New stem cell research could reduce number of animal experiments

Researchers from the University of Bath are embarking on a project to use stem cell technology that could reduce the number of animal experiments used to study conditions such as motor neurone disease. Dr Vasanta Subramanian, from the University's Department of Biology & Biochemistry, will be d...

Research network wins approximately £5.7 million to target human and animal diseases in Africa

Deadly diseases including plague, Ebola and Rift Valley Fever are being targeted as part of a new multi-million pound international partnership involving African researchers and the London International Development Centre (LIDC). The Southern African Centre for Infectious Disease Surveillance (SAC...

FAO/IAEA Symposium to address animal production and health

Vienna, 4 April 2009 | An international symposium to be held in Vienna next week will focus on the use of nuclear technologies to enhance animal nutrition and reproduction strategies and to detect and control animal-origin diseases that can be transmitted to humans, such as swine and avian in...

Countries unite to reduce animal use in product toxicity testing worldwide

Representatives from four international agencies, including the director of the U.S. National Toxicology Program (NTP), today signed a memorandum of cooperation that could reduce the number of animals required for consumer product safety testing worldwide. The agreement between the United States, ...

Tiny super-plant can clean up animal waste and be used for ethanol production

Researchers at North Carolina State University have found that a tiny aquatic plant can be used to clean up animal waste at industrial hog farms and potentially be part of the answer for the global energy crisis. Their research shows that growing duckweed on hog wastewater can produce five to six ...

Reducing animal experiments through top-class research

The haematologist Professor Christopher Baum and his colleagues Dr. Ute Modlich and Sabine Kn have been awarded the 2009 Ursula M. Hndel Animal Welfare Prize. The prize was awarded to this research team from the Hannover Medical School (Medizinische Hochschule Hannover, MHH) in recognition of thei...

Engineering technology pinpoints earliest signs of animal life

Scientists using revolutionary new technology developed at The University of Nottingham have recorded the earliest evidence of animal life so far. Using a scientific technique known as Hydropyrolysis (using hydrogen gas at high pressure) they have been able to date chemical fossils discovered i...

Cell-building discovery could reduce need for some animal research

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] Brown University biomedical engineers can now grow and assemble living microtissues into complex three-dimensional structures in a way that will advance the field of tissue engineering and may eventually reduce the need for certain kinds of animal research. ...

Discovery could lead to a new animal model for hepatitis C

During its career, the potentially fatal hepatitis C virus has banked its success on a rather unusual strategy: its limitations. Its inability to infect animals other than humans and chimpanzees has severely hampered scientists in developing a useful small animal model for the disease. But now, in...

In the animal world, bigger isn't necessarily better

TORONTO, ON. Shocking new research shows size isn't always an advantage in the animal world, shattering a widely-held belief that bigger is better. Michael Kasumovic, a former University of Toronto Scarborough PhD student, examined Australian Redback male spiders to determine whether the larg...

Discovery of giant roaming deep sea protist provides new perspective on animal evolution

AUSTIN, TexasGroove-like tracks on the ocean floor made by giant deep-sea single-celled organisms could lead to new insights into the evolutionary origin of animals, says biologist Mikhail "Misha" Matz from The University of Texas at Austin. Matz and his colleagues recently discovered the grap...

Grapes may aid a bunch of heart risk factors, animal study finds

ANN ARBOR, Mich. Could eating grapes help fight high blood pressure related to a salty diet? And could grapes calm other factors that are also related to heart diseases such as heart failure? A new University of Michigan Cardiovascular Center study suggests so. The new study, published in the...

Moderate use averts failure of type 2 diabetes drugs in animal model

Drugs widely used to treat type 2 diabetes may be more likely to keep working if they are used in moderation, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found in a study using an animal model. The drugs, sulfonylureas, help type 2 diabetics make more insulin, impr...

Swamping bad cells with good in ALS animal models helps sustain breathing

In a disease like ALS - one that's always fatal and that has a long history of research-resistant biology - finding a proof of principle in animal models is significant. This week, Johns Hopkins researchers report that transplanting a new line of stem cell-like cells into rat models of the dise...

Drug-embedded microparticles bolster heart function in animal studies

Researchers at Emory University and Georgia Institute of Technology have developed tiny polymer beads that can slowly release anti-inflammatory drugs and break down into non-toxic components. When injected into rats' hearts after a simulated heart attack, the drug-embedded "microparticles" redu...

Earliest animal footprints ever found -- discovered in Nevada

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- The fossilized trail of an aquatic creature suggests that animals walked using legs at least 30 million years earlier than had been thought. The tracks -- two parallel rows of small dots, each about 2 millimeters in diameter -- date back some 570 million years, to the Ediacara...

Researchers find animal with ability to survive climate change

Queen's researchers have found that the main source of food for many fish - including cod - in the North Atlantic appears to adapt in order to survive climate change. Billions of Calanus finmarchicus , a plankton species, which are just a few millimetres in size, live in the waters of the Nort...

Long-term study shows effect of climate change on animal diversity

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---Two species of giraffe, several rhinos and five elephant relatives, along with multitudes of rodents, bush pigs, horses, antelope and apes, once inhabited what is now northern Pakistan. But when climate shifted dramatically there some 8 million years ago, precipitating a majo...

Unique animal species can survive in space

Water bears (tardigrades) are the first animals in the world to have survived exposure to the vacuum and radiation of space. This has been established by Ingemar Jnsson, a researcher at Kristianstad University in Sweden. It has been nearly a year since the ecologist Ingemar Jnsson had some 3,0...

Genome of simplest animal reveals ancient lineage, confounding array of complex capabilities

WALNUT CREEK, Calif. As Aesop said, appearances are deceivingeven in life's tiniest critters. From first detection in the 1880s, clinging to the sides of an aquarium, to its recent characterization by the U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute (DOE JGI), a simple and primitive animal, T...

Multiple Sclerosis: new MRI contrast medium enables early diagnosis in animal model

In an animal model of multiple sclerosis (MS), neuroradiologists and neurologists of the University hospitals of Heidelberg and Wrzburg have been able to visualize inflammatory tissue damage, most of which had remained unrecognized up to now, with the aid of a new contrast medium, Gadofluorine M, ...

Treatment corrects severe insulin imbalance in animal studies

Researchers have used a drug to achieve normal levels of blood sugar in animals genetically engineered to have abnormally high insulin levels. If this approach succeeds in humans, it could become an innovative medicine for children with congenital hyperinsulinism, a rare but potentially devastatin...

Worm-like marine animal providing

Research on the genome of a marine creature led by scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego is shedding new light on a key area of the tree of life. Linda Holland, a research biologist at Scripps Oceanography, and her colleagues from the United States, Europe and Asia, ...

And the first animal on Earth was a ...

A new study mapping the evolutionary history of animals indicates that Earth's first animal--a mysterious creature whose characteristics can only be inferred from fossils and studies of living animals--was probably significantly more complex than previously believed. The study, which was funde...

And the first animal on Earth was a...

A new study mapping the evolutionary history of animals indicates that Earth's first animal--a mysterious creature whose characteristics can only be inferred from fossils and studies of living animals--was probably significantly more complex than previously believed. The study, which was funde...

Scientists discover 356 animal inclusions trapped in 100 million years old opaque amber

This release is available in French .

animal inclusions in completely opaque amber from mid-Cretaceous sites of Charentes (France). The team used the X-rays of the European light source ...

Umbilical cord blood cell therapy in an animal model of Alzheimer's disease

New Rochelle, NY, March 26, 2008A novel strategy based on targeted immune suppression using human umbilical cord blood cells may improve the pathology and cognitive decline associated with Alzheimers disease, based on the results of a study in a mouse model of this currently untreatable neurodegen...

Scientist postulates 4 aspects of 'humaniqueness' differentiating human and animal cognition

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. Shedding new light on the great cognitive rift between humans and animals, a Harvard University scientist has synthesized four key differences in human and animal cognition into a hypothesis on what exactly differentiates human and animal thought. In new work presented for the...

Stem-cell transplantation improves muscles in MD animal model, UT Southwestern researchers report

DALLAS Jan. 20, 2008 Using embryonic stem cells from mice, UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers have prompted the growth of healthy and more importantly, functioning muscle cells in mice afflicted with a human model of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. The study represents the first time t...

Gene Networks in Animal Development and Evolution Feb. 15 and 16

The National Academy of Sciences' Sackler Colloquium series will hold a meeting on gene regulatory networks. These networks represent the genomic program for the development of animal embryos, body parts, and cell types. The meeting will focus on four areas -- gene regulatory networks that contr...

Where and why humans made skates out of animal bones

Archaeological evidence shows that bone skates (skates made of animal bones) are the oldest human powered means of transport, dating back to 3000 BC. Why people started skating on ice and where is not as clear, since ancient remains were found in several locations spread across Central and North E...

Study finds first-ever genetic animal model of autism

Boca Raton, FL, December 8, 2007 By introducing a gene mutation in mice, investigators have created what they believe to be the first accurate model of autism not associated with a broader neuropsychiatric syndrome, according to research presented at the American College of Neuropsychopharmacolog...

UCSB researchers discover the dawn of animal vision

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) -- By peering deep into evolutionary history, scientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara have discovered the origins of photosensitivity in animals. The findings are published in this weeks issue of the scientific journal PLoS ONE. The scientists studied ...

Brain cell growth diminishes long before old age strikes, animal study shows

Even early in adulthood, aging begins to slow the mind's growth -- but it does not have to stop it altogether, suggests a Princeton University study on the brains of adult monkeys. A team of neuroscientists has found that soon after marmoset monkeys reach adulthood, the rate at which new neura...

New animal and plant species found in Vietnam

WASHINGTON World Wildlife Fund scientists said today that the discovery of 11 new animal and plant species in a remote area in central Vietnam underscores the importance of conservation efforts in the ancient tropical forests of the region. Within the ancient tropical forests of a region kn...

Small animal imaging facility is big boon to research

When powerful magnets line up the bodys protons before radiofrequency waves can grab their attention away, its called spin physics. When signals generated by the movement are mathematically transformed into dramatic images of hearts, lungs and other organs its called a magnetic resonance image...

Tuatara, the fastest evolving animal

In a study of New Zealands living dinosaur the tuatara, evolutionary biologist, and ancient DNA expert, Professor David Lambert and his team from the Allan Wilson Centre for Molecular Ecology and Evolution recovered DNA sequences from the bones of ancient tuatara, which are up to 8000 years old. T...

RNA interference therapy heals growth deficiency disorder in a live animal

A team of Vanderbilt researchers have demonstrated for the first time that a new type of gene therapy, called RNA interference, can heal a genetic disorder in a live animal. The study, which was published online Nov. 15 by the journal Endocrinology, shows that RNA interference can rescue a strain...

Gene therapy delivery of nerve growth factors reverses erectile dysfunction in animal model

Rats with erectile dysfunction, or ED, that were injected with a gene therapy vector containing either of two nerve growth factors were able to regain normal function after four weeks, according to a study conducted by University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine researchers. These findings are bei...

Loss of stem cells correlates with premature aging in animal study

Researchers at the Abramson Family Cancer Research Institute of the University of Pennsylvania have found that deleting a gene important in embryo development leads to premature aging and loss of stem cell reservoirs in adult mice. This gene, ATR, is essential for the body’s response to damaged DN...