Funding Agricultural Research Missions (CoFARM). ...... Pamela J. White, Ph.D. Professor of Food Science, Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, Iowa State University, will discuss Farm...Parent-offspring conflict in the evolution of vertebrate reproductive mode
In the May 2004 issue of The American Naturalist, Bernard Crespi and Christina Semeniuk (Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, BC) explore issues of placental development and its relationship to the transmittal of genes related to human health. ......Animals reproduce by egg-laying (oviparity) or live birth (viviparity) and in many species viviparity involves transfer of nutrients via a placenta. We...Germ-free transparent fish open new window into gut development
St. Louis, March 15, 2004 Every animal including humans is home to "friendly" gut bacteria that help digest food and perform other important functions. Now, a tiny, transparent fish is literally offering biologists a new window into these mutually beneficial symbiotic relationships....... Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis have shown for the first time that zeb...Parenting ethics panel explores thorny issues posed by technology
STANFORD, Calif. - Advances in reproductive technologies have brought babies into the lives of thousands of yearning couples. But with those advances come some difficult questions: What is a parent? Who decides what a parent is? And will we, as a society, be satisfied with the answer?... ...Linda Giudice, MD, PhD, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Stanford University School of Medicine, w...Passwords to guard entry aren't enough to protect complex data
Passwords to guard entry aren't enough to protect complex data - security mechanisms also must protect what goes out... ..."Data can easily find itself in danger of being accessed by 'bad guys,'" says emeritus professor of computer science Gio Wiederhold, who will speak about trusted information databases Feb. 14 in Seattle at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of...New insight into control of parental gene expression in eggs
Researchers have identified a crucial step in a genetic process required for the development of viable eggs. The process, known as imprinting, distinguishes the paternally-inherited and the maternally-inherited copies of a number of developmentally important genes. ......The majority of mammalian genes are present in two copies, both of which are equally expressed and regulated. A small number of...New findings can help parents looking to combat number of kids' sick days
DECEMBER 3, 2003 (Bethesda, MD) How best to keep school aged children from getting sick? Some invoke the most famous parental warning of all: "Don't go outside with your hair wet or you'll catch pneumonia." Now, a new study offers additional strategies for combating the number of cold and flu symptom days among youngsters. ... ...A report by Canadian researchers demonstrates that children who...AACR and CEO Dr. Margaret Foti receive award for raising public awareness about melanoma
The American Association for Cancer Research and its CEO, Margaret Foti, Ph.D., M.D. (h.c.), received the CommunityCaring Award from the William S. Graham Foundation for Melanoma Research, Inc., (The "Billy Foundation") for "going above and beyond" what other organizations have done to help educate the public and survivors about cancer. Through its educational programs, the AACR has raised public...Transparent fish provide window on blood formation and marrow transplantation
Researchers have developed powerful new techniques to see in unprecedented detail how blood-forming cells develop in zebrafish. The scientists have used this system to transplant blood cells with fluorescent "tags" so they can observe how the cells restore the blood system in mutant zebrafish that do not have any red blood cells. ...The techniques may be helpful in learning how bone marrow transp...Awareness of GM foods increasing, while overall support slipping
Most Americans are unaware that they are already eating genetically modified (GM) foods, although awareness of GM foods is growing. This, according to a nationwide telephone survey of 1,200 randomly selected Americans, released on October 15 by the Food Policy Institute at Rutgers' Cook College. The study also found that while Americans seem to know more about genetic modification than most Eur...Signs of recovery in Adirondack lakes apparent, say researchers
LAKE GEORGE, N.Y. - Over the years acid deposition, commonly referred to as "acid rain," has rendered dozens of lakes in the Adirondacks uninhabitable for fish and other wildlife. Now, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute researchers at the Darrin Fresh Water Institute (DFWI) have indicated that some of the most severely affected lakes in that region are showing signs of recovery.... ..."In about hal...New theory of the evolution of bird flight linked to parental care
Modern birds evolved from ground-dwelling reptiles as their increasingly refined parenting skills led them into the trees, where they could better protect their young, proposes a researcher at the University of California, Davis....... This new theory, contradicting the two leading theories on the evolution of avian flight, appears this month in the German journal "Archaeopteryx," named after a...Increased awareness of stroke symptoms could dramatically reduce stroke disability
. . . Only a fraction of stroke patients each year are getting to the hospital in time to receive a treatment that makes the difference between disability and full recovery. Thousands more people could benefit from the treatment-a drug called tissue plasminogen activator (t-PA)-but do not, often because they do not know the symptoms of stroke or do not get to the hospital within the drugs 3-h...Nature reserves aren't protecting pandas, study shows
EAST LANSING, Mich. - The way to panda extinction may be paved on ...... good intentions, a Michigan State study published in Science shows.... ... Panda habitat is being destroyed quicker inside the world's most ...... high profile protected nature reserve than in adjacent areas of ...... China that are not protected. Moreover, the rates of destruction ...... were higher after the reserve was.... FORT COLLINS, COLORADO, USA - Limited awareness of biodiversity and its connections to our lives undermines the ability of public and policymakers to make decisions for sustainable development. So say prominent biologists and ecologists in a paper to be published in the January 2001 issue of Trends in Ecology and Evolution, to mark the start of the International Biodiversity Observation Year,....Do you love Mom or Dad's genes best? It depends, scientists say, on the gene. In the biggest comparison between human and mouse DNA sequence to date, researchers from Johns Hopkins and the Whitehead Institute examine how organisms play favorites between their parents' genes, a phenomenon known as imprinting. .For most genes, the human genome does not actively distinguish between the copy inhe...Parents' escape drinking evokes children's negative response to alcohol smell
.Researchers at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia report in today's Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research that children between the ages of 3 and 6 years are likely to dislike the smell of beer if their parents report drinking to escape feelings of unhappiness. The findings extend earlier knowledge that young children acquire sensory learning about alcohol and suggest th....Radioactivity released during the Three Mile Island (TMI) accident in 1979 does not appear to have caused an increase in cancer mortality among people living within a five-mile radius of the nuclear accident, according to researchers at the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public Health (GSPH). The findings were published Friday, April 28, on the website of Environmental Health Per...Purdue researcher finds space fertile arena for gene transfers
. .WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Biotechnology may have found a new home in space, based on research that found genetic engineering in microgravity was 10 times more successful than on earth.. . . .Purdue University's Richard Vierling is preparing to have his successful soybean DNA transplant experiments recreated on board a NASA space shuttle scheduled for launch April 13. Vierling's first microgravi...New Science study revisits the debate over bird parents, predators, and family planning
.Washington, D.C.-- What factors affect the size of bird families? Understanding the forces that drive evolutionary changes in bird behavior and life history "may help us better assess the vulnerability of different species to extinction or population problems," researcher Thomas E. Martin says of his latest study, appearing February 25 in the journal, . .In tropical and southern regions, femal...Awareness, quick action key to battling canine bacterial disease
.Saving the life of a dog with Canine Streptococcal Toxic Shock Syndrome requires quick action by the pet owner and awareness of the disease by the attending veterinarian.. .That's the word from Dr. Brad Fenwick, Kansas State University veterinarian who has been studying the disease since he first observed it among racing greyhounds. Little is known about transmission or prevention.. ."Typically...Protein component apparently plays key role in muscle elasticity
.CHAMPAIGN, Ill. - A pair of hydrogen bonds in the protein titin appears to be a key component allowing muscle to stretch and return to normal by regulating the ability of the protein to unfold one section at a time when stressed, researchers say.. .The findings were reported in the Nov. 4 issue of the journal Nature. They are a big step forward in the basic understanding of the protein's role...Turtle Population Apparently Threatened By Urban Sprawl, Traffic
.CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Yellow and black blotches and a peaceful demeanor make.Blanding's turtles (Emydoidea.blandingii) easy to identify. Finding them, however, is getting more difficult,.especially in two Chicago-area forest.preserves, because of shrinking numbers. .Populations, which likely intermingled in the past, have been driven apart by.urban sprawl and traffic on suburban.roadways that now...Study: Hydrogen Bonds Aren't Key To DNA Pairing After All
. . Hydrogen bonds play at best only a peripheral role in the.accurate pairing of DNA bases, researchers have shown,.overturning the conventional wisdom long been held by .biochemists. The finding represents a milestone in .researchers' understanding of the workings of DNA -- the .genetic bedrock of all organisms -- and forces scientists .back to the drawing board to revisit the fundamental.... CHICAGO -- A new study has shown that chimpanzees may be able to determine.whether their partners know they are in danger. This suggests that these.primates are able to decide how ignorant or informed their peers are about.an unexpected situation. . The finding, made by a team of researchers at Ohio State University's.Comparative Cognition Project, suggests that chimps share with hum......New Haven, CT -- The number of words toddlers understand is far...more important than the number they speak during the second year of life,...according to a recent study of twins by Yale University psychologist J....Steven Reznick. The study, which was designed to show how a child's...genetic makeup and environment influence the development of language and...other cognitive skills, should re...