ANN ARBOR, Mich.---University of Michigan researchers have identified a gene that acts as a master switch to control obesity in mice. When the switch is turned off, even high-fat-diet mice remain thin.
Deleting the gene, called IKKE, also appears to protect mice against conditions that, in humans, lead to Type 2 diabetes, which is associated with obesity and is on the rise among Americans, including children and adolescents.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (September 3, 2009) – The unique mechanism behind the evolutionary survival of the human Y chromosome may also be responsible for a range of sex disorders, from failed sperm production to sex reversal to Turner Syndrome.
LA JOLLA, CA – September 1, 2009 –A team led by scientists from The Scripps Research Institute has discovered a genetic cause of progressive hearing loss. The findings will help scientists better understand the nature of age-related decline in hearing and may lead to new therapies to prevent or treat the condition.
The findings were published the September 3, 2009, in an advance, online issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics, a publication of Cell Press.
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – People with type 2 diabetes are not consuming sufficiently healthy diets and could benefit from ongoing nutritional education and counseling, according to a new study by researchers at Wake Forest University School of Medicine and colleagues.
The study appears in the August issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association.
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — "I request to ban trans fats from the American diet."
Thus begins a 3,000-word petition to the Food and Drug Administration, the work of a man on a dogged, decades-old crusade to eradicate trans fats from food.
Eat less, exercise more. Now there is new evidence to support adding another "must" to the weight-loss mantra: eat at the right time of day.
A Northwestern University study has found that eating at irregular times -- the equivalent of the middle of the night for humans, when the body wants to sleep -- influences weight gain. The regulation of energy by the body's circadian rhythms may play a significant role. The study is the first causal evidence linking meal timing and increased weight gain.
In the new era of personalized medicine, physicians hope to provide earlier diagnoses and improve therapy byevaluating patients' genetic blueprints. But, as a new bioinformatics study emphasizes, the first step must be tocorrectly decipher the deluge of information locked in our DNA and determine its impact on human health.
Athens, Ga. – The antioxidant quercetin is increasingly being marketed as a supplement that boosts athletic performance, but a new University of Georgia study finds that it is no better than a placebo.
Flowering plants are all around us and are phenomenally successful—but how did they get to be so successful and where did they come from? This question bothered Darwin and others and a paper published in the September issue of the Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society indicates that their ability to adapt anatomically may be the answer.
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Kudzu, the fast-growing vine that has gobbled up some 10 million acres in the Southeast, may prove to be a valuable dietary supplement for metabolic syndrome, a condition that affects 50 million Americans, say researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB).
Vaccinating women against the human papillomavirus (HPV) may prevent some forms of breast cancer and save tens of thousands of lives each year, new Australian research suggests.
Using genetic probes, researchers at the University of New South Wales tested cancerous breast cells and found several strains of HPVs known to have a high risk of initiating cancer of the cervix. HPV has a causal role in 90-95 per cent of cervical cancers.
Newly published research suggests that government use of torture has increased worldwide despite international norms discouraging it.
The study, published in The Journal of Legal Studies, found that between 1985 and 2003, reports of state-sponsored torture collected by the U.S. State Department and Amnesty International increased, even as a growing number of countries signed on to the United Nations Convention Against Torture.
Reptiles are not known to be the most social of creatures. But when it comes to laying eggs, female reptiles can be remarkably communal, often laying their eggs in the nests of other females. New research in the September issue of The Quarterly Review of Biology suggests that this curiously out-of-character behavior is far more common in reptiles than was previously thought.
A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine reports a potential new investigational therapy for advanced and metastatic basal cell skin cancer tested at the Virginia G. Piper Cancer Center at Scottsdale Healthcare and other sites appears to demonstrate tumor shrinkage and limited side effects in patients.
Chimpanzees in the Congo have developed specialised 'tool kits' to forage for army ants, reveals new research published today in the American Journal of Primatology. This not only provides the first direct evidence of multiple tool use in this context, but suggests that chimpanzees have developed a 'sustainable' way of harvesting food.