Health News

Obesity linked to increased inhalation of air pollutants

Date: Feb-09-2014
Researchers have long known that exposure to air pollution can cause respiratory illnesses, such as asthma. But a new study suggests that individuals who are overweight or obese breathe in up to 50% more air each day, compared with those of a healthy weight, meaning they are more vulnerable to air contaminants.To reach their findings, published in the journal Risk Analysis, investigators from the School of Public Health at the Université de Montréal in Canada, led by Dr.

Mediterranean diet 'better than low-fat diet' for cardiovascular risk

Date: Feb-09-2014
There is more evidence that people who adopt a whole diet approach - such as a Mediterranean diet - have a lower risk of heart attack and cardiovascular-related death than those who follow a strictly low-fat diet. This is according to a new study recently published in The American Journal of Medicine.To reach their findings, the investigators analyzed studies dating from 1957 up to the present day that looked at the relationship between food and heart disease.The research team, including Dr. James E.

The structure of a protein identified that helps dengue and West Nile replicate and spread infection

Date: Feb-09-2014
Dengue fever and West Nile fever are mosquito-borne diseases that affect hundreds of millions of people worldwide each year, but there is no vaccine against either of the related viruses.A team of scientists at the University of Michigan and Purdue University has discovered a key aspect both to how the viruses replicate in the cells of their host and how they manipulate the immune system as they spread.

Birth hormone may control the expression of autism in animals

Date: Feb-09-2014
The scientific community agrees that autism has its origins in early life - foetal and/or postnatal. The team led by Yehezkel Ben-Ari, Inserm Emeritus Research Director at the Mediterranean Institute of Neurobiology (INMED), has made a breakthrough in the understanding of the disorder. In an article published in Science, the researchers demonstrate that chloride levels are elevated in the neurons of mice used in an animal model of autism, and remain at abnormal levels from birth.

New gene defect identified which causes a particular type of bone marrow failure

Date: Feb-09-2014
The study, published in The American Journal of Human Genetics, detected and identified a new disease gene (ERCC6L2). In its normal form, the gene plays a key role in protecting DNA from damaging agents, but when the gene is mutated the cell is not able to protect itself in the normal way.The research findings suggest that the gene defect and the subsequent DNA damage was the underlying cause of bone marrow failure among the study participants.

Histones may hold the key to the generation of totipotent stem cells

Date: Feb-09-2014
One major challenge in stem cell research has been to reprogram differentiated cells to a totipotent state. Researchers from RIKEN in Japan have identified a duo of histone proteins that dramatically enhance the generation of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells) and may be the key to generating induced totipotent stem cells.Differentiated cells can be coaxed into returning to a stem-like pluripotent state either by artificially inducing the expression of four factors called the Yamanaka factors, or as recently shown by shocking them with sublethal stress, such as low pH or pressure.

New study defines powerful bacterial immune response

Date: Feb-09-2014
T-cells, the elite guard of the immune system in humans and other mammals, ignore normal biologic protocol and swing into high gear when attacked by certain fast-moving bacteria, reports a team of researchers led by a UC Davis immunologist.The description of this previously undefined immune pathway provides information vital for designing vaccines and medicines to prevent or treat deadly infectious diseases caused by bacteria such as Salmonella and Chlamydia. The results from this recent mouse-based study were reported online in the journal Immunity.

Why do men and women differ in height? X chromosome is key

Date: Feb-09-2014
Investigating the reasons why certain physical traits between men and women differ, researchers at the University of Helsinki in Finland turned their attention to the sex chromosome shared by men and women - chromosome X - and how it might influence height.Chromosomes are DNA-carrying structures in the nuclei of human cells. The sex chromosomes - X and Y - determine whether an embryo becomes male or female.

Discovery of bacterial fibers critical to human and avian infection

Date: Feb-09-2014
Escherichia coli - a friendly and ubiquitous bacterial resident in the guts of humans and other animals - may occasionally colonize regions outside the intestines. There, it can have serious consequences for health, some of them, lethal. In a new study conducted in Assistant Professor Melha Mellata's lab, at the Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University, lead author Alyssa K. Stacy and her colleagues examine one such bacterial adversary, Avian pathogenic Escherichia coli (APEC).

Feeling powerless 'makes tasks more physically challenging'

Date: Feb-08-2014
Do you ever have days when the simplest task can feel physically challenging? It could be down to your social and personal sense of power. New research suggests that people who feel personally and socially powerless see the world in a different light and perceive tasks to be more physically demanding, compared with individuals who have a strong sense of power.This is according to a study published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology.