In recent years, the use of a three-day course of an antimalarial treatment called ACT (artemisinin-based combination therapy) in over 40 countries that face endemic malaria has shown great success in curing this deadly disease.
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Closely related animal species share most of their genes and look almost identical. However, minor morphological differences allow us to tell them apart. What is the genetic basis for these differences? Often, the explanation is provided by minor changes in spatial and temporal activity of transcription factors - "regulator" genes which are conserved throughout the animal kingdom. However, every group of animals also possesses a small proportion of genes which are, in contrary, extremely variable among closely related species or even unique.
We are always being told by marketers of healthy yogurts that the human gut contains a bustling community of different bacteria, both good and bad, and that this balance is vital to keeping you healthy. But if you target the disease-causing bacteria with medicine, what might be the collateral damage to their health-associated cousins that call the human body home?
Why do poppies and sunflowers grow as a single flower per stalk while each stem of a tomato plant has several branches, each carrying flowers? In a new study, published in this week's issue of the open access journal PLoS Biology, Dr. Zachary Lippman and colleagues identify a genetic mechanism that determines the pattern of flower growth in the Solanaceae (nightshade) family of plants that includes tomato, potato, pepper, eggplant, tobacco, petunia, and deadly nightshades.
STANFORD, Calif. — Mention the phrase "diverse ecosystem," and it conjures images of tropical rainforests and endangered coral reefs. It also describes the human colon.
Researchers in one of the external groups of the Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência (IGC), in Portugal, have discovered a novel mechanism which regulates the process whereby new blood vessels are formed and wounds heal, including chronic wounds, such as those found in diabetic patients and those suffering from morbid obesity. These findings, by Sérgio Dias and his team, are to appear in the new issue of the journal PLoS ONE(*), and have implications for the development of new therapeutic approaches to healing damaged blood vessels and building new ones.
The researchers dated remains from four multiple burials discovered in Germany in 2005.
The 4,600-year-old graves contained groups of adults and children buried facing each other – an unusual practice in Neolithic culture.
One of the graves was found to contain a female, a male and two children. Using DNA analysis, the researchers established that the group consisted of a mother, father and their two sons aged 8-9 and 4-5 years: the oldest molecular genetic evidence of a nuclear family in the world (so far).
BBSRC-funded researchers at UCL along with collaborators at King's College London have identified a molecule that could be the key to understanding the cause of neurodegenerative diseases such as motor neurone disease (MND). This insight opens up the possibilities for developing new treatments to treat these devastating progressive conditions.
Canada's only supervised injection facility is extending lives and saving the health-care system millions of dollars, a new study shows.
In analyzing the cost-effectiveness of Vancouver-based Insite, a safe injection facility in a downtown neighbourhood where about 5,000 injection drug users live, researchers found $14 million in savings and health gains of 920 life-years over 10 years.
COLUMBUS, Ohio – Researchers have determined that the two most popular brands of football helmet faceshields can withstand a hit equivalent to a kick in the face and provide that protection without disrupting players' vision.
The eye specialists at Ohio State University used an air cannon to hurl baseballs at the plastic faceshields. The impact was designed to mimic the force of a kick to the face, considered the riskiest way to sustain an eye injury in football.
Asthma may be overdiagnosed in countries like Canada, suggests a longitudinal study of 540 obese and non-obese adults (http://www.cmaj.ca/press/pg1121.pdf)that found approximately one third of Canadians with physician-diagnosed asthma do not have asthma when objectively tested.
A study of Chinese adolescents living in mainland China, Hong Kong and Canada suggests that asthma may be influenced by environmental factors as well as genetics(http://www.cmaj.ca/press/pg1133.pdf).
A cost-effectiveness analysis of Insite, Canada's only supervised safe injection site in Vancouver, concludes that it results in $14 million in savings and health gains of 920 life-years over 10 years. The study (http://www.cmaj.ca/press/pg1143.pdf), published in CMAJ, estimated the number of HIV and Hepatitis C cases that could be prevented with decreased needle sharing, safer injection practices and more referrals to addiction services.
Mortality rates for most types of cancer in Canada are declining, although rates for some are increasing, states this article on the changing size and nature of cancer in Canada (http://www.cmaj.ca/press/pg1163.pdf). The results come from the 2008 edition of Canadian Cancer Statistics. In men, liver cancer incidence and mortality are increasing while thyroid cancer incidence is increasing in men and women as are deaths due to lung cancer in women.
The Canadian Society of Nephrology has issued new guidelines (http://www.cmaj.ca/press/pg1154.pdf) through CMAJ for the management of chronic kidney disease that aim to encourage shared care for patients by general practitioners and specialists. They include recommendations by disease stage to help slow progression, prevent complications and reduce mortality.