Not just important for building strong bones, an international team of scientists has found that vitamin D also plays an essential role in the body's fight against infections such as tuberculosis.
A potentially fatal lung disease, tuberculosis is estimated to cause 1.8 million deaths annually and especially impacts those with reduced immunity such as HIV-infected individuals, according to the World Health Organization.
NEW YORK, NY, Oct. 12, 2011 — As a person ages, the ability of their beta cells to divide and make new beta cells declines. By the time children reach the age of 10 to 12 years, the ability of their insulin-producing cells to replicate greatly diminishes. If these cells, called beta cells, are destroyed—as they are in type 1 diabetes—treatment with the hormone insulin becomes essential to regulate blood glucose levels and get energy from food.
For the first time, scientists have cleanly corrected a human gene mutation in a patient's stem cells. The result, reported in Nature on Wednesday 12 October, brings the possibility of patient-specific therapies closer to becoming a reality.
HOUSTON -- (October 12, 2011) -- In the world of mammals, the two-toed sloth and armadillo appear exceedingly different from humans and their primate cousins.
STANFORD, Calif. -- Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have identified a key molecular pathway responsible for the natural decrease in the proliferation of insulin-producing cells that occurs as a person ages. Artificially activating this pathway, which is normally not functional in adults, may be a new way to combat diabetes.
New York University scientists have developed artificial structures that can self-replicate, a process that has the potential to yield new types of materials. The work, conducted by researchers in NYU's Departments of Chemistry and Physics and its Center for Soft Matter Research, appears in the latest issue of the journal Nature.
An international team -- led by researchers at McMaster University and the University of Tubingen in Germany -- has sequenced the entire genome of the Black Death, one of the most devastating epidemics in human history.
This marks the first time scientists have been able to draft a reconstructed genome of any ancient pathogen, which will allow researchers to track changes in the pathogen's evolution and virulence over time. This work -- currently published online in the scientific journal Nature -- could lead to a better understanding of modern infectious diseases.
An international team of researchers has discovered the vast majority of the so-called "dark matter" in the human genome, by means of a sweeping comparison of 29 mammalian genomes. The team, led by scientists from the Broad Institute, has pinpointed the parts of the human genome that control when and where genes are turned on. This map is a critical step in interpreting the thousands of genetic changes that have been linked to human disease. Their findings appear online October 12 in the journal Nature.
An international research team led by Kerstin Lindblad-Toh at the Broad Institute, US and Uppsala University, Sweden has mapped and compared the genomes of 29 mammals. The findings, published in Nature, reveal millions of new regulatory elements in the human genome that in various ways govern how proteins are formed. The new knowledge is important for our understanding of how mutations in human genes give rise to diseases.
October 12th, Shenzhen, China – BGI, the world's largest genomic organization, announced that an international team of researchers from Korea, China and USA, for the first time, demonstrated the physiology and longevity of the naked mole rats (NMR) in terms of genomics and transcriptomics. The results, published online today in the international journal Nature, provide an excellent opportunity to better understand the unique traits of naked mole rats and advance its use in biological and biomedical studies.
SAN ANTONIO, Texas (Oct. 12, 2011) — Scientists have sequenced the complete genome of the naked mole rat, a pivotal step to understanding the animal's extraordinarily long life and good health. A colony of more than 2,000 naked mole rats at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio contributed to the findings, published today in the journal Nature.
A University of Minnesota team of researchers has overcome a major hurdle in the quest to design a specialized type of molecular sieve that could make the production of gasoline, plastics and various chemicals more cost effective and energy efficient. The breakthrough research, led by chemical engineering and materials science professor Michael Tsapatsis in the university's College of Science and Engineering, is published in the most recent issue of the journal Science.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- A field of flowers may seem innocuous — but for the birds and bees that depend on it for sustenance, that floral landscape can be a battlefield mined with predators and competitors. The more efficient a pollinator is in feeding, the less chance it has of becoming food itself.
MAYWOOD, Ill. -- A Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine study could lead to improved gene therapies for conditions such as heart disease and cancer as well as more effective vaccines for tuberculosis, malaria and other diseases.
Senior author Christopher Wiethoff, PhD, and colleagues report their findings in the October issue of the Journal of Virology. Editors spotlighted the report as one of the "articles of significant interest." Journal of Virology is the leading journal of the study of viruses.
(Boston) - Pediatric researchers from Boston Medical Center (BMC), in partnership with Children's HealthWatch investigators in Boston, Minneapolis, Little Rock, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, have found that higher benefit amounts in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly known as food stamps) protected the health and well-being of very young, low-income children during a period of great financial hardship for many families in America. These findings were released as a policy brief on Oct. 12.