American Chemical Society's Weekly PressPac -- Aug. 8, 2007
... Such surgery corrects the vision loss that occurs when the lens of the eye becomes clouded. Christine Jrme and colleagues report development of a method for applying a polyethylene glycol coating to IOLs. In laboratory experiments, researchers showed that the coating reduced accumulation of the protei...Study begins to reveal clues to the cause and progression of sepsis
...s with sepsis mount the same immune response, even when they look the same clinically, according to findin... had elevated cytokine levels. Levels were highest when the subject presented at the emergency room, tapered down over the first few days, but remained elev...Multinational research: protecting ecology means understanding people, too
... seeks ways to cross traditional barriers, such as when scientists in different disciplines need to know what researchers in companion fields are studying, according to the science foundation. In bridging gaps between different fields of study, the science foundation notes, students also are better prepa...Clones on task serve greater good, evolutionary study shows
... a genetic pool of identical organisms is affected when a few individuals break from the developmental pac...nmental hiccoughs. The scientific intrigue comes when scientists call a big family reunion, and discover that the A family all look close to alike, despit...Which came first, the moth or the cactus?
...cacti's flowers immediately after pollination, and when the eggs hatch the moth larvae eat the fruit, destroying the flowers' chances to produce seeds. Historic theory predicts extreme ecological instability for this relationship; as moth populations increase, more flowers are destroyed, fewer new cacti a...Newly created cancer stem cells could aid breast cancer research
...s must inject about 1 million cells to get a tumor when working with the cancer cell lines routinely used ...ating cells and have a higher metastatic potential when they become cancer cells than other normal cells. The culture medium Ince created favors the growth ...Doernbecher Children's Hospital scientist earns coveted Javits award
...flow to the developing brain falls below normal or when maternalinfection occurs during pregnancy. Critica...hite matter injury occurs during brain development when nerve fibersin the white matter are actively being wrapped in myelin, the insulationthat allows nerv...Gene regulation, not just genes, is what sets humans apart
...ne regulation, the complex cross-talk that governs when genes are turned on and off, appears to be signifi...lection in these studies. Yet, as far back as 1975 when Mary-Claire King and Allan Wilson first said humans and chimps were 99 percent the same genetically,...MIT creates 3-D images of living cell
... the cells, you can't look at their movements, and when you add external contrast agents you can never be sure that you haven't somehow interfered with normal cellular function, said Badizadegan. The current resolution of the new technique is about 500 nanometers, or billionths of a meter, but the team ...Risk of common vaginal infection linked to preterm birth appears higher for blacks
...ection linked to preterm birth appears to escalate when even one partner is African-American, according to... BV risk, Dr. Simhan said. Our results showed that when one partner is black whether male or female risk of BV goes up two-fold. BV infection is commonl...UK scientists working to help cut ID theft
...ystems. For example the use of fingerprint readers when paying by credit or debit card could make identity fraud more difficult. With a range of approaches and technologies available for biometric recognition and new ones constantly in development, the field is a fast moving one. Before investing in sys...Green tea boosts production of detox enzymes, rendering cancerous chemicals harmless
...und that use of Polyphenon E enhanced GST activity when data from all participants were included for analysis. But it had its most significant effect in volunteers whose baseline blood measurements showed low GST activity − an 80 percent increase compared to baseline GST activity. Activity did not c...High blood pressure, low energy -- a recipe for heart failure
... any ERR alpha developed symptoms of heart failure when their hearts were forced to pump against high pressure. The hearts of normal mice took that pressure overload in stride and stayed healthy. Those contrasting outcomes suggest that heart health greatly depends on ERR alpha. "The stress of a cardiac p...Abnormal fat metabolism underlies heart problems in diabetic patients
...fects in mitochondrial function which became worse when they were fasted a condition that, like diabetes, causes the heart to use lipids for fuel. A 16-hour fast caused significant problems with the mouse hearts' ability to pump blood, again implicating altered lipid metabolism, cardiolipin scarcity and ...Circadian clock controls plant growth hormone
... Covington and Harmer made plants that would glow when the auxin signaling was active. They found a natural rhythm of activity, peaking late in the night when water is most available and the plants are preparing for daylight. A circadian response to auxin w...Scientists show that mitochondrial DNA variants are linked to risk factors for type 2 diabetes
...ergy-producing enzyme called cytochrome c oxidase, when compared to the second rat strain. These metabolic characteristics are typical of diabetic individuals. The researchers then obtained DNA sequences from mitochondria of both rat strains, and found DNA variants in genes that encode for proteins inv...New system of wastewater treatment could reduce the size of treatment plants by half
...well as the lack of space many municipalities have when the number of inhabitants grows, which makes it impossible to enlarge their water treatment plants. Prof. Poyatos has used a new technology based on membrane bioreactor systems which makes it possible to shorten the water clarification process (by ...Swarming starlings help probe plasma, crowds and stock market
...echnique that could be used to detect precisely when ordered patterns form in everything from plasma i... than traditional methods in understanding how and when these systems moved from disorder to order. The new tool has obvious benefits in opening up new un...Smokeless tobacco more effective than cigarettes for delivering dangerous carcinogens into the body
...e higher in the urine of snuff users than smokers, when adjusted for age and gender. According to Hecht, the nitrosamines found in tobacco, including NNK, are byproducts of the curing process involved in turning tobacco leaves into products like cigarettes, chew and snuff. While low nitrosamine smokel...No evidence that widely prescribed statins protect against prostate cancer
...terone in the blood, but that association vanished when researchers considered the patients age, body weight, and history of cardiovascular disease and diabetes. We know that men with higher body mass index, diabetes and cardiovascular disease tend to have lower testosterone levels, and this largely accou...