does in Biological News

Single thawed embryo transfer after PGD does not affect pregnancy rates

Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Transferring just one embryo at a time to a woman's womb after embryos have undergone preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) and freezing at the blastocyst stage has become a real option after researchers achieved pregnancy rates that were as good as those for blastocy...

Mate selection: How does she know he'll take care of the kids?

New Haven, Conn. Throughout the animal kingdom brilliant colors or elaborate behavioral displays serve as "advertisements" for attracting mates. But, what do the ads promise, and is there truth in advertizing? Researchers at Yale theorize that when males must provide care for the survival of thei...

One size does not fit all

Statins, a commonly prescribed class of drugs used by millions worldwide to effectively lower blood cholesterol levels, may actually have a negative impact in Multiple Sclerosis (MS) patients treated with high daily dosages. A new study by researchers at the Montreal Neurological Institute (MNI...

Swine flu: What does it do to pigs?

The effects of H1N1 swine flu have been investigated in a group of piglets. Scientists writing in BioMed Central's open access Virology Journal studied the pathology of the virus, finding that all infected animals showed flu-like symptoms between one and four days after infection and were sheddi...

Freezing prostate cancer does a man's body good

SAN DIEGO, Calif. (March 9, 2009)The so-called "male lumpectomy"a minimally invasive interventional radiology treatment for prostate canceris as effective as surgery in destroying diseased tumors and can be considered a first-line treatment for patients of all risk levels and particularly those wh...

Healthy food availability could depend on where you live -- so does the quality of your diet

The availability of healthy food choices and your quality of diet is associated with where you live, according to two studies conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Researchers examined healthy food availability and diet quality among Baltimore City and Ba...

When fish farms are built along the coast, where does the waste go?

If you are a fish eater, it's likely that the salmon you had for dinner was not caught in the wild, but was instead grown in a mesh cage submerged in the open water of oceans or bays. Fish farming, a relatively inexpensive way to provide cheap protein to a growing world population, now supplies, b...

Eliminating soda from school diets does not affect overall consumption

Philadelphia, PA, November 10, 2008 With childhood obesity increasing, school administrators and public health officials are reducing availability of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) in schools. In a study published in the November/December 2008 issue of the Journal of Nutrition Education and Beh...

Research shows that the pill does not deserve its reputation for causing weight gain

For This release is available in German . Research has not proven that the Pill causes weight gain. But many women are put off using contraceptive pills because this has been listed as one of their adverse effects. Their concern may be narrowing their contraceptive choices without good reason,...

Vitamin K does not stem BMD decline in postmenopausal women with osteopenia

In a randomized controlled trial called the "Evaluate the Clinical use of vitamin K Supplementation in Postmenopausal Women with Osteopenia" (ECKO) trial, Angela Cheung and colleagues at the University of Toronto found that a high dose daily vitamin K1 supplement did not protect against age-relate...

If a street tree falls... what does it take to make sound policy?

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- There's little debate that, when a tree falls near a city street, it makes a sound. But other questions are more difficult to answer: Who is affected by the falling tree and how? Who is liable for the damage? And who is responsible for deciding how to replace the tree? A p...

Statin does not appear helpful for children with learning disabilities caused by genetic disorder

Use of simvastatin by children with neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1), a genetic disorder that can cause learning disabilities, did not result in improved cognitive function, according to a study in the July 16 issue of JAMA . Characteristics of NF1 (incidence 1:3,000) include skin disorders, pro...

IVF does not increase risk of developmental disorders in children

This release is available in Spanish . Barcelona, Spain: Couples who need IVF in order to become pregnant can be reassured that this will not lead to developmental problems in early infancy, a Dutch researcher told the 24th annual conference of the European Society of Human Reproduction ...

Embryo biopsy does not affect early growth and risk of congenital malformations in PGD/PGS babies

This release is also available in Spanish . Barcelona, Spain: A study of 70 singleton babies born after preimplantation genetic diagnosis and screening has shown that the procedure does not adversely affect their early growth and risk of congenital malformations. The lead researcher, ...

Sunburn alert: UVB does more damage to DNA than UVA

As bombs burst in air this July 4, chances are that sunburn will be the red glare that most folks see and feel. But unfortunately, even when there is no burn, the effects of the sun's ultraviolet (UV) rays can have deadly consequences. Thanks to a new research study published in the July 2008 iss...

Where does stored nuclear waste go?

Millions of gallons of hazardous waste resulting from the nations nuclear weapons program lie in a remote location in southeastern Washington state called Hanford. Beneath this desert landscape about two million curies of radioactivity and hundreds of thousands of tons of chemicals are captured w...

Micro microwave does pinpoint cooking for miniaturized labs

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards of Technology (NIST) and George Mason University have demonstrated what is probably the worlds smallest microwave oven, a tiny mechanism that can heat a pinhead-sized drop of liquid inside a container slightly shorter than an ant and half as wide ...

U of I scientist does nutritional detective work in Botswana

Many Americans have a soft spot for Botswana, developed while reading the best-selling #1 Ladies Detective Agency series. But few have had a chance to do any sleuthing of their own in that African country. That changed when University of Illinois scientist Karen Chapman-Novakofski acquired a Ba...

How does the opioid system control pain, reward and addictive behavior?

The opioid system controls pain, reward and addictive behaviors. Opioids exert their pharmacological actions through three opioid receptors, mu, delta and kappa whose genes have been cloned (Oprm, Oprd1 and Oprk1, respectively). Opioid receptors in the brain are activated by a family of endogenous...

UCLA: How does your brain respond when you think about gambling or taking risks?

Should you leave your comfortable job for one that pays better but is less secure? Should you have a surgery that is likely to extend your life but poses some risk that you will not survive the operation? Should you invest in a risky startup company whose stock may soar even though you could lose y...

How does your brain tell time?

"Time" is the most popular noun in the English language, yet how would we tell time if we didn’t have access to the plethora of watches, clocks and cell phones at our disposal? For decades, scientists have believed that the brain possesses an internal clock that allows it to keep trac...

What does the public really know about HPV?

Human papillomaviruses (HPV) are the most common sexually transmitted infections in the United States, and certain "high risk" types have been shown to cause cervical cancer. Despite recent advances in the detection and prevention of HPV, the link between the virus and cervical cancer is not well ...

How does a zebrafish grow a new tail?

If a zebrafish loses a chunk of its tail fin, it'll grow back within a week. Like lizards, newts, and frogs, a zebrafish can replace surprisingly complex body parts. A tail fin, for example, has many different types of cells and is a very intricate structure. It is the fish version of an arm or leg...

How many genes does it take to learn? Lessons from sea slugs

Scientists analyzing the genomics of a marine snail have gotten an unprecedented look at brain mechanisms, discovering that the neural processes in even a simple sea creature are far from sluggish. At any given time within just a single brain cell of sea slug known as Aplysia, more than 10,000 ...

Tamoxifen for breast cancer prevention does not benefit most women

Most women at high risk for breast cancer do not increase their life expectancy by taking the drug tamoxifen, according to a new analysis by researchers from UC Davis, UCSF, the University of Pittsburgh and McMaster University in Ontario, Canada. In addition, the researchers showed that tamoxifen i...

Suicide risk does not increase when adults start using antidepressants, study finds

The risk of serious suicide attempts or death by suicide generally decreases in the weeks after patients start taking antidepressant medication, according to a new study led by Group Health Cooperative researchers and published in the January issue of The American Journal of Psychiatry. The study a...

Molecule does more than slice and dice RNA

A team of Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) scientists has peeled back some of the mystery of how cells are able to turn off genes selectively to control critical events of development. The new insights arise from the first clear molecular images of the structure of Dicer, an enzyme that enabl...

How does the brain know what the right hand is doing?

A new experiment has shed more light on the multi-decade debate about how the brain knows where limbs are without looking at them. You don't have to watch your legs and feet when you walk. Your brain knows where they are. For decades scientists have debated two options for how the brain achieves ...

How does Mycobacterium tuberculosis infect the lung?

Tuberculosis (TB) is the most common major infectious disease today. It is estimated that two billion people--or one-third of the world's population--are chronically infected without active symptoms. Nine million new cases of active disease are diagnosed annually, resulting in two million deaths. T...

How exactly does the brain control breathing?

An understanding of exactly how the brain controls breathing is fundamental to the treatment of respiratory disorders. We know that breathing is an automatic rhythmic process that persists without conscious effort whether we are awake or asleep, but the question that has intrigued many scientists f...

Columbia study shows widely used artery clearing device does not help patients during heart attack

Interventional cardiologists from Columbia University Medical Center have shown that a commonly used procedure to remove fatty debris from blocked arteries during a heart attack does not improve patient outcomes. The procedure, called distal microcirculatory protection, is commonly and successfu...

Marine microbes creating green waves in industry

...ystems that have been finely tuned by evolution to solve problems, rather than starting from scratch every time, might seem an obvious thing to do. It does however, in many cases, require the bringing together of particular niche expertise. The value of this collaboration is in the coincidence of knowledg...

Mary had a lot of lambs: Researchers identify way to accelerate sheep breeding

...elatonin," Thonney explained. Melatonin is a naturally produced hormone commonly found in many animals. The change in the DNA sequence of the M allele does not change the amino acid sequence of the protein. This means that it may be an accurate indicator for the phenotype of breeding out of season, though...

University of Hawaii at Manoa researchers reveal ocean acidification at Station ALOHA

...rowth of atmospheric CO 2 concentration would be substantially greater than it is. However, this beneficial role of the oceans as a CO 2 "scrubber" does not come without undesired consequences. When dissolved, CO 2 acts as an acid, and lowers seawater pH. Since the beginning of the industrial age, C...

'Green' energy from algae

...t and electrical engineer. Modern designs under investigation will find more intelligent ways to light distribution. Consequently, algae production does not only work in countries with an extremely high solar irradiation. Most algae need a maximum of ten percent of the incident sunlight intensity. Acco...

Symposium to discuss geoengineering to fight climate change at the ESA Annual Meeting

...ible rate of ocean iron fertilization could only offset a small fraction of the current rate of carbon burning by humans. Ocean fertilization also does not alleviate the increasing problem of ocean acidification, caused by carbon dioxide from the increasingly carbon-rich atmosphere dissolving into sea...

Women often opt to surgically remove their breasts, ovaries to reduce cancer risk

...ch. "Women have their breasts or ovaries removed based on their risk. It does not always happen immediately after counseling or a genetic test result and... sympathetic and is there an ongoing dialogue? "Careful risk counseling does appear to influence women's decision for surgery although the effect is not...

Restoring a natural root signal helps to fight a major corn pest

...matodes. Therefore the research group in Jena and Neuchtel teamed up again in an attempt to restore the EβC signal in a variety that normally does not emit the substance. Jrg Degenhardt, with the help of Monika Frey at the Technical University of Munich, transformed a non-emitting maize line with...

Drug-proof zebrafish reveal secrets of addiction

...ccess journal Genome Biology , provides clues to the genetics that underlie susceptibility to addiction by describing the nad zebrafish mutant, which does not feel the rewarding effects of the drugs. Katharine Webb, from the German Research Center for Environmental Health, Helmholtz Zentrum Mnchen,...

August 2009 Geology and GSA Today media highlights

... only with large perturbations to atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations that observed sea-level changes are simulated. Current geological evidence does not support such drastic greenhouse gas fluctuations, leaving the driving factors of dynamic late Paleozoic climate change up for debate. U-Pb...