EurekAlert! Public News List

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Genetics
International study points to inflammation as a cause of plaque buildup in heart vessels
Fifteen new genetic regions associated with coronary artery disease have been identified by a large, international consortium of scientists -- including researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine -- taking a significant step forward in understanding the root causes of this deadly disease.

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature
Stanford researchers discover master regulator of skin development
The surface of your skin, called the epidermis, is a complex mixture of many different cell types -- each with a very specific job. The production, or differentiation, of such a sophisticated tissue requires an immense amount of coordination at the cellular level, and glitches in the process can have disastrous consequences. Now, researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have identified a master regulator of this differentiation process.

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Chemical Biology
Glowing fish shed light on metabolism
A tiny, translucent zebrafish that glows green when its liver makes glucose has helped an international team of researchers identify a compound that regulates whole-body metabolism and appears to protect obese mice from signs of metabolic disorders.

National Institutes of Health and by a grant from the American Heart Association

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Chemistry
A better way to make chemicals?
For the first time, scientists have studied a mechanochemical milling reaction in real time, using highly penetrating X-rays to observe the surprisingly rapid transformations as the mill mixed, ground, and transformed simple ingredients into a complex product. This research, reported in Nature Chemistry, promises to advance scientists' understanding of processes central to the pharmaceutical, metallurgical, cement and mineral industries – and could open new opportunities in "green chemistry" and environmentally friendly chemical synthesis.

Herchel Smith Fund, FRQNT Centre for Green Chemistry and Catalysis, ESRF Grenoble

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

American Epilepsy Society
Surprising results from study of non-epileptic seizures
A Loyola University Medical Center neurologist is reporting surprising results of a study of patients who experience both epileptic and non-epileptic seizures.

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Genetics
Cell surface transporters exploited for cancer drug delivery
According to Whitehead Institute researchers, a protein known as monocarboxylate transporter 1 (MCT1), which is highly expressed in a subset of metabolically altered cancer cells, is needed for the entry of the investigational cancer drug 3-bromopyruvate (3-BrPA) into malignant cells. This work may open a new avenue for cancer therapeutic research, as other transport molecules have already been identified on the surface of certain cancer cells.

National Institutes of Health, David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, Jane Coffin Childs Fund, National Science Foundation

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Chemistry
A shock to pollution in chemistry
Solvents are everywhere in chemistry and a major environmental concern. High-frequency milling is an energy-efficient alternative: the impact of steel balls in a rapidly moving jar drives reactions. Direct observation of the underlying chemistry is difficult but scientists used X-rays to observe, for the first time, in real time the chemistry when a mill mixes, grinds and transforms simple ingredients into a complex product. The study opens new opportunities in Green Chemistry and environmentally-friendly synthesis.

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Neuroscience
Childhood trauma leaves mark on DNA of some victims
Gene-environment interaction causes lifelong dysregulation of stress hormones.

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Neuroscience
Origin of intelligence and mental illness linked to ancient genetic accident
Scientists have discovered for the first time how humans -- and other mammals -- have evolved to have intelligence. Researchers have identified the moment in history when the genes that enabled us to think and reason evolved.

Wellcome Trust, Medical Research Council and European Union

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Genetics
Scientists find 'bully' genes in common childhood tumor
In a genome sequencing study of 74 neuroblastoma tumors in children, scientists at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center and the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia found that patients with changes in two genes, ARID1A and ARID1B, survive only a quarter as long as patients without the changes. The discovery could eventually lead to early identification of patients with aggressive neuroblastomas who may need additional treatments.

St. Baldrick's Foundation, NIH/National Cancer Institute

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Structural & Molecular Biology
Scientists at Scripps Research Institute discover how 2 proteins help keep cells healthy
Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have determined how two proteins help create organelles, or specialized subunits within a cell, that play a vital role in maintaining cell health. This discovery opens the door for research on substances that could interfere with the formation of these organelles and lead to new therapies for cancer.

National Institutes of Health, Japan Science and Technology Agency

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Genetics
Genes linked to low birth weight, adult shortness and later diabetes risk
An international team of genetics researchers has discovered four new gene regions that contribute to low birth weight. Three of those regions influence adult metabolism, and appear to affect longer-term outcomes such as adult height, risk of type 2 diabetes and adult blood pressure. The cumulative effect of the genes is equivalent to the effect of maternal smoking during pregnancy.

National Institutes of Health, Wellcome Trust, Medical Research Council, and others

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Genetics
New gene-sequencing tools offer clues to highest-risk form of a childhood cancer
Using powerful gene-analysis tools, researchers have discovered mutations in two related genes, ARID1A and ARID1B, that are involved in the most aggressive form of the childhood cancer neuroblastoma. While these findings do not immediately improve clinical treatments, they identify a novel pathway that is defective in these cancers, a pathway that scientists can now study to develop potential new therapies.

St. Baldrick's Foundation, National Institutes of Health, Children's Oncology Group, and others

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Cell Biology
The role of the cellular entry point of anthrax identified
Anthrax uses a receptor on the surface of cells to inject its lethal toxins. However, the physiological function of this receptor, named Anthrax Toxin Receptor 2a (Antxr2a), remained unknown until now. A team led by Marcos Gonzalez-Gaitan, a professor at the University of Geneva, Switzerland, in collaboration with Gisou van der Goot at EPFL, reveals that Antxr2a actually plays a role in embryonic development, orienting cell division along a specific plane.

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Genetics
Insights into the genetic causes of coronary artery disease and heart attacks
By identifying a further 15 genetic regions and 104 independent genetic variants associated with coronary artery disease, one of the most common causes of death in the worldwith, researchers have identified some of the most prominent biological pathways that underlie the disease. These pathways that control CAD could be targets for the development of new drug treatments in the future.

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Climate Change
Record high for global carbon emissions
Global CO2 emissions are set to rise again in 2012, reaching a record high of 35.6 billion tonnes -- according to the University of East Anglia.

Public Release: 2-Dec-2012

Nature Materials
Bismuth provides perfect dance partners for quantum computing qubits
New research has demonstrated a way to make bismuth electrons and nuclei work together as qubits in a quantum computer.

Public Release: 1-Dec-2012

Genes & Development
X-ray analysis deciphers master regulator important for skin cancer
With the X-ray vision of DESY's light source DORIS, a research team from Hamburg and Iceland has uncovered the molecular structure of a master regulator central to the most deadly form of skin cancer, melanoma. The results, published in the scientific journal "Genes & Development", throw new light on the workings of the so-called Microphthalmia-associated Transcription Factor MITF, that is not only connected to skin cancer, but also to a variety of hereditary diseases.

Public Release: 1-Dec-2012

BioScience
Long-term research reveals how climate change is playing out in real ecosystems
Around the world, the effects of global climate change are increasingly evident and difficult to ignore. However, evaluations of the local effects of climate change are often confounded by natural and human induced factors that overshadow the effects of changes in climate on ecosystems. Now, a group of scientists writing in the journal BioScience report a number of surprising results that may shed more light on the complex nature of climate change.

National Science Foundation

Public Release: 1-Dec-2012

Cancer Research
Researchers identify a mechanism for the transformation of colon polyps
The causes underlying the development of certain types of common cancers have not yet been elucidated. In order to better determine the origin and the sequence of events responsible for the onset of colon cancer, the teams led by Thanos Halazonetis and Stylianos Antonarakis, professors at the UNIGE, Switzerland, have sequenced the DNA of biopsied tissue from colon polyps. The results show that these precancerous lesions have a specific profile.

Public Release: 1-Dec-2012

Sleep
Extended sleep reduces pain sensitivity
A new study suggests that extending nightly sleep in mildly sleepy, healthy adults increases daytime alertness and reduces pain sensitivity.

Fund for Henry Ford Health System

Public Release: 1-Dec-2012

Journal of Thoracic Oncology
Lung cancer patients with pockets of resistance prolong disease control by 'weeding the garden'
This study of 65 patients showed that continuing either crizotinib or erlotinib after the treatment of resistant pockets with focused radiation ("weeding the garden") was associated with more than half a year of additional cancer control.

NIH/National Cancer Institute

Public Release: 1-Dec-2012

Spine
Steroid injection linked with significant bone loss in postmenopausal women treated for back pain
Postmenopausal women suffered significant bone density loss in their hip after they were treated with an epidural steroid injection for back pain relief, according to a Henry Ford Hospital study Bone density loss after six months was six times greater when compared to the typical bone density loss seen in a year in a postmenopausal woman who doesn't receive steroid injection, researchers say.

Henry Ford Hospital

Public Release: 30-Nov-2012

NeuroImage
In schizophrenia patients, auditory cues sound bigger problems
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and the VA San Diego Healthcare System have found that deficiencies in the neural processing of simple auditory tones can evolve into a cascade of dysfunctional information processing across wide swaths of the brain in patients with schizophrenia.

NIH/National Institute of Mental Health, US Department of Veteran Affairs, Mitsubishi Pharma Research

Public Release: 30-Nov-2012
NASA's TRMM satellite video reveals 2012 hurricane season rainfall
The 2012 Atlantic Hurricane season was a busy one as there were 19 tropical cyclones. A new NASA animation using data from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite known as TRMM shows rainfall from tropical cyclones in the western Atlantic, as measured from space.

NASA


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