Sheep farmers are highly able to spot even mildly lame sheep, but many do not take steps to prevent the spread of lameness in their flocks by catching and treating these animals. A study in the open access journal BMC Veterinary Research is the first to provide evidence for the accuracy of farmers' reporting of lameness, suggesting that farmers have one of the skills required to minimise footrot and other infectious foot conditions in their flocks.
Body
Boston--Scientists from The Forsyth Institute, working with collaborators at Tufts and Tuebingen Universities, have discovered a new control over embryonic stem cells' behavior. The researchers disrupted a natural bioelectrical mechanism within frog embryonic stem cells and trigged a cancer-like response, including increased cell growth, change in cell shape, and invasion of the major body organs. This research shows that electrical signals are a powerful control mechanism that can be used to modulate cell behavior.
EVANSTON, Ill. --- Nanotechnology offers unique opportunities to advance the life sciences by facilitating the delivery, manipulation and observation of biological materials with unprecedented resolution. The ability to pattern nanoscale arrays of biological material assists studies of genomics, proteomics and cell adhesion, and may be applied to achieve increased sensitivity in drug screening and disease detection, even when sample volumes are severely limited.
Durham, N.C. – A team of neuroscientists at Duke University Medical Center has suggested an entirely new way to explain a puzzling visual phenomenon called the flash-lag effect.
Experts have debated for the past 100 years about why -- when a flash of light is presented in alignment with a moving object -- the flash is perceived to lag behind the position of the object.
Hospital-sponsored stop-smoking programs for inpatients that include follow-up counseling for longer than one month significantly improve patients' ability to stay smoke-free. An analysis of clinical trials of programs offered at hospitals around the world finds that efforts featuring long-term support can increase participant's chances of success by 65 percent.
Individuals with Parkinson's disease appear more likely to be vitamin D deficient than healthy adults of the same age or patients with Alzheimer's disease, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Neurology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Health-related quality of life appears to deteriorate as the number of cigarettes smoked per day increases, even in individuals who subsequently quit smoking, according to a report in the October 13 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Smoking has been shown to shorten men's lives between seven and 10 years, according to background information in the article. It also has been linked to factors that may reduce quality of life, including poor nutrition and lower socioeconomic status.
Caffeine consumption does not appear to be associated with overall breast cancer risk, according to a report in the October 13 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. However, there is a possibility of increased risk for women with benign breast disease or for tumors that are hormone-receptor negative or larger than 2 centimeters.
Only about half of Medicaid recipients age 50 and older appear to receive recommended screening tests for colorectal, breast and cervical cancer, according to a report in the October 13 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
A European study suggests that the combination of low plasma levels of antioxidants and blue light exposure from the sun is associated with certain forms of the eye disease age-related macular degeneration (AMD), according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Ophthalmology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Visual impairment appears to be more common in people with diabetes than in those without the disease, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Ophthalmology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Hospital-based smoking cessation programs, along with referrals to cardiac rehabilitation, appear to be associated with increased rates of quitting smoking following heart attack, according to a report in the Oct. 13, 2008, issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Emory University researchers studied 639 patients who smoked at the time of their hospitalization for heart attack. Six months later, 297 of the patients – approximately 47 percent of them - had quit smoking.
In a population survey of West African chimpanzees living in Côte d'Ivoire, researchers estimate that this endangered subspecies has dropped in numbers by a whopping 90 percent since the last survey was conducted 18 years ago. The few remaining chimpanzees are now highly fragmented, with only one viable population living in Taï National Park, according to a report in the October 14th issue of Current Biology, a Cell Press publication.
A new study demonstrates that the embryonic mouse heart has an astounding capacity to regenerate, a phenomenon previously observed only in non-mammalian species. The research, published by Cell Press in the October 14th issue of the journal Developmental Cell, describes the previously unrecognized potential of the embryonic heart to replace diseased tissue through compensatory proliferation of healthy cells.
PASADENA, Calif.-- The transportation of antibodies from a mother to her newborn child is vital for the development of that child's nascent immune system. Those antibodies, donated by transfer across the placenta before birth or via breast milk after birth, help shape a baby's response to foreign pathogens and may influence the later occurrence of autoimmune diseases.