Aphids make 'chemical weapons' to fight off killer ladybirds
...those insects eating a diet rich in glucosinolates had a high success rate in fending off predators, whereas those without glucosinolates in their diet did not. Scientists already knew that aphids absorbed these chemicals from their food, but this study published Proceedings of the Royal Society B is the...Nearly 90 percent of babies receive recommended newborn screening tests
...ng could be eliminated or reduced. Massachusetts had been a leader in newborn screening when, in the early 1960s, it became the first state to routinely screen all newborns for PKU (phenylketonuria), an inherited metabolic disorder that, if untreated, causes severe mental retardation. But today Massach...New blood test might offer early warning of deep belly fat
...od concentrations of RBP4, although the connection had not been clearly shown, the researchers said. In a study of 196 people, the researchers now reveal that RBP4 is indeed preferentially produced in the deep fat that covers organs of the belly. RBP4 gene expression activity levels spiked about 60-fol...Study provides new data about the laws governing embryo development in organisms
... vertebrate species. Although biologists already had an intuitive idea of how the limit or border between these compartments was generated, there had been no systematic study taking into account all the relevant elements. Therefore, and with the back...New research shows vaginal bacteria vary among healthy women, need customized treatment
... vaginal yeast infections, while others have never had one partly explain differences in susceptibility to infection in the two racial groups, based upon the relative frequency of different kinds of bacterial communities in women. Forney also said differences in the kinds of bacteria normally pres...Fat horses face health problems
...hly publicized struggle that the racehorse Barbaro had with the disorder as a result of his catastrophic ...ve a BCS of 8 to 9. Ten percent of the horses that had a BCS greater than 6 but less than 8 and 32 percent of the horses that had a BCS of 8 to 9 were hype...New perspectives for the geosciences and climate research
... This has meant that researchers from Germany have had to perform their experiments abroad, for example at the ETH in Zurich, Switzerland, or at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, USA, which involves long waiting times as well as being expensive. This was why the DFG launched the call for proposals for...A spoonful of sugar helps your waistline go down
...Measures of blood fats (total cholesterol and LDL) had also significantly improved. This research contributes to the growing body of evidence that an effective way to lose weight is by adhering to a high-carbohydrate, low-fat diet and by being physically active. commented Dr Drummond, adding it also pro...Neutral evolution has helped shape our genome
...ing for new genes, they found portions of DNA that had been copied from the mitochondria, the energy-making apparatus of human cells that has its own small genome. These mitochondrial sequences are known as numts. When they expanded their study across the whole human genome, they found more than 1200 s...New gene mutation identified in common type of dementia
...g back to the 16th century; 36 family members have had frontotemporal dementia. For this study, DNA tests...lmost identical, said Bruni. The Italian family had no cases with two copies of the mutated gene. We would have expected to see cases with two copies of...Scientists identify 2 distinct Parkinson's networks
...d decreased metabolic activity and some areas that had increased metabolic activity. Over time, the cognitive network became apparent. And as the disease progressed and symptoms worsened, this network also took its toll. The circuits are like a fingerprint of the disease, Dr. Eidelberg said. As the di...It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that (modern) swing
...urned unharmed to their capture sites. The males had to be assessed in the field to see how vigorously they would approach an apparent interloper on their home territory. Derryberry trudged through knee-deep snow in Tioga Pass, Calif., during the 2005 spring mating season to place a speaker in the cent...Scientists follow familiar TRAIL to new cancer therapy
...lly optimize TRAIL therapy. Dr. El-Deirys group had previously established that c-Myc is a key mediato...sensitized the cells to TRAIL, even when the cells had intrinsic apoptotic defects. The researchers observed that TRAIL induced expression of two potent an...Tiny tweezers and yeast help St. Jude show how cancer drug works
...thin a few seconds. This suggested that the enzyme had nicked the supercoils, relieving tension and allowing the DNA to expand to its previous length. But in the presence of topotecan, the rate of DNA uncoiling due to topoisomerase was reduced 20-fold compared to uncoiling without topotecan. However, the...Size and positioning of floral anthers facilitates pollen collection by bees
...wering plants on earth about 150 million years ago had a profound effect on the evolution of many other kinds of organisms like insects, birds, and mammals, who became the pollinators and consumers of those plants, thus ensuring the continuity of both the plant and its animal partner. Scientists are be...Pumpkin: A fairytale end to insulin injections?
...iversity, found that diabetic rats fed the extract had only 5% less plasma insulin and 8% fewer insulin-positive (beta) cells compared to normal healthy rats (Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture, 87(9) 1753-7 2007). Xia says: pumpkin extract is potentially a very good product for pre-diabeti...Size and positioning of floral anthers facilitates
...wering plants on earth about 130 million years ago had a profound effect on the evolution of many other kinds of organisms like insects, birds, and mammals, who became the pollinators and consumers of those plants, thus ensuring the continuity of both the plant and its animal partner. Scientists are begi...Climate change reduces Queensland's bat numbers
...urned up bat fossils which show climate change has had a negative impact on the states bat population. Queensland University of Technology (QUT) PhD student Sandrine Martinez is currently sifting through what is the largest and best record of the states southern most bat population from the late Pleistoc...Highlights from the July 2007 Journal of the American Dietetic Association
...chers also found a substantial percentage of girls had intakes of vitamin E, magnesium and folate that fall below recommended guidelines. The researchers studied data from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institutes National Growth and Healthy Study of nearly 1,200 white girls and more than 1,200 Af......in urine samples from 10 individuals, five of whom had bladder cancer. Each sample was small, on average about 30 milliliters, equivalent to a fluid ounce. In contrast, previous urine protein profiles required large-volume samples. Of the 186 proteins identified in the study, five were present only in ...