Take that Ms. Neo-Con Palin

The findings by a team of scientists led by UEA's Climatic Research Unit will be published online by the Nature Geoscience this week.

Previous studies have observed rises in both Arctic and Antarctic temperatures over recent decades but have not formally attributed the changes to human influence due to poor observation data and large natural variability. Moreover, the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had concluded that Antarctica was the only continent where human-induced temperature changes had yet to be detected.

Now, a newly updated data-set of land surface temperatures and simulations from four new climate models show that temperature rises in both polar regions are not consistent with natural climate variability alone and are directly attributable to human influence.

The results demonstrate that human activity has already caused significant warming, with impacts on polar biology, indigenous communities, ice-sheet mass balance and global sea level.



http://www.physorg.com/news144593037.html

With bacterial resistance growing researchers are keen to uncover as many new antibiotics as possible. Some of the Streptomyces bacteria are already used industrially to produce current antibiotics and researchers have developed approaches to find and exploit new pathways for antibiotic production in the genome of the Streptomyces family. For many years it was thought that the relatively unstable butyrolactone compounds represented by "A-factor" were the only real signal for stimulating such pathways of possible antibiotic production but the Warwick and John Innes teams have now found a much more stable group of compounds that may have the potential to produce at least one new antibiotic compound from up to 50% of the 1000 or so known Streptomyces family of bacteria.


http://www.physorg.com/news144495812.html

The "Total Recall" effect may be possible using low frequency ultrasound.

While it might be hard to imagine the day where doctors could treat post traumatic stress disorders, traumatic brain injury and even Alzheimer's disease with the flip of a switch, most of us have in fact experienced some of ultrasound's numerous applications in our daily lives. For example, ultrasound has been used in fetal and other diagnostic medical imaging, ultrasonic teeth cleaning, physiotherapies, or surgical ablation. Ultrasound also provides a multitude of other non-medical uses, including pharmaceutical manufacturing, food processing, nondestructive materials testing, sonar, communications, oceanography and acoustic mapping.

When asked about the potential of using his groups' methods to remotely control brain activity, Tyler says: "One might be able to envision potential applications ranging from medical interventions to use in video gaming or the creation of artificial memories along the lines of Arnold Schwarzenegger's character in 'Total Recall.' Imagine taking a vacation without actually going anywhere?

"Obviously, we need to conduct further research and development, but one of the most exhilarating prospects is that low intensity, low frequency ultrasound permit deep-brain stimulation procedures without requiring exogenous proteins or surgically implanted medical devices," he adds.

Tyler and the other ASU researchers will now focus on further characterization of the influence of ultrasound on intact brain circuits and translational research, taking low intensity ultrasound from the lab into pre-clinical trials and treatment of neurological diseases.


http://www.physorg.com/news144495604.html

Hollow lipid nanoparticles filled with engineered siRNA effectively shrink melonomic tumors.

“It is a very selective and targeted approach,” said Gavin Robertson, Ph.D., who led the team of researchers from the Penn State College of Medicine. “And unlike most other cancer drugs that inadvertently affect a bunch of proteins, we are able to knock out single genes.”

The Penn State researchers speculated that siRNA could turn off the two cancer-causing genes and potentially treat the deadly disease more effectively. “siRNA checks the expression of the two genes, which then lowers the abnormal levels of the cancer causing proteins in cells,” explained Dr. Robertson. This research appears in the journal Cancer Research.

In recent years, researchers have zeroed in on two key genes—B-Raf and Akt3—that play key roles in the development of melanoma. Mutations in the B-Raf gene, the most frequently mutated gene in melanoma, lead to the production of a mutant form of the B-Raf protein, which then helps mole cells survive and grow. B-Raf mutations alone, however, do not trigger melanoma development. That event requires a second protein, called Akt3, that regulates the activity of the mutated B-Raf, which aids the development of melanoma. The siRNA agents used in this study specifically target Akt3 and the mutant B-Raf and therefore do not affect normal cells.


http://www.physorg.com/news144437051.html

A team of scientists from University of California, San Diego (USA) and Arizona State University (Tempe, USA) has now developed nanorods that swim extremely fast. “These nanorods travel about 75 times their own length in one second,” report Joseph Wang and his co-workers in the journal Angewandte Chemie. “We are approaching the speed of the most efficient biological nanomotors, including flagellated bacteria.”

The first simple applications for nanomotors could include rapid transportation of pharmaceutical agents to specific target areas, or the passage of specimen molecules through the tiny channels of diagnostic systems on a microchip. However, forward motion through a liquid is not as trivial as one would like to think. One method for the construction of nanomotors that can achieve this is the fuel-driven catalytic nanowire. These are tiny nanoscopic rods whose ends are made of two different metals. Unlike macroscopic motors, they do not have a fuel tank; instead they move through a medium that contains the fuel they need.


http://www.physorg.com/news144479498.html

Passion is red, it's confirmed!

Through five psychological experiments, Andrew Elliot, professor of psychology, and Daniela Niesta, post-doctoral researcher, demonstrate that the color red makes men feel more amorous toward women. And men are unaware of the role the color plays in their attraction.

The research provides the first empirical support for society's enduring love affair with red. From the red ochre used in ancient rituals to today's red-light districts and red hearts on Valentine's Day, the rosy hue has been tied to carnal passions and romantic love across cultures and millennia. But this study, said Elliot, is the only work to scientifically document the effects of color on behavior in the context of relationships.

"It's only recently that psychologists and researchers in other disciplines have been looking closely and systematically at the relationship between color and behavior. Much is known about color physics and color physiology, but very little about color psychology," said Elliot. "It's fascinating to find that something as ubiquitous as color can be having an effect on our behavior without our awareness."


http://www.physorg.com/news144393074.html



Technorati Tags: dating, sexuality, colors, red

MicroRNA modified viruses become drug bombs for cancer treatment.

Viruses -- long regarded solely as disease agents -- now are being used in therapies for cancer. Concerns over the safety of these so-called oncolytic viruses stem from their potential to damage healthy tissues. Now Mayo Clinic researchers have discovered a way of controlling the viruses behind potential cancer therapeutics. They are engineering the virus's genetic sequence, using microRNAs to restrict them to specific tissues. The microRNAs destabilize the virus's genome, making it impossible for the virus to run amok. The discovery is reported in the current issue of Nature Medicine.

http://www.physorg.com/news144249677.html

Employees in the office used to ponder this question about corporate technology not easily available to consumers.

Today the question, usually asked from home or a cafe, is: "Why can't I do this at work?"

Innovative, user-friendly offerings -- Skype, Facebook, Twitter, mash-ups, YouTube, wikis, and the like -- take root and thrive as consumer offerings.

Corporate IT departments meanwhile often seem oblivious to their potential usefulness, even as workers wonder at their absence. But increasingly such technologies are being used for business. 

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/TECH/10/23/db.workwikis/index.html

Eat your way to a better mood!

Still, there's growing recognition in the medical community that the right food choices can improve your mood. Though drugs are often considered the first line of treatment for depression, a dietary change might be all you need, says James Gordon, a psychiatrist who advocates non-drug approaches to depression.

Gordon, a clinical professor at the Georgetown University School of Medicine, believes what we eat affects how we think and feel. "It's a wake-up call to let us know our body is out of balance."

Food can help restore that equilibrium, Gordon wrote in his new book, "Unstuck" (The Penguin Press, $25.95). The trick is knowing which key nutrients to include, and which foods to avoid.

Nutritional changes aren't a magic bullet; they're subtle pieces of a treatment plan that might also include therapy, exercise_one of the most effective depression busters_and stress-reduction techniques.

1. Salmon. Fatty, cold-water fish such as salmon contain omega-3 fatty acids, which keep cell membranes pliable and flexible, said neurosurgeon Larry McCleary, founder of a research group that looks at natural ways to treat health issues. It's also in tuna, anchovies and sardines, but since fish fat is also a good place to store heavy metals, pesticides and poylchlorinated biphenyls (PCB), consider plant-based sources, including walnuts, flax seeds, pumpkin seeds and green, leafy vegetables.

2. Oatmeal, soy milk and two scrambled eggs. This meal will give you 500 milligrams of tryptophan, an amino acid that's a precursor for the neurotransmitter serotonin, the brain's feel-good hormone. Many antidepressants are designed to prolong the activity of serotonin in our cells, but you can actually increase the levels by eating carbohydrates (with the exception of fructose, the sugar in fruit), said Judith Wurtman, author of "The Serotonin Power Diet" (Rodale, $24.95).

3. Spinach: Low levels of the B vitamin folate, found in spinach, peas, navy beans, orange juice, wheat germ or avocado, may play a role in depression in some patients, said Brent Bauer, director of the Mayo Clinic's Complementary and Integrative Medicine Program.

4. Vitamin D supplement. Vitamin D has been shown to help with seasonal affective disorder, said Bruce Hollis, professor of pediatrics at the Medical University of South Carolina. It may also have an anti-inflammatory effect and increase the flexibility of cell membranes, making the brain's neurotransmitters work better. While primarily generated after the skin soaks up the sun's ultraviolet B rays, Vitamin D can be obtained from oily fish and supplemented products like cow or soy milk and orange juice.

But Hollis says the recommended daily allowance - 200 to 400 international units per day_is far too low. Instead, supplement with 2,000 IU's or higher, especially between October and April for Chicagoans. At these levels, though, food isn't a good option, since you'd have to drink a gallon of milk a day and no one needs those calories, Hollis said.

5. Broccoli and blueberries: When combined with protein in fish, chicken and turkey, high-fiber, non-starchy vegetables help stabilize blood sugar levels, said Jack Challem, author of "The Food-Mood Solution" (Wiley, $24.95). "Our moods usually track with blood sugar levels," Challem said. "When our blood sugar is on the rise right after we eat, most people feel pretty contented. If it goes up too high, people feel sleepy because high blood sugar turns off orexins, a family of neuropeptides involved in feeling alert." Superfruits such as blueberries are high in antioxidants, which are substances that absorb the free radicals produced by stress. Too many free radicals cause wear and tear on the body. Challem recommends green leafy vegetables, broccoli, cauliflower, raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, and kiwifruit.

6. Quinoa. Whole grains, a good source of B vitamins, break down and release sugar slowly, so you don't get high levels of insulin and the ups and down of blood sugar, said Gordon. Quinoa, a seed that is classified as a grain, is considered one of the best sources of protein in the vegetable kingdom. Also try oats, brown rice, or whole wheat bread or pasta.


http://www.physorg.com/news144063723.html

What a wonderful advance! One will be able to erase from memory those gut wrenching, guilt ridden, faux pax memories born of too many cocktails!

Amping up a chemical in the mouse brain and then triggering the animal's recall can cause erasure of those, and only those, specific memories, according to research in the most recent issue of the journal Neuron. While the study was done in mice that were genetically modified to react to the chemical, the results suggest that it might one day be possible to develop a drug for eliminating specific, long-term memories, something that could be a boon for those suffering from debilitating phobias or post-traumatic stress disorder.

http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/21593/?nlid=1452

Technorati Tags: memory, brain chemistry

McGill University researchers have discovered a new state of matter, a quasi-three- dimensional electron crystal, in a material very much like those used in the fabrication of modern transistors. This discovery could have momentous implications for the development of new electronic devices. Currently, the number of transistors that can be inexpensively crammed onto a single computer chip increases exponentially, doubling approximately every two years, a trend known as Moore's Law. But there are limits, experts say. As chips get smaller and smaller, scientists expect that the bizarre laws and behaviours of quantum physics will take over, making ever-smaller chips impossible.



http://www.physorg.com/news143823997.html



Technorati Tags: quantum electronics

"Research into the adult brain has shown that gamma activity is the 'glue' that binds together perceptions, thoughts and memories," notes Benasich. "Little research, however, has been conducted into the development of gamma activity in the infant brain and its possible connection to cognitive and language skills."

Benasich and her research team are the first to look at "resting" gamma power in the frontal cortex, the "thinking" part of the brain, in children 16, 24 and 36 months old. In an article published online and in an upcoming issue of Behavioral Brain Research, Benasich offers significant new insight into the likely role gamma activity plays in supporting emerging cognitive and language abilities during the first 36 months of life.


http://www.physorg.com/news143803049.html

Read the following article from the New York Times .... then ask yourself: "Doesn't it make clear sense for the West to aggressively pursue alternative energy strategies ... even on a Manhattan project scale?" Duh!!!!!



CARACAS, Venezuela — As the price of oil roared to ever higher levels in recent years, the leaders of Venezuela, Iran and Russia muscled their way onto the world stage, using checkbook diplomacy and, on occasion, intimidation.

Now, plummeting oil prices are raising questions about whether the countries can sustain their spending — and their bids to challenge United States hegemony.

For all three nations, oil money was a means to an ideological end.

President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela used it to jump-start a socialist-inspired revolution in his country and to back a cadre of like-minded leaders in Latin America who were intent on eroding once-dominant American influence.

Iran extended its influence across the Middle East, promoted itself as the leader of the Islamic world and used its petrodollars to help defy the West’s efforts to block its nuclear program.

Russia, which suffered a humiliating economic collapse in the 1990s after the fall of communism, recaptured some of its former standing in the world. It began rebuilding its military, wrested control of oil and gas pipelines and pushed back against Western encroachment in the former Soviet empire.

But such ambitions are harder to finance when oil is at $74.25 a barrel, its closing price Monday in New York, than when it is at $147, its price as recently as three months ago.

That is not to say that any of the countries is facing immediate economic disaster or will abandon long-held political goals. And the price of oil, still double what was considered high just a few years ago, could always shoot back up.

Still, Russia, Iran and Venezuela have all based their spending on oil prices they thought were conservative but are now close to the market level. Significant further drops could tip the three countries into deficit spending or at least force them to choose among priorities. A worldwide recession, which many economists say is likely, would worsen matters, dampening energy demand and holding down prices.

It is not clear whether the new pressures could create opportunities for the United States to ease tensions, or whether the three countries’ leaders will rely more on angry words even if they cannot afford provocative actions. Mr. Chávez has continued his overtures to Russia. He, Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran may now see the United States, hobbled by financial crisis, as even more vulnerable.

Daniel Yergin, chairman of Cambridge Energy Research Associates, a consulting firm in Cambridge, Mass., said oil states were facing something of a reckoning. Originally, he said, they saw the economic crisis as a problem mainly for the United States — but then oil prices went into free fall.

“Now, the producers are experiencing a reverse oil shock,” Mr. Yergin said. “As revenue went up, government spending went up and expectations of a continuing windfall led to greater and greater ambitions. Now they are finding how integrated they are into this globalized world.”

Venezuela

Mr. Chávez was emphatic last month when he announced that Venezuela would engage in naval exercises with the Russian Navy in the Caribbean. “Go ahead and squeal, Yanquis,” he said. “Russia’s naval fleet is welcome here.”

The moment, made possible in part by a flood of petrodollars used to buy Russian weaponry, must have been sweet for a man who has spent his presidency wagging his finger at the United States and railing against its capitalist model. Cozying up to Russia, whose leaders have been increasingly at odds with the United States, evoked cold war rivalries in the hemisphere.

Mr. Chávez has also used his oil money — in direct payments and through subsidized oil shipments — to win friends in the hemisphere and elsewhere, including President Evo Morales of Bolivia, who expelled the United States ambassador in La Paz last month, saying the envoy was involved in plotting a coup.

Domestic spending in Venezuela has also surged, through the creation of a wide array of social welfare programs that furthered Mr. Chávez’s goal of building a socialist-inspired state — and suppressed opposition. The 2009 budget, based on $60-a-barrel oil, includes a 23 percent increase in government spending, to $78.9 billion.

At $140 a barrel for oil, that was conservative. With prices now uncomfortably close to $60 a barrel, economists in Venezuela are expressing alarm over the government’s ability to pay its bills, including those for arms purchases.

Venezuelans are already struggling with an inflation rate of 36 percent, one of the highest in the world.


Read the full article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/21/world/21petro.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp

Bring on the magnets!!

It has been touted as a possible treatment for migraine, depression, and stroke, and is even said to have roused a patient from a coma.

Now transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has received its first stamp of approval as a therapy by the US Food and Drugs Administration, which says TMS can be used to treat depression in adults who don't respond to anti-depressant drugs.

TMS involves holding an electromagnetic coil over the head and using it to stimulate the underlying brain tissue.

Rapidly changing magnetic fields induce weak electric currents in brain tissue, either exciting or inhibiting brain cells, and making it easier or harder for them to communicate with one another.

Several large trials have suggested TMS can be useful in treating depression, where it is used to excite cells in the areas of the brain involved in mood regulation.

In the latest trial, submitted to the FDA by Neuronetics of Malvern, Pennsylvania, which develops TMS devices, more than half of depressed patients showed an improvement in symptoms after receiving five 40-minute TMS sessions per week for four to six weeks.

Remaining doubts

"I am delighted that patients with depression have a new treatment option without the side effects of medications," says Mark George of the Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, who pioneered the use of TMS in depression during the mid 1990s.

However, he cautions that some scientists remain sceptical about the effectiveness of TMS, because participants in clinical trials can usually tell if they are getting a sham treatment or not.

George is currently conducting a trial which may solve the issue, as the sham treatment feels more similar to the real thing. "We will have what I hope will be the definitive statement about whether TMS really works," he says. The results are expected next year.

Others welcomed the FDA approval, but added that further studies were needed to establish the optimum dose, and which patients are most likely to benefit.

"Only some patients respond to TMS for depression, so part of the process for optimising it is to find ways of screening patients," says Vincent Walsh of University College London.

The FDA's approval may also open the floodgates for medical devices companies hoping to get TMS approved in other countries. "It is a very significant step forward," says Andrew Thomas of UK-based TMS company Magstim.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14998-magnetic-brain-therapy-gets-us-green-light.html?DCMP=ILC-hmts&nsref=news1_head_dn14998

A team of Japanese climbers claimed they have found the footprints of the legendary abominable snowman in the folds of the eastern Himalayas in Nepal.

An eight-member team claimed the footprints of the snowman or Yeti were about 20 centimetres long and were human in appearance. The creature's footprints were found on snow at an altitude of about 4,800 metres (15,748 feet) in the Dhaulagiri mountain range in west Nepal.

The scientific community said there is no proof of the Yeti's existence despite decades of sightings. "We saw three footprints which looked like that of human beings," Kuniaki Yagihara, a member of the Yeti Project Japan, told Reuters, after returning with photographs of the footprints.

The Japanese crew said it was their third attempt to track down the half-man-half-ape, which has long been part of the western adventuring folklore in this part of the world.

The team said they have become adept at recognising the various beasts such as bear and snow leopards and are adamant that the "footprint" was "none of those".

Although the climbers spent more than 40 days on Dhaulagiri IV - a 7,661 metre (25,135-foot) peak where they say they have seen traces of yetis in the past - they could not furnish the press with a single photograph of the Yeti. "If I don't believe in Yeti I would never come," said Yagihara.

Nepali Sherpas say the legend of the Yeti rests deep in the Himalayan psyche. Tales of wild hairy giants living in the snow are part of growing up in the mountains. These prompted many, including Sir Edmund Hillary, to carry out yeti hunts.

The Yeti is also considered more than a myth by the world of cryptozoology, the study of uncatalogued creatures, which takes seriously the idea that the alleged creature may be the last fragments of a race of giant man-apes that existed in central Asia more than 300,000 years ago.

There appears a global trading industry in sightings of the abominable snowman. Most turn out to be false. In July Yeti hairs were supposedly found in north east India. Upon testing they turned out to belong to a species of Himalayan goat. In August, two men in the US claimed they had found the remains of a half-man-half-ape Bigfoot, which actually turned out to be a rubber gorilla suit.

Why I drove past the gas station on Tuesday.....

In Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Christopher J. Pittenger, M.D., and colleagues describe a sort of competition between areas of the brain involved in learning that results in what Pittenger calls the "dry cleaning effect."

One area of the brain called the striatum helps record cues or landmarks that lead to a familiar destination. It is the area of the commuter's brain that goes on autopilot and allows people to get to work, often with little memory of the trip.

But when driving to an unfamiliar place, the brain recruits a second area called the hippocampus, which is involved in a more flexible system called spatial learning. The commuter must employ this system if he or she wants to run an errand before work.

"When you have driven the same route many times and are doing it on autopilot, it can be really difficult to change," said Pittenger, assistant professor of psychiatry at Yale and senior author the paper. "This is why I cannot, for the life of me, remember to drop off my dry cleaning on the way to work. If I'm not paying enough attention right at that moment, if I am thinking about something else, I just sail right on by."

Pittenger and Yale colleagues Anni S. Lee and Ronald S. Duman developed a way to study how these two modes of learning might be interconnected in mice.

In one group, they disrupted areas of the striatum in mice and discovered that their ability to complete landmark navigation tasks was impaired. However, these mice actually improved on tasks that involved spatial learning.

Conversely, when the researchers disrupted an area of the hippocampus involved in spatial learning, the animals could no longer navigate spatially but learned landmark tasks more quickly.

Pittenger speculates that the interactions between these two systems may be important for understanding certain mental illnesses in which patients have destructive, habit-like patterns of behavior or thought. Obsessive-compulsive disorder, Tourette syndrome, and drug addiction involve abnormal function of the striatum and may also involve disruption of the interactions between the two learning systems, which may make habits stronger and less flexible.

"This is part of what we are doing in cognitive-behavioral therapy when we teach patients to recognize their destructive habits, to take a step back, and to learn to do things differently," Pittenger said. "What we're really asking them to do is to use one of these systems to overcome and, ultimately, to re-train the other."


http://www.physorg.com/news143740774.html

Eyal Zussman and colleagues point out that researchers have tried for years to develop wound repair materials from natural proteins, hoping that such fibers would be more compatible with body tissue than existing materials. Scientists recently focused on producing these fibers through "electrospinning," a high-tech weaving process that uses electrical charges to draw out nano-sized fibers from a liquid. But the approach has achieved poor results until now.

In the new study, the scientists describe a new method for producing electrospun polymers using bovine serum albumin (BSA), a so-called "globular" protein found in cow's blood. BSA is similar to serum albumin, one of the most abundant proteins in the human body.

The method involves adding certain chemicals to a solution of BSA to loosen the bonds that hold these highly-folded proteins together. That results in a thinner, more spinnable protein solution. Using electrospinning, the process resulted in strong fibers that are easily spun into suture-like threads or thick mats resembling conventional wound dressings.

http://www.physorg.com/news143718880.html

Major leadership changes Thursday at Twitter renewed questions about its business prospects -- was the replacement of CEO Jack Dorsey by fellow co-founder Evan Williams a shuffling of deck chairs on the Titanic?

But today VC backers of the microblogging service interviewed by wired.com Friday insisted they remain bullish, and Bijan Sabet, a general partner at Twitter backer Spark Capital, revealed that new revenue models will be unveiled in the first half of next year.

For now, they grow weary of the question.

“It’s like the stupidest question in the world: How’s Twitter going to make money?," said Union Square Ventures’ Fred Wilson, another investor. "It’s like 'How was Google going to make money?'

Commentary:
....the lurking question is how will the social networks make money? Many say it will not happen and social networks will go the way of the bubble - bursting and losing VC's mucho denero. Time will tell in the 'Next 10 years'.

Reimagining the Future of Your Desktop, in 3D

By Scott Loganbill
October 17, 2008
Categories: Software & Tools

Bumptop and Shock Desktop 3D provide a way to organize your desktop files and applications in three dimensions.

The desktops treat applications and files almost like they were
dice. You can pick one up and toss it across the desktop. When it runs
into other files, the files tumble, fall and scatter across the screen
utilizing life-like physics simulations.

Gather a bunch of like files together, and you can organize them
into stacks and push them aside. Much like your actual desktop, where
you can have stacks of paper and books, it actually makes it quite easy
to be as organized or disorganized as you’d like. A video demonstration
of the invitation only desktop BumpTop is below:

BumpTop 3D Desktop Prototype - www.bumptop.com

General Science / Biology

The first reports of the successful reprogramming of adult human cells back into so-called induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, which by all appearances looked and acted liked embryonic stem cells created a media stir. But the process was woefully inefficient: Only one out of 10,000 cells could be persuaded to turn back the clock.

Now, a team of researchers led by Juan Carlos Izpisúa Belmonte at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, succeeded in boosting the reprogramming efficiency more than 100fold, while cutting the time it takes in half. In fact, they repeatedly generated iPS cells from the tiny number of keratinocytes attached to a single hair plucked from a human scalp.

Their method, published ahead of print in the Oct. 17, 2008 online edition of Nature Biotechnology, not only provides a practical and simple alternative for the generation of patient- and disease-specific stem cells, which had been hampered by the low efficiency of the reprogramming process, but also spares patients invasive procedures to collect suitable starting material, since the process only requires a single human hair.

"Having a very efficient and practical way of generating patient-specific stem cells, which unlike human embryonic stem cells, wouldn't be rejected by the patient's immune system after transplantation brings us a step closer to the clinical application of stem cell therapy," says Belmonte, PhD., a professor in the Gene Expression Laboratory and director of the Center of Regenerative Medicine in Barcelona, Spain.

http://www.physorg.com/news143472651.html

Engineers build first-ever multi-input 'plug-and-play' synthetic RNA device

Engineers build first-ever multi-input 'plug-and-play' synthetic RNA device

In the future, such devices could have a multitude of potential medical applications, including being used as sensors to sniff out tumor cells or determine when to turn modified genes on or off during cancer therapy.

A synthetic RNA device is a biological device that uses engineered modular components made of RNA nucleotides to perform a specific function--for instance, to detect and respond to biochemical signals inside a cell or in its immediate environment.

Created by Caltech's Christina Smolke, assistant professor of chemical engineering, and Maung Nyan Win, postdoctoral scholar in chemical engineering, the device is made up of modules comprising the RNA-based biological equivalents of engineering's sensors, actuators, and information transmitters. These individual components can be combined in a variety of different ways to create a device that can both detect and respond to what could conceivably be an almost infinite number of environmental and cellular signals.

This modular device processes these inputs in a manner almost identical to the logic gates used in computing; it can perform AND, NOR, NAND, and OR computations, and can perform signal filtering and signal gain operations. Smolke and Win's creation is the first RNA device that can handle more than one incoming piece of biological information. "There's been a lot of work done in single-input devices," notes Smolke. "But this is the first demonstration that a multi-input RNA device is possible."

Man 'roused from coma' by a magnetic field - health - 15 October 2008 - New Scientist

Man 'roused from coma' by a magnetic field - health - 15 October 2008 - New Scientist

JOSH VILLA was 26 and driving home after a drink with a friend on 28 August 2005 when his car mounted the kerb and flipped over. Villa was thrown through the windscreen, suffered massive head injuries and fell into a coma.

Almost a year later, there was little sign of improvement. "He would open his eyes, but he was not responsive to any external stimuli in his environment," says Theresa Pape of the US Department of Veterans Affairs in Chicago, who helped treat him.

Usually there is little more that can be done for people in this condition. Villa was to be sent home to Rockford, Illinois, where his mother, Laurie McAndrews, had volunteered to care for him.

But Pape had a different suggestion. She enrolled him in a six-week study in which an electromagnetic coil was held over the front of his head to stimulate the underlying brain tissue. Such transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been investigated as a way of treating migraine, stroke, Parkinson's disease and depression, with some promising results, but this is the first time it has been used as a potential therapy for someone in a coma-like state.

The rapidly changing magnetic fields that the coil creates can be used either to excite or inhibit brain cells - making it easier or harder for them to communicate with one another. In Villa's case, the coil was used to excite brain cells in the right prefrontal dorsolateral cortex. This area has strong connections to the brainstem, which sends out pulses to the rest of the brain that tell it to pay attention. "It's like an 'OK, I'm awake' pulse," says Pape.

At first, there was little change in Villa's condition, but after around 15 sessions something happened. "You started talking to him and he would turn his head and look at you," says McAndrews. "That was huge."

Technorati tags: magnetic brain stimulation

Hand-held scanning devices | Spinning a good tale | The Economist

Hand-held scanning devices | Spinning a good tale | The Economist:

BIOTECHNOLOGISTS have long dreamed of creating a “lab on a chip” that would pack the power of a full-scale analytical laboratory into an object as small and as easy to use as the hand-held scanners familiar to fans of science fiction. Such a device might detect biological weapons, run genetic tests or sniff out contaminants. Staff at clinics could use it to screen people for infectious diseases. Police could perform on-the-spot drug tests; paramedics, roadside diagnoses.

Technorati tags: tricorder, lab on a chip

New Chips Poised to Revolutionize Photography, Film | Gadget Lab from Wired.com

New Chips Poised to Revolutionize Photography, Film | Gadget Lab from Wired.com:

CMOS image sensors

Technorati tags: hd video in SLR format

Cannabis less harmful than drinking, smoking: report

Cannabis less harmful than drinking, smoking: report

"Many of the harms associated with cannabis use are the result of prohibition itself, particularly the social harms arising from arrest and imprisonment," it said.

"It is only through a regulated market that we can better protect young people from the ever more potent forms of dope," it added.

Technorati tags: reefer madness redux by labour government in Britain.

Musicians use both sides of their brains more frequently than average people

Musicians use both sides of their brains more frequently than average people:

intensive musical training is associated with an elevated IQ score

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Strippers, armadillos inspire Ig Nobel winners

Strippers, armadillos inspire Ig Nobel winners

Duke University behavioral economist Dan Ariely won an Ig Nobel for his study that found more expensive fake medicines work better than cheaper fake medicines.

"When you expect something to happen, your brain makes it happen," Ariely said.

Ariely spent three years in a hospital after suffering third-degree burns over 70 percent of his body. He noticed some burn patients who woke in the night in extreme pain often went right back to sleep after being given a shot. A nurse confided to him the injections were often just saline solution.

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