Body

FRANKFURT. Truffles, along with caviar, are among the most expensive foods in the world. Because they grow underground, people use trained dogs or pigs to find them. But the distinctive smell of truffles is not only of interest to gourmets. A group of German and French scientists under the direction of the Goethe University Frankfurt have discovered that the smell of white truffles is largely produced by soil bacteria which are trapped inside truffle fruiting bodies.

DURHAM, N.C. -- Pollution in urban and farm runoff in Hawaii is causing tumors in endangered sea turtles, a new study finds.

The study, published Tuesday in the peer-reviewed open-access journal PeerJ, shows that nitrogen in the runoff ends up in algae that the turtles eat, promoting the formation of tumors on the animals' eyes, flippers and internal organs.

When it comes to using marijuana, new research, involving mice and published in the October 2014 issue of the Journal of Leukocyte Biology, suggests that just because you can do it, doesn't mean that you should. That's because a team of Italian scientists have found that using marijuana in adolescence may do serious long-term damage to the immune system.

Researchers of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich report that a new class of chemical compounds makes cancer cells more sensitive to chemotherapeutic drugs. They have also pinpointed the relevant target enzyme, thus identifying a new target for anti-tumor agents.

If you want your doctor to know what goes wrong with your muscles because of age, disease or injury, it's a good idea to know what "normal" actually is. That's where a new research report published in the October 2014 issue of the FASEB Journal comes in. In the report, a team of scientists produce a complete transcriptome—a key set of molecules that can help scientists "see" which genes are active in an organ at a particular time.

Having trouble getting pregnant—even with IVF? Here's some hope: A new research report published in October 2014 issue of The FASEB Journal, explains how scientists developed a synthetic version of a sperm-originated protein known as PAWP, which induced embryo development in human and mouse eggs similar to the natural triggering of embryo development by the sperm cell during fertilization.

Screening for a genetic condition in younger people who are diagnosed with bowel cancer would be cost-effective for the NHS and prevent new cases in them and their relatives, new research has concluded.

Silver nanoparticles are well known for their anti-bacteria properties[1-4]. One of the main routes by which they may act as an anti-bacteria agent, is through attaching themselves to the thiol group present on the cellular membrane surface and hence disrupting the membrane's function[5]. Hence, it is crucial to gain a greater understanding of this complex silver-thiol interaction to determine silver nanoparticles' role in biological systems. With thiols, silver nanoparticles have been proposed to form various types of compounds with different structures[6-8].

Sildenafil, the active ingredient in the erectile dysfunction drug Viagra®, could cause unusual visual responses in people who carry a common mutation for eye disease and may have long-term detrimental effects on their vision, UNSW Australia researchers warn.

Sildenafil can inhibit an enzyme which is important for transmitting light signals from the retina to the brain, and it is already known from clinical trials of Viagra® that its use in high doses can cause transient disturbances in the vision of some healthy people.

Scientists from InSilico Medicine and its partners successfully established a visual mapping of the molecular pathway cancer progression originating from myeloid derived suppressor cells (MDSC). The damage and immune suppression the cells cause are not fully understood, however this is a major stepping stone in creating necessary transparency. Highly cited MetaCoreTM was the primary interactome analysis tool used for mapping, providing these promising results.

What do seedless watermelon, salmon, and strawberries all have in common? Unlike most eukaryotic multicellular organisms that have two sets of chromosomes and are diploid, these organisms are all polyploid, meaning they have three or more sets of chromosomes—seedless watermelon and salmon have 3 and 4 sets of chromosomes, respectively, and strawberries have 10! While this might seem surprising, in fact most plant species are polyploid.

ANN ARBOR—Researchers at the University of Michigan have described a new approach to discovering potential cancer treatments that requires a fraction of the time needed for more traditional methods.

They used the platform to identify a novel antibody that is undergoing further investigation as a potential treatment for breast, ovarian and other cancers.

Coral reefs face a suite of perilous threats in today's ocean. From overfishing and pollution to coastal development and climate change, fragile coral ecosystems are disappearing at unprecedented rates around the world. Despite this trend, some species of corals surrounding the island of Moorea in French Polynesia have a natural protector in their tropical environment: coral guard-crabs.

A species of gut bacteria called Clostridium ramosum, coupled with a high-fat diet, may cause animals to gain weight. The work is published this week in mBio®, the online open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology.

Boston, MA – A retrospective study led by researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), has found an overuse of colonoscopies for colorectal cancer screening and surveillance. The study demonstrated that endoscopists commonly recommended shorter follow-up intervals than established guidelines support, and these recommendations were strongly correlated with subsequent colonoscopy overuse.