K-State researchers say after-school programs should promote activity, healthy nutrition

Children's after-school activities often consist of sedentary behavior such as watching television, but after-school programs that offer physical activity and healthy snacks could be the best place for children's health. David Dzewaltowski, head of the department of kinesiology at Kansas State ...

The right messenger for a healthy immune response

Researchers from the Molecular Immunology group at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig, Germany have now shown that Beta-Interferon also plays a crucial role during an immune response: without Beta-Interferon immune cells are unable to show "wanted posters" of pathoge...

Consumers more likely to identify healthy food using traffic light nutrition labels

Amsterdam, the Netherlands: Consumers are five times more likely to identify healthy food when they see colour-coded traffic light nutrition labels than when labels present the information numerically by showing what percentage of the recommended daily nutrient intake each portion provides, new re...

Lithium may help radiation target cancer, spare healthy tissue

Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center investigators have uncovered a mechanism that helps explain how lithium, a drug widely used to treat bipolar mood disorder, also protects the brain from damage that occurs during radiation treatments. In the May 1 issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation ,...

Vitamin D deficiency related to increased inflammation in healthy women

COLUMBIA, Mo. According to a recent study in the Archives of Internal Medicine, 75 percent of Americans do not get enough Vitamin D. Researchers have found that the deficiency may negatively impact immune function and cardiovascular health and increase cancer risk. Now, a University of Missouri ...

Doctors endorse vegan and vegetarian diets for healthy pregnancies

WASHINGTON--Well-planned vegetarian and vegan diets are healthful choices for pregnant women and their children, and vitamin B12 needs can be easily met with fortified foods or any common multivitamin, say doctors and dietitians with the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM). PCRM n...

Gladstone scientists reveal that fat synthesizing enzyme is key to healthy skin and hair

Scientists at the Gladstone Institutes of Cardiovascular Disease (GICD) have found that an enzyme associated with the synthesis of fat in the body is also an element in healthy skin and hair. The enzyme is acyl CoA:diacylglycerol acyltransferase 1 or DGAT1. Mice that lack DGAT1 have many interes...

Young adults need to make more time for healthy meals

January 6, 2009, St. Louis, MO As adolescents mature into young adults, increasing time constraints due to school or work can begin to impact eating habits in a negative way. In a study published in the January 2009 issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association , researchers observed...

Scientists can now differentiate between healthy cells and cancer cells

One of the current handicaps of cancer treatments is the difficulty of aiming these treatments at destroying malignant cells without killing healthy cells in the process. But a new study by McMaster University researchers has provided insight into how scientists might develop therapies and drugs t...

How healthy are America's coasts?

(Washington, DC December 16, 2008) The overall condition of the nation's coastal waters has improved slightly, based on a recently released environmental assessment. The National Coastal Condition Report III (NCCRIII) is the third in a series of environmental assessments of U.S. coastal and Great...

Modified gene targets cancer cells a thousand times more often than healthy cells

Researchers at the University of Rochester have designed a gene that produces a thousand times more protein in cancer cells than in healthy cells. The findings may help address the prime challenge in anti-cancer therapy: improving treatments' ability to specifically and effectively target cancer ...

How healthy are America's coasts?

(Washington, DC December 16, 2008) The overall condition of the nation's coastal waters has improved slightly, based on a recently released environmental assessment. The National Coastal Condition Report III (NCCRIII) is the third in a series of environmental assessments of U.S. coastal and Great...

Tiny protein provokes healthy bonding between cells

In human relationships, a certain "spark" often governs whether we prefer one person to another, and critical first impressions can occur within seconds. A team lead by Johns Hopkins researchers has found that cell-to-cell "friendships" operate in much the same way and that dysfunctional bonding ...

Caloric intake negatively influences healthy adults' sleep patterns

WESTCHESTER, Ill. Caloric intake negatively influences sleep patterns in healthy adults, according to a research abstract that will be presented on Tuesday at SLEEP 2008, the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS). The study, authored by Ion Zalcman, of Feder...

Fat intake negatively influences the sleep pattern in healthy adults

WESTCHESTER, Ill. Total fat intake and dinner fat intake seem to influence negatively the sleep pattern in healthy adults, according to a research abstract that will be presented on Tuesday at SLEEP 2008, the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS). The study,...

Study finds healthy intestinal bacteria within chicken eggs

Athens, Ga. The conventional wisdom among scientists has long been that birds acquire the intestinal bacteria that are necessary for good health from their environment, but a new University of Georgia study finds that chickens are actually born with those bacteria. Lead author Adriana Pedroso ...

Crop management strategies key to a healthy Gulf, planet

OAK RIDGE, Tenn., April 21, 2008 Improved management of crops and perennials could go a long way toward alleviating the problem of hypoxia, which claims thousands of fish, shrimp and shellfish in the Gulf of Mexico each spring. An assessment by a team led by Virginia Dale of Oak Ridge National...

Macadamia nuts can be included in heart healthy diet

Macadamia nuts included in a heart healthy diet reduced low-density cholesterol (bad cholesterol) and should be included among nuts with qualified health claims, according to researchers. "We looked at macadamia nuts because they are not currently included in the health claim for tree nuts, whi...

U of M research finds teens who have TV in their bedroom are less likely to engage in healthy habits

University of Minnesota School of Public Health researchers have found that older adolescents who have a bedroom television are less likely to engage in healthy activities such as exercising, eating fruits or vegetables, and enjoying family meals. They also consumed larger quantities of sweetened ...

Iowa Staters talk biofuels, healthy oils and 'pharma crops' at AAAS meeting

AMES, Iowa Theres more to biofuels than the food vs. fuel debate and talk of the various technologies associated with biofuels production. And so Steven Fales, a professor of agronomy and a member of the Science and Engineering Board of Iowa States Bioeconomy Institute, organized and moderate...

Want healthy gums? Hit the dairy aisle

CHICAGO (February 6, 2008) Consumers have long known that including dairy in their diets can help maintain healthy bones and even help promote weight loss. However, a recent study published in the January issue of the Journal of Periodontology, the official publication of the American Academy of...

Gene, stem cell therapy only needs to be 50 percent effective to create a healthy heart

COLUMBIA, Mo. Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States and greatly affects the quality and length of life for individuals with specific forms of muscular dystrophy. Recent discoveries have demonstrated that gene and/or stem cell therapy could help a variety of organs in th...

'Scrawny' gene keeps stem cells healthy

Baltimore, MDStem cells are the body's primal cells, retaining the youthful ability to develop into more specialized types of cells over many cycles of cell division. How do they do it? Scientists at the Carnegie Institution have identified a gene, named scrawny, that appears to be a key factor in...

Bee smart, bee healthy

Bumblebee colonies which are fast learners are also better able to fight off infection, according to scientists from Queen Mary, University of London and the University of Leicester. Dr Nigel Raine from Queen Mary's School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, and Akram Alghamdi, Ezio Rosato and...

Case Western Reserve University study looks at keeping migrant workers' children healthy

CLEVELAND As Ohio and Michigan fruit and vegetable farms yield this year's harvest, they also will provide data about the eating choices of Latino migrant children for a Case Western Reserve University researcher. Information gathered this summer will help migrant families understand why their c...

Growth hormone is not the anti-aging bullet for healthy adults

A review of published data on use of human growth hormone (GH) by healthy elderly people found that the synthetic hormone was associated with small changes in body composition but not in body weight or other clinically important outcomes. Further, people who took GH had increased rates of unheal...

A natural chemical found in strawberries boosts memory in healthy mice

Mothers have long exhorted their children to eat their fruit and vegetables. But once kids are beyond mom's watchful eye, the hated greens often go the way of Barbie dolls and power rangers. Now, there's another reason to reach for colorful fruits past adolescence. Fisetin, a naturally occurring ...

Beaver dams create healthy downstream ecosystems

Beavers, long known for their beneficial effects on the environment near their dams, are also critical to maintaining healthy ecosystems downstream. Researchers have found that ponds created by beaver dams raised downstream groundwater levels in the Colorado River valley, keeping soil water levels ...

How healthy is that marsh? Biologists count parasites

Is that salt marsh healthy? To answer this, Sea Grant biologists are cracking open common marsh snails and counting parasitic worms. Their claim: the more parasites, the healthier the marsh. While the parasite hypothesis may conflict with conventional ideas about infectious disease and human heal...

Free-radical busting antioxidants might not promote healthy hearts

Antioxidants, such as beta-carotene and Vitamin E, have been touted for their ability to protect against heart disease. This protective effect is attributed to their ability to prevent the oxidation of bad cholesterol by free radicals—a process thought to contribute to the build-up of disease-causi...

A surprising pair of proteins help make healthy eggs

Human eggs rely on handmaidens. Called granulosa cells, they surround eggs and deliver nutrients and hormones. Without granulosa cells, eggs cannot mature and be successfully fertilized. How do these handmaidens grow? Biologists at Brown University and the University of California–Berkeley have d...

H5N1 avian flu virus vaccine induces immune responses in healthy adults

Results from a clinical trial demonstrate that high doses of an experimental H5N1 avian influenza vaccine can induce immune responses in healthy adults. Approximately half of those volunteers who received an initial and a booster dose of the highest dosage of the vaccine tested in the trial deve...

SLU researchers uncover direct evidence on how HIV invades healthy cells

Using sophisticated detection methods, researchers at the Saint Louis University Institute for Molecular Virology (IMV) have demonstrated the molecular mechanism by which the HIV virus infects, or integrates, healthy cells. The discovery could lead to new drug treatments for HIV. Although scienti...

Scientists develop nanotech-laser treatment that kills cancer cells without harming healthy tissue

Scientists at Stanford University have developed a new laser therapy that destroys cancer cells but leaves healthy ones unharmed. The new, non-invasive treatment is described in a study published in the Aug. 1 online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). "One of t...

New cancer drug delivery system is effective and reversible

... CHAMPAIGN, Ill. For cancer drug developers, finding an agent that kills tumor cells is only part of the equation. The drug must also spare healthy cells, and ideally its effects will be reversible, to cut short any potentially dangerous side effects. University of Illinois researchers report...

First human gets new antibody aimed at hepatitis C virus

...HCV). The first volunteer received the antibody known as MBL-HCV1 on July 28, 2009, and the study is now proceeding and will eventually involve 30 healthy subjects in a dose-escalation trial expected to conclude later this year. "We are pleased that this program has now entered the clinical trial phase,"...

Abnormal brain circuits may prevent movement disorder

...ed, making it difficult to integrate the information needed to plan movements and to learn new motor skills. It was not suspected that these otherwise healthy individuals had such difficulties since doctors only saw those who presented with the uncontrollable movements. While their brains show the same a...

Pitt researchers find promising candidate protein for cancer prevention vaccines

...s at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine have learned that some healthy people naturally developed an immune response against a protein that is mad... kinds of cancer," she said. "While we were studying it, we noted that many healthy people already had an immune response, or antibodies, against the protein, ...

Sustainable agriculture at the ESA Annual Meeting

.... All these findings, says Glover, suggest that the perennial field soil is healthy enough to maintain high levels of organic nutrients. In addition to bein...rsity The idea of using biological instead of chemical methods to create healthy croplands doesn't include just above-ground approaches. Soil bacteria can a...

Structure of protective protein in the eye lens revealed

...n of the three-dimensional structure of αB-crystallin, which is currently being further refined, the basis has now been established for comparing healthy and disease-promoting mutants and, based on this, for clarifying the way they function. The scientists hope that this will lead to the discovery of ne...