Body

A study exploring the prevalence of mental health symptoms in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and questioning (LGBQ) community, found that the oft-overlooked questioning and bisexual youth face their own significant challenges, particularly when it comes to depression, anxiety and traumatic distress.

By studying fossils from southern China, scientists have gained insights into how primates in Asia evolved to resemble the array seen today. The results suggest that a distinct period marked by cooler weather served as a filter of sorts in Asia, altering the makeup of primates there to reflect fewer anthropoids (monkeys and apes) and more strepsirrhines, a suborder of primates that includes lemurs. Primates are sensitive to shifts in temperature, and thus, to climate change.

A team of researchers led by Leonid Kruglyak have developed a technique using the gene editing system CRISPR to rapidly identify gene variants. The findings could significantly improve efforts to map out genes and determine their function.

An assessment of rivers in the US suggests that although there is a relationship between increased flood size and erosion, the effect is most pronounced for moderate floods. Understanding the effects of climate on the geometry and erosion rate of rivers is essential for reconstructing the geologic history of landscapes, as well as for predicting the response of rivers to human-accelerated climate change. Currently, models predict that climate should play a fundamental role in setting erosion rates, yet a strong correlation has not been verified in studies of bedrock erosion.

Two new studies reveal that administering a potent, broadly neutralizing antibody that binds to HIV evokes a strong immune response in humans, and can even accelerate the clearance of infected cells. First, Till Schoofs et al.

Irvine, Calif. -- University of California, Irvine scientists who study how circadian rhythms -- our own body clocks -- control liver function have discovered that cancerous lung tumors can hijack this process and profoundly alter metabolism.

Their research, published online in Cell, is the first showing that lung adenocarcinoma can affect the body clock's sway over lipid metabolism and sensitivity to insulin and glucose.

ROCHESTER, Minn. -- A Mayo Clinic study suggests laboratory findings do not tell the whole story of how the diabetes drug metformin works to limit the level of glucose in the blood. The researchers found that metformin does not limit the action of the hormone glucagon, specifically glucagon-stimulated glucose production from the liver. The article appears in the journal Cell Reports.

DURHAM, N.C. -- A research team from Duke Health has developed an antibody from the body's own immune system that preferentially attacks cancer cells.

The antibody works by targeting a natural defense mechanism that cancer tumors exploit.

Cells in the body essentially use a home security system that relies on certain proteins to protect the cell surface and keep it safe. These proteins help the cell avoid injury and even death from unwanted activation of the immune system.

LAWRENCE -- In a study to be published this week in the journal Science, researchers describe unearthing a "mother lode" of a half-dozen fossil primate species in southern China.

These primates eked out an existence just after the Eocene-Oligocene transition, some 34 million years ago. It was a time when drastic cooling made much of Asia inhospitable to primates, slashing their populations and rendering discoveries of such fossils especially rare.

ITHACA, NY--Potato plants boost the chemical defenses in their leaves when Guatemalan tuber moth larvae feed on their tubers, report researchers at the Boyce Thompson Institute (BTI).

People with type 2 diabetes treated with insulin plus metformin had a reduced risk of death and major cardiac events compared with people treated with insulin alone, a new study by Cardiff University shows.

Led by Professor Craig Currie of the University's School of Medicine, the retrospective research looked at people with type 2 diabetes who were treated with insulin with or without metformin from the year 2000 onwards.

(Boston)--A newly discovered pathway leading to neurodegeneration in Alzheimer's disease (AD) may unlock the door to new approaches for treating the disease.

Can a staging system - much like one used to classify cancerous tumors - help facial plastic surgery patients understand the complexity of their revision rhinoplasty and help to manage their expectations?

In a new review article published online by JAMA Facial Plastic Surgery, Regina Rodman, M.D., and Russell Kridel, M.D., of the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, propose the PGS Staging System.

Menlo Park, Calif. -- A number of important biological processes, such as photosynthesis and vision, depend on light. But it's hard to capture responses of biomolecules to light because they happen almost instantaneously.

Now, researchers have made a giant leap forward in taking snapshots of these ultrafast reactions in a bacterial light sensor. Using the world's most powerful X-ray laser at the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, they were able to see atomic motions as fast as 100 quadrillionths of a second -- 1,000 times faster than ever before.

Most high school students can recite the central dogma of molecular biology: DNA makes RNA makes protein. We all know it. But have we ever seen it?

Parts of it, yes. DNA transcription, the first step in gene expression, has been quantified in real time. But the second step ­- the translation of genetic code into a protein - is much harder to see in living systems, and until now has eluded us.