Researchers unlock secrets of 1918 flu pandemic

Researchers discovered the 1918 flu pandemic so deadly a group of 3 genes that lets the virus invade the lungs & cause pneumonia. The researcher actually mixed the samples of 1918 influenza strain with modern seasonal flu viruses to find the 3 genes that might help in the development of new flu drugs. The discovery could also point to mutations that might turn ordinary flu into a dangerous pandemic strain.

Usually flu causes an upper respiratory infection affecting the nose and throat, and so called systemic illness causing fever, muscle aches & weakness. But some people become seriously ill and develop pneumonia. Sometimes bacteria cause the pneumonia and sometimes flu does it directly. During pandemics, such as in 1918, a new and more dangerous flu strain emerges. The 1918 influenza pandemic was the most devastating outbreak of infectious disease in human history, accounting for about 50 million deaths worldwide but It killed 2.5% of victims, compared to fewer than 1% during most annual flu epidemics. Autopsies showed many of the victims, often otherwise healthy young adults, died of severe pneumonia. They painstakingly substituted single genes from the 1918 virus into modern flu viruses and, one after another, they acted like garden-variety flu, infecting only the upper respiratory tract. But a complex of 3 genes helped to make the virus live and reproduce deep in the lungs. The 3 genes called PA, PB1, and PB2 along with a 1918 version of the nucleoprotein or NP gene, made modern seasonal flu kill ferrets in much the same way as the original 1918 flu. Most flu experts agree that a pandemic of influenza will almost certainly strike again. No one knows when or what strain it will be but one big suspect now is the H5N1 avian influenza virus.

H5N1 is circulating among poultry in Asia, Europe and parts of Africa. It rarely affects humans but has killed 247 of the 391 people infected since 2003. A few mutations would make it into a pandemic strain that could kill millions globally within a few months. Four licensed drugs can fight flu but the viruses regularly mutate into resistant forms just as bacteria evolve into forms that evade antibiotics.

HIV/TB infection

Dual HIV/TB infection common in S. African infants

Picture: HIV virus----------------------------&---------------HIV life cycle

Researchers from South Africa report in the current issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases said that, HIV-positive infants are over 20 times more likely to develop tuberculosis than their HIV-negative counterparts.

Dr. Anneke Hesseling from Cape Town told Reuters Health: "The current status of TB amongst HIV-infected children is still very high,this burden is not always accurately assessed because it can be difficult to confirm the diagnosis of TB in young children." In their study, the prevalence of tuberculosis and HIV among infants attending their hospital in Western Cape province between 2004 and 2006. During the study, 245 infants were confirmed as having tuberculosis, the investigators report. of these, 53 (21.6 percent) infants were HIV positive, 122 (49.8%) HIV negative, while the others were untested.

The incidence of tuberculosis was 1,596 per 100,000 population among HIV-positive infants and 65.9 per 100,000 among HIV-negative infants, the researchers estimated. HIV-infected infants were at a 24.1-fold higher risk of pulmonary tuberculosis and a 17.1-fold higher risk of disseminated tuberculosis. Increased exposure to tuberculosis, HIV-associated immunosuppression & reduced efficacy of the BCG vaccine could explain the increased risk of tuberculosis among these infants, Hesseling suggested.


"A very important strategy to reduce the TB burden amongst infants born to HIV- infected women is to implement TB screening amongst pregnant women."

In addition, routine HIV testing of infants with tuberculosis, prophylactic treatment for TB, improved access to HIV treatment and newer vaccines could help reduce the burden.

blood pressure

Key gene linked to high blood pressure identified


Researchers said, a gene that affects how the kidneys process salt may help determine a person's risk of high blood pressure, and it could lead to better ways to treat the condition.

University of Maryland School of Medicine researchers found that people with a general variant of the gene STK39 tend to have higher blood pressure levels & are likely to develop full blown high blood pressure, also called hypertension . They identified the gene's role in high blood pressure susceptibility by analyzing 560 people in the insular old Order Amish community in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Researchers confirmed that the genes of another group of Amish peopleand 4 other groups of white people in the United States and Europe. About 20% of the people studied had either one or two copies of this particular variant.

The researchers said, the gene produces a protein involved in regulating the way the kidneys process salt in the body-a key factor in determining blood pressure.

Note: Yen-Pei Christy Chang, who led the study appearing in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, said the findings could lead to the development of new high blood pressure drugs targeting the activity of STK39.

People with high blood pressure are more likely to develop heart attacks, heart failure, strokes and kidney disease. While STK39 may play a pivotal role in some people, Chang said numerous other genes also may be involved. Many factors are involved in high blood pressure such as being overweight, lack of exercise, smoking and too much salt in the diet.

Several different types of medications are used to treat high blood pressure, including diuretics, beta blockers, ACE inhibitors, calcium channel blockers and others.

Chang said the researchers want to determine how people with different versions of this gene respond to the various drugs and to lifestyle interventions such as cutting the amount of salt in the diet. The Lancaster Amish are seen as ideal for genetic research because they are a genetically homogenous people whose ancestry can be traced to a small group who arrived from Europe in the 1700s.

cancer

Pain pills may cut risk of bowel cancer

Study finds, use of a non-steroidal anti inflammatory drug (NSAID) for over 5 years may lessen a person's risk of developing cancer of the lower portion of the large bowel.

Dr. Sangmi Kim, of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, and colleagues found that the risk reduction appears more robust among whites than among African Americans. The investigators evaluated use of NSAIDs among 1,057 white & American men and women with cancer of the lower bowel and rectum and 1,019 individuals who were cancer-free. The participants with cancer included 790 whites and 267 Americans, of whom 76% reported ever using NSAIDs during the 5 years prior to diagnosis. Of the cancer-free group, 83% reported NSAID use during the 5 years prior to study participation.

Compared with those never using NSAIDs, NSAID use was associated with about 40% reduced risk for cancer in the lower portion of the large bowel overall, after allowing for age, gender, race, body mass, physical activity, and other factors potentially associated with distal large bowel cancers. In analyses that factored for race, the investigators found a "strongly protective" association between NSAIDs and large bowel cancer in whites, according to a report in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Risk reduction was slightly stronger with prescription, rather than non-prescription NSAID use, but again this association was stronger among whites than among African Americans.

The apparent protective effect between NSAID use and cancer of the lower portion of the large bowel noted in this study is similar to that previously reported between NSAIDs and colon cancer.

heart rhythm problem

Smoking ups risk of common heart rhythm problem

In a new study finds that both current and former smokers run an elevated risk of the heart rhythm disorder atrial fibrillation. The condition known as AF, is the most common heart arrhythmia, affecting 2 million people. The arrhythmia itself is not life threatening, but over time AF can contribute to stroke or heart failure in some people.

The new findings, reported in the American Heart Journal, suggest that it does even after a smoker quits. Researchers found, nearly 5,700 Dutch adults age 55 & older, current smokers & former smokers were about 50% more likely to develop AF over 7 years.

An independent effect of smoking on atrial fibrillation has never been found, until now, in the study. Even when the researchers took other factors into account such as age, and whether participants had high blood pressure or had ever suffered a heart attack smoking itself was still linked to higher AF risk. It is surprising that former smokers had an AF risk comparable to current smokers.

But the finding does not mean that quitting the habit is "meaningless," the researcher stressed. It's known that smokers who quit lower their risk of developing a number of smoking-related ills, including lung cancer and heart attacks.

Heart failure risk

Even a tiny bit of flab raises heart failure risk

According to a US study: even a little bit of extra weight can raise the risk of heart failure that calculated the heart hazards of being pudgy but not obese. It comes obesity makes a person much more apt to get heart failure, a deadly condition which the heart is unable to pump enough blood throughout the body.

But researchers tracked the health of 21,094 male doctors for two decades found that even those who were only modestly overweight had a higher risk & it grew along with the amount of extra weight.

In men who are 5 feet 10 inches tall, for every seven pounds (3.2 kg) of excess body weight, their risk of heart failure rose on average by 11% over the next 20 years.

The average age of the men at the outset of the so called Physicians' Health Study was 53. Overall, the risk of heart failure increased by 180% in men who met the definition of obesity according to their body mass index (BMI of 30 and higher), and by 49 percent in men who met the definition of overweight (a BMI of 25 to 30).

Heart failure known as congestive heart failure, contributes to 300,000 deaths each year. The lean and active group had the lowest risk and the obese and inactive group had the highest risk. As far as vigorous physical activity is concerned, even if somebody said they exercised one to three times per month which is a very low level of exercise they had an 18% reduction in the risk of heart failure after accounting for all other established risk factors.

The benefit of exercise in cutting heart failure risk was seen in lean, overweight and obese men, the researchers found. But regardless of the level of activity, higher body mass index also meant higher heart failure risk.

Signs of the Times

Signs of the Times

The global recession manifests itself in big & small ways, most gloomy, some quirky and often reflecting the inventive human spirit. Here is a look at some signs of the times.

• If your hedge fund has collapsed, the bank foreclosed on your mansion and the Bentley's been repossessed, don't worry, you can still toast the new year with caviar.Well, fake caviar. A supermarket chain in Britain is selling something it calls Arenkha MSC with a similar texture and taste to the much-prized sturgeon roe but at a fraction of the price. It says it combines "smoked herring with squid ink, lemon juice and spices."
  
• Cricketers and dogs are also feeling the pain in Britain. Mobile phone company Vodafone Group Plc announced it was ending its sponsorship of the English cricket team, part of moves to cut 1 billion pounds ($1.52 billion) in costs. Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, the country's best-known animal refuge, said it was filled to bursting point, partly because of the financial crisis.
  
• Even the Queen of England is feeling the pinch. "The Sun"newspaper said Queen Elizabeth had mounted a sale at the gift shop at her Balmoral estate in Scotland, offering up to 50 percent cuts. Bargain hunters could buy a Prince Charles glossy landscape painting book for 10 pounds ($15). A bottle of Balmoral Whisky was cut by 6 pounds ($9) to 24 pounds ($36).
  
• In Moscow, the Niyama Japanese restaurant is pegging the price of a fixed-menu lunch to the country's benchmark stock index, the RTS. The "RTS lunch" costs 27 percent of the RTS index's daily opening level. If it opens at 690 points, as it did on Tuesday, the meal would cost 186.50 roubles (about $7). Had the offer been available at the market's peak in May, it would have been about four times the price.
  
• High-end consignment stores, where the once-rich try to unload their Gucci bags and Rolexes, have been swamped.
  
• Tokio 7, ranked one of New York's best second-hand shops, is turning down all but the best new consignments. "Business if very, very slow. Customers are very scared. Everyone needs a little money," said owner Makoto Watanabe.
  
• In Singapore, second-hand luxury watch dealers say customers are lowering their sights. Where they used to go for a Patek Philippe that can cost over S$10,000 (about $6,800), shoppers opt for models under S$5,000 (about $3,400). "Business has gone down about 20 to 30 percent," said Alvin Lye of Monster-Time.
  
• In Tokyo, many people are choosing the tubby "daruma"dolls, often given as good luck charms to someone starting a new business, not in the traditional red but in black. They hope it might portend their accounts will stay out of the red.
  
• Some American couples are being driven by the financial crisis to sell their wedding and engagement rings. The website idonowidont.com, originally conceived as a way for survivors of failed relationships to move on and make some cash at the same time, has experienced a 145 percent spike in traffic this fall, said David Becker, the site's chief executive officer.
  
• With unemployment spreading like a virus, Slovenia's national Employment Service has formed mobile units that will visit companies announcing losses to sign up the newly jobless, making it easier for them to get unemployment benefits.
  
• Greenwich, Connecticut, an upscale bedroom community for Wall Street and unofficial capital of the hard-hit hedge fund world, is, like thousands of U.S. towns, facing a big budget shortfall in 2009. Greenwich's deficit is projected at $31 million in the next 18 months, prompting proposed wage and hiring freezes and property tax hikes.

Lung cancer

Experts identify gene variants linked to lung cancer

Researchers in China & US identified 2 genes which appear to make ethnic Chinese more susceptible to lung cancer. Their finding involves 2 genes,ABCB1 & ABCC1, which were previously thought to be linked to eliminating carcinogens from the lungs and protecting them against inhaled toxins. Their study, analyzed the genes of 500 patients with lung cancer & 517 cancer free participants in China. The analysis found certain (gene) variants were found much more often in individuals with lung cancer than in cancer free controls. Among those 31% were found with a certain mutation of the ABCB1 gene, while 27% were found with a variant of the ABCC1 gene. But those same mutations were found in only 15% and 12 percent of participants in the cancer free group. The variant (of ABCB1) was particularly associated with an increased risk of cancer in women and in individuals under age 60 years. It also was linked to a major type of lung cancer called adenocarcinoma.

Those figures would account for 19 and 5% respectively of all deaths in China during that period, said the researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH).

Respiratory diseases are among the 10 leading causes of deaths in China. About half of Chinese men smoke. In more than 70% of homes, Chinese cook and heat their homes with wood, coal and crop residues.

Fast food

Fast food

According to a research it's found that, youth who study just a short walk from a fast food outlet eat fewer fruit and vegetables, drink more soda, are more likely to be obese than students at other schools. The study involved more than 500,000 schools and high schools in California, lends new fuel to a growing backlash against the fast-food industry as studies suggest they contribute to the rising obesity epidemic in the US.

Basically it discovered that kids who are going to a school that is near a fast food restaurant have a higher chance of being overweight & obese than kids who are at a school that is not near a fast food restaurant. Their study adds to prior research showing that fast food restaurants tend to be clustered near schools.

Students who were exposed to nearby fast food have a higher level of body mass index they weigh more. They are more likely to be overweight and obese.

Consumer groups have pushed for laws such as July's moratorium on new fast food restaurants in certain Los Angeles neighborhoods, while the food industry often maintains that a lack of exercise is more to blame.

For the study, they examined the relationship between fast food restaurants located within one half mile of schools and obesity among middle and high school students in California. They took weight and dietary information from a statewide school survey between 2002 and 2005 and cross referenced the data with a database of top fast food chains located near each school.

They also found that students whose schools were located near-fast food restaurants eat fewer servings of vegetables and fruits, and drink far more soda than students at schools not located near fast-food restaurants.

The study could not determine why fast-food restaurants near schools have such an impact. A nearby fast-food restaurant is really a hangout place for people to socialize.

Second-hand smoke

Second-hand smoke tied to fertility problems

A new study suggests that women who have ever been around smokers regularly may have more difficulty getting pregnant than those who have not. In their studies its found that women who smoke raise their risk of a number of pregnancy complications & their infants' risk of health problems. Less is known about the dangers of second hand smoke, though some studies have linked exposure during pregnancy to an elevated risk of miscarriage. The new study, of 4,800 women, researchers found those who had grown up with a parent who smoked were more likely to report they'd had difficulty becoming pregnant defined as having to try for more than 1 year.

In addition, women who'd been exposed to second-hand smoke in both childhood and adulthood were 39% more likely to have suffered a miscarriage or stillbirth, and 68% more likely to have had problems getting pregnant.

Researcher Luke J. Peppone at the University of Rochester, New York said: "These statistics are breathtaking and certainly (point) to yet another danger of second-hand smoke exposure." He also mentioned, "We all know that cigarettes and second hand smoke are dangerous, breathing the smoke has lasting effects, especially for women when they're ready for children."

For the study of surveying from 4,804 women who'd visited the university's Roswell Park Cancer Institute between 1982 and 1998 for health screening or cancer treatment. All had been pregnant at least once in their lives. Overall, Peppone's team found 11 % of the women had difficulty becoming pregnant, while one third had a miscarriage or stillbirth.

The risk of these problems tended to climb in tandem with the number of hours per day that a woman was exposed to second hand smoke a pattern that suggests a cause effect relationship.

Second hand smoke contains a host of toxic compounds that could potentially harm a woman's reproductive health. Tobacco toxins may damage cells' genetic material, interfere with conception, raise the risk of miscarriage, or inhibit the hormones needed for conception and a successful pregnancy.

Sleep duration

Sleep duration and cardiac death link seen in study

US team found relevant data how sleeping very little may cause bad impact in our heart. Among 58,044 men and women 45 years of age or older without heart disease at study entry, those who slept 5 hours or less or 9 hours or more, were significantly more likely to die from cardiovascular disease over the next several years than people who logged7 hours a night. These findings back the results of other studies that have suggested how long people sleep may be a key predictor of their heart disease risk. Most research on sleep duration and heart disease has been in Western populations, aside from three studies in Japan, the researchers note.


To investigate, the researchers looked at people participating in the Singapore Chinese Health Study. The study participants, who were ethnic Chinese living in Singapore, were enrolled between1993 and 1998, and followed through the end of 2006. During that time, 1,416 people died of heart disease. 35 of the study participants said they got 7 hours of sleep a night. People who slept for 5 or less or 9 or more hours were more likely to have several different heart disease risk factors than those who slept for 7 hours, such as smoking and eating fewer fruits and vegetables and more fat and cholesterol. But even after the researchers adjusted the data to account for these risk factors, they found that people who slept 5 hours or less were 57% more likely to die of heart
disease. Some investigators have suggested that sleeping longer may indicate underlying poor health.

Mineral points

Mineral points to Martian water suitable for life

Scientists said: mineral evidence for a water environment capable of supporting life has been discovered on Mars. Deposits of carbonate, formed in neutral or alkaline water, were spotted by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Carbonate is formed when water and carbon dioxide mix with calcium, iron or magnesium. It dissolves quickly in acid, so its discovery counters the theory that all water on Mars was at one time acidic. Carbonates on Earth like chalk or limestone sometimes preserve organic material, but scientists have found no such evidence on Mars. The 3.6 billion year old carbonate was discovered in bedrock at the edge of a 930 mile wide (1,490-km-wide) crater.

Carbonate previously had been found in minuscule amounts in soil samples provided by the Phoenix Mars Lander, Martian dust and Martian meteorites on Earth. But this is the first time scientists have found a site where carbonate formed. The deposits are about the size of football fields and are visible in images taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The deposits appear to be limited, but the neutral or alkaline water environment may once have been more widespread, said Scott Murchie, a scientist at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

Phyllosilicates, which form under similar conditions to carbonate but do not dissolve in acidic environments, are abundant on Mars.

Shocking study

Shocking study finds most will torture if ordered

Scientists mentioned that some things never change as they had replicated an experiment in which people obediently delivered painful shocks to others if encouraged to do so by authority figures. Seventy percent of volunteers continued to administer electrical shocks or at least they believed they were doing so even after an actor claimed they were painful. The found is validation
of the same argument if you put people into certain situations, they will act in surprising, and maybe often even disturbing ways. In an experiment in which volunteers were asked to deliver electric "shocks" to other people if they answered certain questions incorrectly. The experiment surprised psychologists & no one has tried to replicate it because of the distress suffered by many of the volunteers who believed they were shocking another person. It was a very stressful experience for many of the participants. That is the reason no one can ethically replicate the experiment today. The experiment, by stopping at the 150 volt point for the 29 men and 41 women in his experiment. Scientists measured how many of his volunteers began to deliver another shock when prompted by the experiment's leader but instead of letting them do so, stopped them.

At 1 point, researchers brought in a volunteer who knew what was going on and refused to administer shocks beyond 150 volts. Despite the example, 63% of the participants continued administering shocks past 150 volts. The experiment found no differences among his volunteers, aged 20 to 81, and carefully screened them to be average representatives of the U.S. public. Although one must be cautious when making the leap from laboratory studies to complex social behaviors such as genocide, understanding the social psychological factors that contribute to people acting in unexpected and unsettling ways is important.

Late night festive meals

Late night festive meals won't make you fat

Think twice about blaming sweets for your out-of-control children this festive season, and those added pounds might not be due to an ill-advised late-night meal. As for an aspirin to cure a hangover? Forget it.

That's the advice of 2 researchers seeking to debunk some common medical myths that crop up during the holidays but have little scientific backing.

Rachel Vreeman and Aaron Carroll of the Indiana University School of Medicine wrote in the British Medical Journal: "In the pursuit of scientific truth, even widely held medical beliefs require examination or re-examination."

The pair combed through previous scientific studies and searched the Web for evidence to support or refute common beliefs such as one tagging poinsettia plants as toxic. Many parents think sugar from sweets, chocolates and other sources makes children hyperactive but research shows this is not the case. Rather, the link is most likely in the parents' minds, the researchers said. Regardless of what parents might believe, however, sugar is not to blame for out-of-control little ones- the researchers wrote.

People fret over the holidays about putting on the pounds after so many festive meals. But eating late at night does not pose a problem when it comes to gaining weight, according to the studies the researchers reviewed.

Another myth is a mistaken belief that most body heat escapes through the head, putting undue importance on woolen hats when temperatures drop, they wrote. If this were true, humans would be just as cold if they went without trousers as if they went without a hat.

And for revelers confident they have the trick to prevent or cure a hangover, the researchers say moderation is the only way to escape that pounding headache. From aspirin to bananas to Vegemite and water, Internet searches present seemingly endless options for preventing or treating alcohol hangovers. No scientific evidence, however, supports any cure or effective prevention for alcohol hangovers.

Right help

Right help key to quit success for women smokers

According to experts from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Female smokers who want to kick the habit face different challenges than men, but with the right help they can be just as successful. Research suggests women may be more likely than men to relapse after quitting, in an analysis of 3,000 people treated at the Mayo Clinic center found no difference between men and women in the ability to stay smoke free 6 months later. Women report more troublesome symptoms of withdrawal such as depression, irritability, anxiety and lethargy than men do, smoking can be more of a reaction to negative emotions for women than it is for men and women may also have less faith in their ability to quit.

Croghan noted in an interview: "Treatment specialists can actually adjust the behavioral intervention to fit those kinds of issues to help her move along." One of the most important keys to quitting smoking is to get professional help, which is often covered by health insurance.

The fact that nicotine patches and similar smoking cessation aids are now available over the counter may give the impression that people don't need assistance, but these medications were actually designed to be an adjunct to counseling, they pointed out.

"I would encourage people who do want to use over-the-counter pharmaceutical aids to at least get some kind of counseling in there, whether it's a tobacco quit line, a self-help manual, or just going to a physician to talk," Croghan advised.

Along with professional help, there are 3 more key steps to smoking cessation success, Set a quit date or timeframe; choose some type of pharmaceutical smoking cessation aid; and get support from at least one friend or family member or even an online connection.

People should try not to get discouraged if they try to quit and fail, he adds in the newsletter; smokers typically make four to six attempts before they succeed. People need to realize that if they have a relapse, they can learn from it.

Phoenix

Phoenix probe sheds new light on Mars weather

NASA is still not sure whether its Phoenix lander has found a place where life could have existed on Mars. But scientists working with the US space agency, computer models they have been using to predict what the weather would be like on the Red Planet are wrong, and more accurate models would give a better picture of its past.

Speaking at the opening day of the American Geophysical Union conference in San Francisco,
Phoenix mission scientists laid out the early harvest from five months of robotic operations on the northern polar region of Mars.

Analyzing ice and soil samples for organic material, a process that is still under way, the Phoenix science team collected daily weather reports, information considered critical to learning if the planet could have supported water long enough for life to evolve.

Phoenix saw dusty summer days slip into cloudy fall, replete with ground fog, snow and frost. Global climate models that are running on Mars would not predict this but the polar region is going to force us to make changes.

More accurate computer models would give scientists a clearer picture of what happened in Mars' past, particularly when the planet's axial tilt, or obliquity, was greater than it is now. Without a large moon for stabilization, Mars' polar regions periodically shift off axis by more than 35 degrees. During those times, the sun would rise higher in the sky above the Martian poles, making for warmer summers.

Scientists are trying to determine if there was ever a period of time when it would have been warm enough for water, considered a key ingredient for life as we know it. If the scientists can update these global circulation models and we can understand better about the polar weather, then they can look back in time to see if liquid water was ever a dominant influence on this soil in this location.

Scientists had problems delivering soil samples into Phoenix's tiny ovens for analysis because the soil turned out to be rather clumpy, not dry and dusty like the soil at sites where other probes have landed. Though frustrating, the discovery also spurred new questions about how water is moving through the ice, soil and atmosphere.

Six new gene mutations linked to obesity

Study finds six new gene mutations linked to obesity

Researchers founded 6 new gene mutations linked to obesity and they point to ways the brain and nervous system control eating and metabolism.

Dr. Alan Guttmacher, Acting director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, said: "Today's findings are a major step forward in understanding how the human body regulates weight." This study essentially doubles in one fell swoop the number of known and replicated genetic factors contributing to obesity as a public health problem. These findings are a major step forward in understanding how the human body regulates weight.

They found variations in six genesn TMEM18, KCTD15, GNPDA2, SH2B1, MTCH2 and NEGR1 were strongly associated with a height to weight ratio known as body mass index or BMI.

One of the most notable aspects of these discoveries is that most of these new risk factors are near genes that regulate processes in the brain. This suggests that to develop better means of combating obesity, including using these discoveries as the first step in developing new drugs, we need to focus on the regulation of appetite at least as much as on the metabolic factors of how the
body uses and stores energy. Nearly a third of US adults are considered obese with a BMI of 30 or more. Obesity is associated with more than 100,000 deaths each year in the US population and trends are similar in many other countries.

Dr. Eric Green, the genome institute's said: We know that environmental factors, such as diet, play a role in obesity, but this research further provides evidence that genetic variation plays a significant role in an individual's predisposition to obesity.

East west divide

East west divide in media habits

In a new online survey by Nielsen finds that while Western countries tend to be heavy users of such media hardware as DVD players and gaming consoles, next-generation devices like video-enabled handsets are more popular in up-and-coming markets, particularly in Asia. The online population of the Philippines, for instance, emerged first among the 52 countries surveyed with the highest levels of usage across a range of devices, one of five Asia-Pacific countries that filled the top 10. The Philippines also topped a pair of rankings that tracked usage of digital media and video games. The findings emerged from the entertainment portion of the biannual Nielsen Global Online Consumer Survey, which reached 26,000 online users in September. Rankings were computed by measuring a range of scores in response to thematically similar survey questions.

Klaas Hommez, who oversaw the survey's entertainment portion as vp of Nielsen Entertainment, said that many Asian consumers largely skipped landlines in favor of wireless technology. "The same leapfrogging is taking place with entertainment," he said. "For example, consumers are circumventing the need for a relatively expensive gaming console to play subscription-based video games online."

Hommez identified other factors responsible for media usage in many Asian countries, such as the broad uptake of mobile because of widespread use of public transportation and government policies maximizing broadband access in China and Singapore. In contrast, Western countries tended to score better on such less-mobile offerings as console video games and DVD players. But when it came to streaming and downloading content, Eastern nations like China proved no match. Although the Philippines was joined in the top 10 by China, Vietnam, Malaysia and Thailand, the quartet of booming economies known as the BRIC countries, Brazil, Russia, India and China fared even better on a regional basis. Brazil finished second to the Philippines in the overall media usage ranking and first in the music category.

The Philippines is a media market known for remarkably high mobile usage, largely because landline penetration is quite small. Research has noted high levels of text messaging and social networking; the site Friendster gets about one fifth of its global traffic from that country alone. While its broadband infrastructure pales in comparison to other Asian countries, the Philippines compensates somewhat with a robust market for cafes that provide Internet access. Rounding out the top finishers in overall media consumption behind the Philippines and Brazil were the United Arab Emirates, Pakistan and Russia.

The Nielsen study also yielded a sense of which media devices are used most worldwide. The desktop or laptop computer managed to edge out the television set, with 77% of respondents indicating they had used a PC during the past month versus 75% for TV. The CD player finished with 50%, followed by DVD player (48%). The emergence of wireless devices also registered, but ones with media capabilities were behind those without. Mobile phones without video or Web capabilities were used by 40%, while video-enabled phones finished with 30%. The elevated usage scores of emerging nations can be explained in several ways. Emerging economies that tend to have low Internet penetration are more likely in an online survey to skew toward heavy media users.

Coral may predict future

Coral may predict future Indian Ocean quake

Researchers said: In an study (Indonesian reefs) its found that corals record cyclical environmental events & could predict a massive earthquake in the eastern Indian Ocean within the next 20 years.The scientists said: the study of corals off Indonesia's Sumatra island showed they have annual growth rings, like those in tree trunks, which record cyclical events such as earthquakes.

Kerry Sieh, professor at the California Institute of Technology's Tectonics Observatory, told: "If previous cycles are a reliable guide we can expect one or more very large west Sumatran earthquakes within the next two decades."

• Scientists said the earthquake could be similarto the magnitude 9.15 earthquake which sparked the devastating 2004 tsunami and left 230,000 people either dead or missing across Asia. More than170,000 of those victims were in Aceh on the northwestern tip of Sumatra.

  Sieh said while Thailand and Sri Lanka were unlikely to be affected, people in Sumatra should be prepared. He also mentioned: "The tsunami could be at five meters in Padang (in Sumatra). This is a worse case scenario."
  

• "When earthquakes push the seafloor upward, lowering local sea level, the corals can't grow upward and grow outwardinstead," the researchers wrote in Science.
  
  
• Earlier this month, Sieh and his colleagues reported in the journal Nature that an area off Sumatra that has been the source of disastrous earthquakes, still carried a lot of pent-up pressure that could result in another strong quake.

Angelina Jolie

Angelina Jolie tops actress salary list

The Hollywood Reporter's report that Angelina Jolie (oscar winner) become the highest earning actress on Friday with gun-wielding action and in serious roles. Angelina Jolie, 33, earned $15 million for the action movie "Wanted" this year and she could make $20 million to star in a possible sequel.


Jolie played dramatic roles in 2007's "A Mighty Heart" and in this year's "Changeling." The mother of six and partner of actor Brad Pitt last month talked about eventually fading away from acting to spend more time with her family. Oscar winner Julia Roberts, 41, claimed the No. 2 spot after a long absence from the screen, making more than $15 million for "Duplicity," which comes out next year.

Actors are also earning less, with the exception of Will Smith, star of blockbusters "Hancock" and "I Am Legend," who is riding high with up to $25 million per movie. Reese Witherspoon, 32, who topped the female list last year after winning an Oscar for her role in the 2005 movie "Walk the Line," dropped to No. 3. She earned $14 million for appearing in the comedy hit "Four Christmases" that opened last week. Cameron Diaz, Katherine Heigl, Kate Hudson, Anne Hathaway and Jennifer Aniston rounded out the list, with 39 year old "Friends" star Aniston earning more than $8 million for the comedy "Marley & Me" opening on Christmas Day. Big stars such as Halle Berry and Nicole Kidman both are no longer able to earn $10 million a movie.

Big Bang collider

Big Bang collider repairs to cost up to $29 million


European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) said: repairing the giant particle collider built to simulate the Big Bang" could cost up to 35 million Swiss francs ($29 million).

The collider, the largest & most complex machine ever made, has already cost 10 billion Swiss francs to build, supported by CERN's 20 European member states and other nations including the US & Russia. The collider was designed to recreate conditions just after the Big Bang, believed by most cosmologists to have created the universe 13.7 billion years ago.It sends beams of sub-atomic particles to smash into each other at nearly the speed of light. Physicists plan to look at the results of those explosions for new or previously unseen particles that could unlock more secrets of science. Scientists started it up with great fanfare in September, firing beams of proton particles around its 27-km (17-mile) underground tunnel. But nine days later they were forced to shut it down when an electrical fault caused a helium leak. Repairing it will require 53 of the 57 magnets in the collider's tunnel, buried under the Swiss-French border near Geneva, to be removed and then re-installed.

Some 28 have already come out, and all the magnets should be back in place by the end of March, Gillies said. CERN now expects the machine to be powered up again for tests by June, after which particle beams can be sent around again.

Happiness

Happiness

Researchers reported that the more happy people you know, the more likely you are yourself to be happy. And getting connected to happy people improves a person's own happiness.

They have been analyzing a trove of facts from tracking sheets dating back to 1971, following births, marriages, death, and divorces. Volunteers also listed contact information for their closest friends, co-workers, and neighbors. They assessed happiness using a simple, four-question test. The 70% of people who scored highly on all four questions were rated as happy, while the rest were designated unhappy.

Nicholas Christakis, a professor of medical sociology at Harvard Medical School in Boston, said: "What we are dealing with is an emotional stampede."

Fowler said:"People are asked how often during the past week, one, I enjoyed life, two, I was happy, three, I felt hopeful about the future, and four, I felt that I was just as good as other people."

People with the most social connections likewise, friends, spouses, neighbors, relatives, social networking like, marriage, parties, birthdays, celebration etc were also the happiest moment for each life, the data showed each additional happy person makes you happier. Your happiness depends on what is going on in the patch around you.

"Imagine that I am connected to you and you are connected to others and others are connected to still others. It is this fabric
of humanity, like an American patch quilt."

"It is not just happy people connecting with happy people, which they do. Above and beyond, there is this contagious process going on." And happiness is more contagious than unhappiness, they discovered. "If a social contact is happy, it increases the likelihood that you are happy by 15%,"

Fowler said. A friend of a friend, or the friend of a spouse or a sibling, if they are happy, increases your chances by 10 percent, he added. But every extra unhappy friend increases the likelihood that you'll be unhappy by 7%.

A happy third degree friend the friend or a friend of a friend increases a person's chances of being happy by 6%. Happiness has been shown to have an important effect on reduced mortality, pain reduction & improved cardiac function. So better understanding of how happiness spreads can help us learn how to promote a healthier society. The study also fits in with other data that suggested in 1984 that having $5,000 extra increased a person's chances of becoming happier by about 2%. Human who happy with other happiness are valueless and those people have a strong communication and remain exist in hearts after their death.

Breast cancers

Some breast cancers may naturally regress

Researchers tracked breast cancer rates in Norwegian women proposed the controversial notion that some tumors found with mammograms might otherwise naturally disappear on their own if left undetected.

But leading cancer experts expressed doubt about the findings and urged women to continue to get regular mammograms, saying this screening technique unquestionably saves lives by finding breast cancer early on when it is most treatable.

Dr. Per-Henrik Zahl of the Norwegian Institute of Public Health in Oslo and Norwegian and U.S. colleagues examined invasive breast cancer rates among nearly 120,000 women age 50 to 64 who had a mammogram an X-ray of the breast used to find evidence of cancer every two years over a six-year period. They compared the number of breast cancers detected with another group of about 110,000 Norwegian women of the same age and similar backgrounds who were screened just once at the end of the six-year period.

The researchers said they expected to find no differences in breast cancer rates but instead found 22% more invasive breast tumors in the group who had mammograms every 2 years. This raises the possibility that some cancers somehow disappear naturally, although there is no biological reason to explain how this might be, according to Zahl, whose findings were published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Mammography and breast self-examination for tumors are standard methods used for early detection of breast cancer, the leading cause of cancer deaths among women worldwide. The American Cancer Society estimated that about 465,000 women die of breast cancer globally each year, and 1.3 million new cases are diagnosed.

Dr. Eric Winer, director of the Breast Oncology Center at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston said: "I think generally when we look at studies like this it is important to keep in mind there are some studies that change practice and others that make us think a little bit more.

"The idea that somehow these cancers go away entirely is, I would say, an intriguing hypothesis, but one we don't have a lot of evidence to support," said Winer, who was speaking on behalf of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

In much of Europe women undergo mammograms every two years after age 50 except for in Britain where it is every three years, Zahl said. The American Cancer Society recommends that women get an annual mammogram beginning at age 40.

The researchers acknowledged many doctors might be skeptical of the idea but they cited 32 reported cases of a breast cancer regressing, a small number for such a common disease. The researchers said their findings provide new insight on what is "arguably the major harm associated with mammographic screening, namely, the detection and treatment of cancers that would otherwise regress."

Abortion

Abortion not seen linked with depression

US researchers said: In a study its found an abortion causes psychological distress or a post-abortion syndrome and efforts to show it does occur appear to be politically motivated. The study was made on 150,000 women and found the high-quality studies showed no significant differences in long-term mental health between women who choose to abort a pregnancy and others. Dr. Robert Blum, who led the study published in the journal Contraception, said in a statement: the best research does not support the existence of a 'post-abortion syndrome' similar to post-traumatic stress disorder."

An estimated 1.29 million American women get elective abortions each year, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. An estimated 25 million women globally have legal abortions every year. Abortion is a hot-button political issue, with many voters and members of the US Congress as well as state lawmakers seeking to ban it. They analyzed those that included valid mental health measures and factored in pre-existing mental health status and potentially confusing factors.

The best quality studies indicate no significant differences in long-term mental health between women in the United States who choose to terminate a pregnancy. The most flawed methodology consistently found negative mental health consequences of abortion," they added. "Scientists are
still conducting research to answer politically motivated questions."

Rocky debris on Mars

Huge glaciers detected under rocky debris on Mars

Scientists said: a radar instrument aboard a NASA spacecraft has detected large glaciers hidden under rocky debris that may be the vestiges of ice sheets that blanketed parts of Mars in a past ice
age.

University of Texas planetary geologist John Holt said: the glaciers, the biggest known deposits of water on Mars outside of its poles, could prove useful for future manned missions to the red planet as drinking water or rocket fuel.The glaciers, perhaps 200 million years old, also may entomb genetic fragments of past microbial life on Mars as well as air bubbles that might reveal the composition of the atmosphere as it was long ago,according to geologist James Head of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.

Scientists previously determined that large deposits of ice exist at the Martian north and south polar regions, but hundreds of these buried glaciers are located at mid-latitudes on the planet. The ones described by the researchers in the journal Science were in the Hellas Basin region of the Martian southern hemisphere, but many more are in the northern hemisphere.

Holt said the glaciers may be the vestiges of large ice sheets that once covered parts of Mars in a past ice age. Earth's most recent ice age ended about 12,000 years ago. "It's dramatic evidence of major climate change on Mars, presumably linked to orbital variations. That's what causes the major glaciations on Earth," Holt said.

The existence of these features rounded surfaces sloping gently away from steeper ridges has been known for decades but their nature was a matter of dispute. Some scientists had argued they were ice-filled rock piles and not glaciers. But the radar echoes received by the spacecraft indicated that a thin coating of rocky material at the surface covered thick ice and not rock.

Scientists want to understand the history of water on Mars because water is fundamental to the question of whether the planet has ever harbored microbial or some other life. Liquid water is a necessity for life as we know it. While Mars is now arid and dusty, there is evidence it once was much wetter. For example, scientists think that long, undulating features seen on the northern plains of Mars may be remnants of shorelines of an ocean that covered a third of the planet's
surface at least 2 billion years ago.

The Phoenix Mars Lander, which touched down at the north pole of Mars in May, found definitive proof of water before ending its mission earlier this month.

Epilepsy

Scientists shed light on causes of epilepsy

Italian researchers said: any kind of collapse in a reaction between immune cells and blood vessels in the brain appears to play a key role in epilepsy. This means that modern antibody based drugs designed to modify the immune system used in other diseases may one day help fight the debilitating disorder. Epilepsy is considered incurable but medicines can control seizures in most people with the common neurological disorder, although sometimes they can have severe side effects.

Gabriela Constantin of the University of Verona in Italy and colleagues reported: a study of mice showed how immune cells sticking to blood vessels in the brain caused inflammation that contributed to epileptic seizures. The finding could lead to new treatments to prevent the condition that affects about 1% of the general population worldwide.

The researchers found that during a seizure the brain released a chemical that caused the white blood cells, or leukocytes, to stick to blood vessels. But when these immune cells stuck to the brain blood vessels they caused damage by releasing molecules that caused inflammation and contributed to seizures in mice, Constantin said. She also said: Mice that received monoclonal antibodies to block the immune cells from sticking to blood vessels had a dramatic reduction of seizures, in some cases 100%.

The treatment worked in a similar way to Elan Corp Plc's multiple sclerosis drug Tysabri and Genentech Inc's Raptiva for psoriasis, she added. This means these kinds of drugs might also one day be used to treat epilepsy and the findings could also lead to new anti-inflammatory treatments for epilepsy, she said.

C-section babies

Researchers link C-section babies to asthma risk

Swiss researchers said: babies born by Caesarean section are more likely to develop asthma than children delivered naturally. There has been conflicting evidence on the link between asthma & C-sections but the researchers said the number of children involved in their study and a long
monitoring period strengthened their results.

Asthma, which affects more than 300 million people worldwide, is the most common pediatric chronic illness. Symptoms include wheezing, shortness of breath, coughing and chest tightness. Babies born by C-section are not exposed to their mother's bacteria when they pass through the birth canal, something that helps prime the immune system and could explain the increased risk.


The Swiss findings are based on nearly 3,000 children whose respiratory health was monitored until age eight. By this time, about 12%, or 362 children, had been diagnosed with asthma for which a doctor had prescribed inhaled steroids. About 9 percent of the children were born by C-section but these babies were nearly 80% more likely to develop asthma compared to those born vaginally.

The association was even stronger for the 9% of the children with two allergic parents who were already more predisposed to the respiratory condition, they wrote. The findings follow a Norwegian study in July suggesting babies born by C-section have a moderately increased asthma risk. Other studies have found no link between C-sections and a child's long-term health, including asthma.

Obesity fuels

Obesity fuels fears of faster diabetes rise

Obesity are controlled, health experts said: The prevalence of diabetes worldwide will far outstrip even the sharp increase currently projected unless rising trends.

Diabetes has been linked to risk factors like aging, an immobile lifestyle, unhealthy diets, smoking, alcohol & obesity. The silent, chronic disease damages the heart, blood vessels, eyes, kidneys and nerves and was responsible for 3.8 million deaths worldwide in 2007.

International Diabetes Foundation (IDF) estimates a current prevalence of 246 million diabetes cases worldwide and projects it would reach 380 million in near 2025.

"The projections are conservative because they take into account only aging and urbanization but not obesity, which if unarrested, will lead to more cases," Gojka Roglic of the World Health Organization's diabetes program told a regional diabetes conference in Chennai, southern India.

Roglic said not a single country in the world had shown any signs of a plateau for obesity.

"If you don't have a park to walk in, if the traffic is too dangerous, then people won't be encouraged to walk or ride bicycles or if there is crime and someone will kill you for your bike, then you won't be encouraged to cycle."

Anthony Harries, senior adviser with the London based International Union Against Tuberculosis (TB) and Lung Diseases, warned of the increased risks of developing active tuberculosis that come with diabetes.

"It was recognized even in ancient Roman times that people with urine that was sweet had increased risk of tuberculosis," he told the conference, adding that a diabetic was three times more likely to develop active TB than a non-diabetic.

India carries the highest diabetes burden in the world, with 41 million cases in 2007, projected to hit 70 million by 2025. The problem is worsening in rural India, which now has a prevalence of 9.2 percent among people aged 20 years and older, up from 2.2 percent in 1983. The rate in urban areas is 18.6 percent, compared with 11.2 percent in 1998.

Apart from a more sedentary lifestyle, experts say the propensity for diabetes among Indians may also be due to a switch, linked to rising affluence, to eating polished rice which has much more sugar than crude, unpolished rice.

Charlotte Rampling

Few Minute With: Charlotte Rampling

Charlotte Rampling's is an British actress known asto film lovers for her Nazi-themed, sado-masochist performance in 1974's "The Night Porter," has been enjoying a career Renaissance in recent years with a string of European arthouse films. She has a wide reputation as a screen siren in European cinema.

Now in Sweden when she was getting a lifetime achievement award at the Stockholm film festival caught by a reporter and she share few moments, Now i would post some of her conversion.


Q: In your latest movie, "The Duchess," you play what is maybe not a classic Rampling part. What attracted you to the film?

A: Saul Dibb (the director), who came to see me twice in Paris, and I talked about it over six
months and in the end I said yes because I was free at that time. I didn't have any other films and I thought that sometimes it is good to also be part of a mainstream, sort of very beautiful classical film. And with a film like this... it is maybe nice to put myself a little more into the eyes of the public.

Q: What do you normally seek in a part?

A: I decided very early on that the mainstream world wasn't the way I wanted to go on in the world of cinema. I sought out directors who were making films in different ways and with subjects that weren't necessarily commercial.

Q: Why is that?

A: Because that was how I wanted to express myself, through that medium in that way. I wanted to be in a sort of permanent Ingmar Bergman film. I wanted to vibrate and show feeling and not just to be in entertainment movies. So obviously that limited a lot, so I didn't work nearly as much as a lot of actors -- but I turned a lot of work down because that was not where I wanted to be.

Q: Are you a big Ingmar Bergman fan?


A: Yes, very big. I was amazed when I discovered in my 20s that film could be like that, and that is why I went to Italy because films were like that too. Italian directors were doing films, not quite Bergman, but exploring different ways of making cinema.

Q: Any particular Bergman movie you like?


A: There are lot of very different types of work. Like 'Persona' and 'Cries and Whispers' that are
really, really intense. But there are a lot of comic films too. Like Strindberg -- I did a (August) Strindberg play, Dance of Death, in Paris a few years ago. Strindberg is funny too -- it's terrifying but funny too. Swedes are very wild - wild and dark. You all seem very nice and all but underneath there is wildness.

Q: In your latest project you play the mother of Jesus on a Brueghel painting


A: The Polish film I've just made is with Lech Majewski, a conceptual artist, filmmaker, musician.
It's depicting the painting, and brings to life everything that happens in that day when Jesus is crucified. Brueghel paints it like it is just another day where people are just doing their thing and in the background is Christ.

Q: What can you tell us about your upcoming project with director Todd Solondz?

A: I can't really talk about it. He asked us not to. But I mean, it is his world (laughs), it carries on, with rather bizarre creatures.

Melamine in baby

Melamine in baby

US Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman said: they have found trace amounts of the chemical melamine in one sample of infant formula.

The formula actually found in this year in China where thousands of children fell ill & lots of died.The chemical, normally used to make plastics, has been found in milk power, wheat gluten and other Chinese-made ingredients used in products ranging from pet food to candy. Melamine's ability to make foods appear to have higher amounts of protein during testing has made it a cheap but dangerous substitute that can damage the kidneys.

Leon declined to name the manufacturer of the sample found to contain melamine. U.S.-approved makers include Abbott Nutrition, Bristol-Myers Squibb unit Mead Johnson Nutritionals and Nestle USA.

Industry trade group the International Formula Council sought to reassure consumers.

Mead Johnson Nutritionals, the maker of Enfamil baby formula, said that by testing samples of its products and raw materials using published FDA methodology, it had not detected any level of melamine.
Mead Johnson spokesman Pete Paradossi said: "We maintain stringent standards at all our manufacturing sites to ensure the high quality and safety of our products."

Leon said the FDA has deployed more sensitive tests in recent weeks as it has expended tests for melamine in all food products, including infant formula.

FDA scientists conducted two tests of the formula sample, one finding a melamine level of 137 parts per billion (ppb) and another measuring 140 ppb. A level of 250 ppb or less is considered a trace amount, Leon said.
But some consumer advocates said it was premature to say there was no risk for infants.

The FDA's earlier determination that 250 ppb of melamine was a trace amount was intended for foods other than infant formula, said Sonya Lunder, a senior analyst with the Environmental Working Group.

Lunder said: "We need to have a zero-tolerance policy for contaminants in infant formula, Babies eat only formula for months and months on end."
Leon said the FDA was in the process of determining what amounts of melamine pose a risk to infants and would release a public advisory later. In the meantime, parents should not change their babies' feeding habits, she said.

"We found one positive test on one sample at a level so low that it has absolutely no impact on the health of babies whatsoever," Leon said. "So there's no reason for any parent to be concerned for any reason."
The FDA was not yet ready to release results of tests of other food products, including dietary supplements, Leon said.

Buddha boy

Buddha boy in Nepal vanishes

Its found that in Nepali, off late a boy was discovered that who is mystery now vanishes again after blessing many supporters.

Ram Bahadur Bamjon locals him Buddha boy was 17 years old used to devotees himself in meditation nearly 10 days in the forest of Ratanpuri, Kathmandu before disappearing on Friday.

He come to the manes attention in 2005 many people watch him that he sit alone and doing meditation for 10 months that Buddha used to do. The Buddha is often shown in sketches sitting under a tree in a similar posture.

Ten days ago Bamjon reappeared after almost a year when he had disappeared in order to meditate in the jungle. This is the third time Bamjon has disappeared since his first appearance three years ago.

Thousands of people, some out of sheer curiosity, including many from neighbouring India walked to the site in the middle of dense forests to see him this time.

"He gave a 25 minute religious discourse to more than 5,000 people on Friday then went into an underground site for meditation," Budhathoki said.

He said the boy had wrapped a white cloth around his body and sometimes sat for more than 12 hours at one stretch during the discourse.

Buddha, the founder of Buddhism, was born a prince in Lumbini, a sleepy town in Nepal's rice-growing plains about 350 km southwest of Kathmandu more than 2,600 years ago. He is believed to have attained enlightenment at Bodh Gaya in the eastern Indian state of Bihar, which borders Nepal.

Breast cancers

Breast cancers may naturally regress

Researchers who tracked breast cancer rates in women proposed the controversial notion that some tumors found with mammograms might otherwise naturally disappear on their own if left undetected.

But experts expressed doubt about the findings and urged women to continue to get regular mammograms, saying this screening technique unquestionably saves lives by finding breast cancer early on when it is most treatable. They compared the number of breast cancers detected with another group of about 110,000 Norwegian women of the same age and similar backgrounds who were screened just once at the end of the six-year period. This raises the possibility that some cancers somehow disappear naturally, although there is no biological reason to explain how this might be, according to Zahl, whose findings were published in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Mammography and breast self-examination for tumors are standard methods used for early detection of breast cancer, the leading cause of cancer deaths among women worldwide. The American Cancer Society estimated that about 465,000 women die of breast cancer globally each year, and 1.3 million new cases are diagnosed.

The researchers acknowledged many doctors might be skeptical of the idea but they cited 32 reported cases of a breast cancer regressing, a small number for such a common disease.

Autumn babies

Autumn babies at greater risk of asthma


US researchers said: babies born four months before the peak cold and flu season have a 30% higher risk of developing asthma.

Dr. Tina Hartert, director of the center for Asthma Research at Vanderbilt University said: "All infants are exposed to this and it is potentially preventable." She said it has been known for some time that infants in the Northern Hemisphere born in the fall are at higher risk of developing asthma, but the study is the first to tie this trend to peak viral activity in the winter months. Hartert and colleagues studied the medical records of 95,000 infants and their mothers in the state of Tennessee. They found that all babies in the study were at increased risk if they had bronchiolitis, a lung infection usually caused by respiratory syncytial virus or RSV. But autumn babies were at the highest risk.

While genetic risk factors predispose a child to develop asthma, Hartert thinks environmental exposure such as winter viral infection, and particularly RSV infection, may activate those genes.Nearly every child is infected with RSV early in life, with infections occurring most often between the ages of 3 and 6 months. The virus usually clears up without serious complications.

The easiest way to do that would be a vaccine, but so far, none exists. Vaccine makers GenVec Inc, AstraZeneca's MedImmune unit and others are working on RSV vaccines.

Stem cells

Stem cells restore hearing, vision in animals

Researchers said: stem cells from tiny embryos can be used to restore lost hearing and they believe it is a 1st step toward helping people. Their findings help describe some of the most basic biological processes underlying the development of hearing and sight, and may help in the development of the new field of regenerative medicine.

Dr. Sujeong Jang of Chonnam National University in Gwang-ju, South Korea, and colleagues used mesenchymal stem cells from human bone marrow to restore hearing in guinea pigs whose hearing had been destroyed using chemicals. They grew the stem cells into neuron-like cells in lab dishes and then transplanted them into the inner ears of the guinea pigs. Three months later, the animals appeared to have some hearing, Jang told a meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.

They would eventually like to try something similar in humans, Jang told a news conference. Jang said: "When sensitive hair cells in the inner ear of humans and other mammals are killed by loud noise, autoimmune attack, toxic drugs, or aging the damage is permanent." "Birds and reptiles are luckier. Their damaged hair cells apparently regenerate and can restore normal hearing."

Usually, frog stem cells just form skin when grown in a dish. Zuber's team added seven different genetic "factors" that turned on eye formation genes. When they transplanted the transformed cells into frog embryos, the resulting tadpoles could see out of those eyes. They tested the tadpoles by putting white tissue paper over their tank, Zuber said in an interview. Normal tadpoles will stay in the lighter side of the tank, covered by the white paper. Genetic tests showed that the stem cells had transformed, a process called differentiation, into many different cell types.

Woman gets first trachea transplant without drugs

Woman gets first trachea transplant without drugs

An international research team reported: Colombian woman has received the world's first tailor-made trachea transplant, grown by seeding a donor organ with her own stem cells to prevent her body rejecting it. The success of the operation, performed in June using tissue generated from the woman's own bone marrow, raises the prospect that transplanting other organs may be possible without drugs to dampen the immune system.

Doctors work hard to match tissue type when transplanting organs so that the body does not completely reject the new organ, but patients usually have to take immunosuppressant for the rest of their lives. Claudia Castillo sought help after a case of tuberculosis destroyed part of her trachea -- the windpipe connected to the lungs & left her with breathing difficulties, prone to
infections and unable to care for her 2 children.

The researchers said: the 30 year old's only option other than the experimental surgery was for doctors to remove part of her lung -- a choice that would have seriously degraded her quality of life. After finding a donor, the researchers first depleted the transplanted trachea of the donor's cells and then obtained bone marrow stem cells from Castillo they grew into cartilage cells. Next, the team seeded these cells on the outside of the donor trachea using a device developed at Milan Polytechnic in Italy that incubated the cells. The researchers used the same device to make epithelial cells to construct the lining of the trachea. Finally, the team grafted a 5 cm (1.97 inch) piece of the trachea onto Castillo's damaged left main bronchus, which connects the main
windpipe to the left lung.

The researchers said: Castillo, who lives in Spain, had no complications from the surgery and left the hospital after 10 days. She is returning to normal activities and even called her doctors from a night club to say she had been out dancing all night.

Kangaroo genes close to humans

Kangaroo genes close to humans

Australian researchers said: kangaroos from Australia are genetically similar to humans. Scientists said they had for the 1st time mapped the genetic code& found much of it was similar to the genome for humans.

Centre Director Jenny Graves told in a report that: "There are a few differences, we have a few more of this, a few less of that, but they are the same genes and a lot of them are in the same order." "We thought they'd be completely scrambled, but they're not. There is great chunks of the
human genome which is sitting right there in the kangaroo genome," Graves said, according to AAP.

Humans and kangaroos last shared an ancestor at least 150 million years ago, the researchers found, while mice and humans diverged from one another only 70 million years ago.

"Kangaroos are hugely informative about what we were like 150 million years ago," Graves said.

Cigarette smoking may

Cigarette smoking may worsen premenstrual woes

Dr. Elizabeth R. Bertone-Johnson of the University of Massachusetts in Amherst and her colleagues found: Women who smoke twice in a day in the age of (25 to 45 years) are likely to increase premenstrual syndrome over the next 2 to 4 years, especially hormonally related symptoms like backaches, bloating, breast tenderness, and acne.

Bertone-Johnson said: "Our findings lend further support to the idea that smoking increases the risk of moderate to severe PMS and provides another reason for women, especially adolescents and young women, not to smoke."

Up to 20% of women have PMS severe that effect their relationships as well as interfere with their normal activities. Smoking affect at all levels of several different hormones.

To investigate the relationship further, they analyzed data from the Nurses' Health Study II, which has been following 116,678 US registered nurses since 1989. The researchers looked at a subset of women who were PMS-free during the first two years of the study, comparing 1,057 who did go on to develop PMS to 1,968 who did not. The researchers found: the women who were current smokers were 2.1 times as likely as non-smokers to report PMS within the next 2 to 4 years. The risk increased with the amount they smoked, and women who had picked up the habit in adolescence or young adulthood were at even greater risk; those who had begun smoking before their 15th birthday, for example, were 2.53 times as likely to develop PMS.

A 2005 study found that 26% of female 12th-graders had smoked on at least one of the previous 30 days, Bertone-Johnson and her team note in their report. "Given the high prevalence of this behavior in young women," they say, "these findings may provide additional incentive for young women to avoid cigarette smoking."

Cigarette smoking may

Cigarette smoking may worsen premenstrual woes

Dr. Elizabeth R. Bertone-Johnson of the University of Massachusetts in Amherst and her colleagues found: Women who smoke twice in a day in the age of (25 to 45 years) are likely to increase premenstrual syndrome over the next 2 to 4 years, especially hormonally related symptoms like backaches, bloating, breast tenderness, and acne.

Bertone-Johnson said: "Our findings lend further support to the idea that smoking increases the risk of moderate to severe PMS and provides another reason for women, especially adolescents and young women, not to smoke."

Up to 20% of women have PMS severe that effect their relationships as well as interfere with their normal activities. Smoking affect at all levels of several different hormones.

To investigate the relationship further, they analyzed data from the Nurses' Health Study II, which has been following 116,678 US registered nurses since 1989. The researchers looked at a subset of women who were PMS-free during the first two years of the study, comparing 1,057 who did go on to develop PMS to 1,968 who did not. The researchers found: the women who were current smokers were 2.1 times as likely as non-smokers to report PMS within the next 2 to 4 years. The risk increased with the amount they smoked, and women who had picked up the habit in adolescence or young adulthood were at even greater risk; those who had begun smoking before their 15th birthday, for example, were 2.53 times as likely to develop PMS.

A 2005 study found that 26% of female 12th-graders had smoked on at least one of the previous 30 days, Bertone-Johnson and her team note in their report. "Given the high prevalence of this behavior in young women," they say, "these findings may provide additional incentive for young women to avoid cigarette smoking."