EurekAlert! InContext Modules

Public Release: 4-Jul-2012

16th Biennial Meeting for the Society for Free Radical Research International
Strawberries activate protection protein to prevent cardiovascular disease
Scientists at the University of Warwick have been studying the beneficial effects of strawberries on our cardiovascular health, particularly around how they prevent the development of heart disease and diabetes.

Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council

Public Release: 4-Jul-2012

Lancet
Developing world has less than 5 percent chance of meeting UN child hunger target, study estimates
Insufficient progress has been made in most developing countries to meet the United Nations' target of halving the proportion of children who suffer from hunger by 2015 compared with 1990 levels, according to a systematic analysis of data on children's height and weight, published today in the Lancet.

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Public Release: 4-Jul-2012
New study maps hotspots of human-animal infectious diseases and emerging disease outbreaks
A new global study mapping human-animal diseases like tuberculosis and Rift Valley fever finds that an "unlucky" 13 zoonoses are responsible for 2.4 billion cases of human illness and 2.2 million deaths per year. The vast majority occur in low- and middle-income countries.

Public Release: 3-Jul-2012

Ecology Letters
Social bats pay a price: Fungal disease, white-nose syndrome ... extinction?
The effect on bat populations of a deadly fungal disease known as white-nose syndrome may depend on how gregarious the bats are during hibernation, scientists have discovered.

National Science Foundation

Public Release: 3-Jul-2012

PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases
New drug prospect offers hope against hookworm infections
A drug candidate that is nearing clinical trials against a Latin American parasite is showing additional promise as a cure for hookworm, one of the most widespread and insidious parasites afflicting developing nations, according to a collaborative study at UCSF and Yale University.

Sandler Foundation, Yale Child Health Research Center, National Institutes of Health

Public Release: 3-Jul-2012

Lancet
Polio vaccination programs not reaching enough children in Afghanistan and Pakistan
New, more effective vaccines are struggling to have an impact in the drive to eradicate polio in Afghanistan and Pakistan because not enough children are being vaccinated, according to a study published in the Lancet medical journal today.

World Health Organization, Royal Society, Medical Research Council

Public Release: 3-Jul-2012

American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene
2 studies offer new insights from the front lines of battle against malaria
A pair of provocative studies in the July 2012 issue of the American Journal of Tropical and Medicine and Hygiene provides a window into the intense ground war now underway against malaria.

Public Release: 2-Jul-2012

International Journal of Risk Assessment and Management
Measuring the uncertainties of pandemic influenza
A major collaboration between US research centers has highlighted three factors that could ultimately determine whether an outbreak of influenza becomes a serious epidemic that threatens national health. The research suggests that the numbers in current response plans could be out by a factor of two or more depending on the characteristics of the particular pandemic influenza.

Public Release: 1-Jul-2012

Nature Methods
Scripps Research Institute Scientists Develop Alternative to Gene Therapy
Scientists at the Scripps Research Institute have discovered a surprisingly simple and safe method to disrupt specific genes within cells. The scientists highlighted the medical potential of the new technique by demonstrating its use as a safer alternative to an experimental gene therapy against HIV infection.

National Institutes of Health, Skaggs Institute of Chemical Biology at Scripps Research

Public Release: 29-Jun-2012

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Clean cookstoves unaffordable to Bangladeshi women
Women in rural Bangladesh prefer inexpensive, traditional stoves for cooking over modern ones despite significant health risks, according to a Yale study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Public Release: 27-Jun-2012

Journal of Virology
Building a better Rift Valley fever vaccine
Researchers have significantly improved an existing experimental vaccine for Rift Valley fever virus, making possible the development of a more effective defense against the dangerous mosquito-borne pathogen.

NIAID

Public Release: 26-Jun-2012

PLOS Medicine
Bacterial vaginosis is associated with higher risk of female-to-male transmission of HIV
"Previous research has shown that bacterial vaginosis can increase a women's risk of becoming infected with HIV as much as sixty percent. Our study is the first to show that the risk of transmitting HIV is also elevated. Our findings point to the need for additional research to improve the diagnosis and treatment of bacterial vaginosis, which is extremely common in sub-Saharan Africa, the region of the globe with the highest burden of HIV."

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Public Release: 25-Jun-2012

DIA 2012: Collaborate to Innovate
7 pharmaceutical companies join academic researchers to speed TB drug discovery
Seven pharmaceutical companies and four research institutions, working with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, have launched a groundbreaking partnership that aims to speed the discovery of essential new treatments for tuberculosis (TB). The partnership, known as the TB Drug Accelerator, will target the discovery of new TB drugs by collaborating on early-stage research.

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Public Release: 21-Jun-2012

American Journal of Primatology
From the mouths of monkeys: Swab technique spots tuberculosis in non-human primates
A new technique detected the first published evidence of tuberculosis pathogens in the mouths of macaques living near people in six Asian countries. The method analyses mouth swabs from monkeys to check for tuberculosis DNA. The findings raise the question of interspecies transmission, but the origin of these infections is uncertain. However, the risk of spread to people appears minimal. The test could help protect the health of the world's primate populations.

NIH/National Center for Research Resources, NIH/National Institute of Allergy and Infections Diseases, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Chicago Zoological Society, University of New Mexico Research Allocations Committee

Public Release: 20-Jun-2012

Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine
Controversial vaccine trial should never have been run in India, researchers say
Research published today in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine raises further questions about a trial of HPV vaccines in India.

Public Release: 18-Jun-2012

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
University of Maryland researchers detail 2010 Haitian cholera
A new study by an international team of scientists led by researchers from the Institute for Genome Sciences (IGS) at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, the Center for Bioinformatics and Computational Biology at the University of Maryland, College Park, and CosmosIDTM Inc., College Park, have found two distinct strains of cholera bacteria may have contributed to the 2010 Haitian cholera outbreak. Their results are published in PNAS June 18, 2012.

Public Release: 14-Jun-2012

JAMA
Researchers outline plan to end preventable child deaths in a generation
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health researchers outline a strategy and benchmarks for curbing childhood preventable deaths.

Public Release: 13-Jun-2012
GAVI boosts global response to measles outbreaks
Seeking to address the devastating resurgence of measles, the GAVI Alliance will provide up to an additional $162 million to control and prevent outbreaks in developing countries. This funding will help countries bridge critical gaps in their efforts to build sustainable systems to control this deadly disease.

GAVI Alliance

Public Release: 13-Jun-2012

Journal of Medicinal Chemistry
New drug-screening method yields long-sought anti-HIV compounds
Scientists at the Scripps Research Institute have used a powerful new chemical-screening method to find compounds that inhibit the activity of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus that causes AIDS.

NIH/National Institute of General Medical Sciences, NIH/National Institute of Allergy and Infection Diseases, California HIV/AIDS Research Program, others

Public Release: 13-Jun-2012
Clinical trial of human hookworm vaccine begins at Children's National Medical Center
Today, the Sabin Vaccine Institute, in partnership with the George Washington University and the Children's National Medical Center, began vaccinating participants for a Phase 1 clinical trial of a novel human hookworm vaccine. The trial will investigate the Na-GST-1 antigen developed by the Sabin Vaccine Institute Product Development Partnership to prevent hookworm infections in endemic areas.

Public Release: 13-Jun-2012

Evolutionary Applications
Genetic discovery will help fight diarrhea outbreaks
Researchers at the University of East Anglia have discovered unexpectedly large genetic differences between two similar species of the pathogenic Cryptosporidium parasite.

Public Release: 12-Jun-2012

Health Policy & Planning
Save the Children report shows global health funding often ignores newborn babies
Save the Children's major new report, "A Decade of Change for Newborn Survival," was published in the medical journal, Health Policy and Planning today. Sixty main authors and 90 contributors collaborated for 3 years on a first-of-its-kind analysis of newborn health around the world and what is needed to speed up progress on ending newborn deaths. From 2000 to 2010 newborn deaths dropped from 3.7 million to 3.1 million annually.

Save the Children, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Public Release: 12-Jun-2012

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
UCI researchers create mosquitoes incapable of transmitting malaria
Mosquitoes bred to be unable to infect people with the malaria parasite are an attractive approach to helping curb one of the world's most pressing public health issues, according to UC Irvine scientists.

NIH/National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases

Public Release: 12-Jun-2012
Astellas and DNDi to collaborate on new drug discovery research for the treatment of NTDs
Astellas Pharma Inc. and the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative announced an agreement today to collaborate on drug discovery research for leishmaniasis, Chagas disease, and sleeping sickness -- three neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) which together affect nearly 10 million people worldwide. The agreement is a first critical step in Astellas' new strategy to enter into the field of NTDs, with DNDi as its first partner.

Public Release: 12-Jun-2012

Circulation
Echocardiogram screenings are effective in preventing rheumatic heart disease
Routine screening with echocardiogram can detect three times as many cases of rheumatic heart disease as clinical examinations, offering a novel approach in preventing this common disease, according to a new study in Circulation. The study, conducted by cardiologists from Children's National Medical Center, is the largest single-population study in Africa. The August issue of Nature Reviews -- Cardiology features a summary of the article in its Public Health feature.


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