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Mental activity leads to mental agility

Scientists have long known that brains need neural activity to mature and that sensory input is most important during a specific window of time called the "critical period" when the brain is primed for aggressive learning.

10 May 2006

Neurons can produce Alzheimer's-linked apolipoprotein E

A question long debated among Alzheimer's disease researchers has been definitively answered by scientists at the Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease in San Francisco.

10 May 2006

Psychological well-being improves after adolescence

Although young adults are faced with a diversity of life choices, they seem to be coming to terms with themselves and their lives in their 20s, says new University of Alberta research that shows psychological well-being improves after adolescence and girls improve faster than boys.

10 May 2006

Unique protein expression could serve as a screening test for head and neck cancers

The blood of patients with head and neck cancer appears to have unique patterns of protein expression that one day could serve as a screening test for the highly aggressive cancer that is often diagnosed too late, researchers say.

10 May 2006

Hurricane linked to long term effects on mental health

Florida State University sociologists in Tallahassee, Fla. have found that some South Floridians who survived 1992's Hurricane Andrew suffered mental health problems many years later, a finding that has led the researchers to predict even more dire consequences for those who lived through last year's devastating Hurricane Katrina.

10 May 2006

Local clinical quality monitoring for detection of excess operative deaths

If convicted murderer Dr Harold Shipman had been working as a surgeon or anaesthetist at a specialist UK heart hospital in Cambridge, increased patient death rates would have alerted clinical audit staff after eight to ten months, according to research in the latest issue of Anaesthesia.

10 May 2006

"Internet addiction"

The Internet - millions of people rely on it for everyday tasks. But when is the line crossed between average use and addiction?

10 May 2006

Promising chemo, therapeutic viruses, cutting-edge surgery debut at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center

Brain tumor specialists at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center are poised on the brink of a new era.

10 May 2006

Grapefruit substance that interferes with drugs identified

New research from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has identified and established the substance in grapefruit juice that causes potentially dangerous interactions with certain medications.

10 May 2006

New treatment for chronic eosinophilic leukemia

Leukemia - or cancer of the bone marrow - strikes some 700 Belgians each year. Chronic Eosinophilic Leukemia (CEL), a specific form of leukemia, is currently treated with Glivec.

10 May 2006

Help for elderly people to spark new research ideas

New technologies and services can help elderly and disabled people live longer at home. The Ambient Assisted Living programme will focus on this vision but can only begin after agreement on how to combine national and European initiatives. Political accord is the key, notes a project preparing the groundwork.

10 May 2006

New treatment for food poisoning

A team of researchers working at the University of Bristol has found a potential new treatment for listeriosis, a deadly form of food poisoning. Their work is reported in Nature Medicine.

10 May 2006

Air purifiers increase ozone levels exceeding health standards

In a small, poorly ventilated room, an indoor air purifier that produces even a few milligrams of ozone per hour can create an ozone level that exceeds public health standards, researchers at UC Irvine have found.

10 May 2006

An evolutionary life-history framework for understanding sex differences in human mortality rates

Despite research efforts to find modern factors that would explain the different life expectancies of men and women, the gap is actually ancient and universal, according to University of Michigan researchers.

10 May 2006

Gene "CGI-58" linked to rare disease activates fat breakdown

A gene earlier linked to a rare disease plays a critical role in the body's "finely tuned balance" of fat storage and break down, new evidence reported in the May Cell Metabolism reveals.

10 May 2006

"Junk" RNA regulates important cellular processes

It has been known for a long time that much of a cell’s RNA stems from DNA regions called intergenic spacers (IGS) that lie between two genes and do not code for proteins.

9 May 2006

Aggressive cancer treated successfully in mice

White blood cells from a strain of cancer-resistant mice cured advanced cancers in ordinary laboratory mice, researchers at Wake Forest University School of Medicine reported.

9 May 2006

New discovery about role of sugar in cell communication

A research team from Uppsala University has uncovered an entirely new mechanism for how communication between cells is regulated.

9 May 2006

New insulin-production method holds promise for diabetics

A University of Houston professor and his student have made a major discovery in the field of diabetes research and diagnosis, finding a new mechanism for the formation of insulin crystals in the pancreas.

9 May 2006

Renewed interest in studying influenza A viruses

The emergence of the avian influenza virus H5N1 that is currently devastating chicken flocks in many countries and threatening to unleash a worldwide epidemic among humans has triggered a renewed interest among scientists in studying influenza A viruses, according to investigators at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.

9 May 2006