Public Release: 2-Apr-2007
Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine
Babies who don't respond to their names may be at risk for developmental disorders, including autism
Year-old babies who do not respond when their name is called may be more likely to be diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder or other developmental problem at age 2, making this simple test a potential early indicator for such conditions, according to a report in the April issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, a theme issue on autism spectrum disorders.
Contact: Karen Finney
916-734-9064
JAMA and Archives Journals
Public Release: 2-Apr-2007
Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine
Combination of early detection, timely treatment hold promise for autism
Emerging genetic research may help scientists recognize children with autism at a younger and potentially treatable age, according to an editorial in the April issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. The issue is devoted to studies of autism spectrum disorders.
Contact: Joel Schwarz
206-685-0658
JAMA and Archives Journals
Public Release: 2-Apr-2007
'Self-healing' house in Greece will dare to defy nature
A high-tech villa designed to resist earthquakes by "self-healing" cracks in its own walls and monitoring vibrations through an intelligent sensor network will be built on a Greek mountainside.
European Union
Contact: Simon Jenkins
s.jenkins@leeds.ac.uk
44-011-334-35764
University of Leeds
Public Release: 2-Apr-2007
PLoS Biology
Elephant highways of death
A new study coordinated by the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society and other groups found that Central Africa's increasing network of roads -- which are penetrating deeper and deeper into the wildest areas of the Congo Basin -- are becoming highways of death for the little known forest elephant.
Contact: Stephen Sautner
ssautner@wcs.org
718-220-3682
Wildlife Conservation Society
Public Release: 2-Apr-2007
Get a whiff of this: Smell test could sniff out serious health problems
University of Cincinnati researchers develop a test that could indicate early symptoms of neurological diseases.
National Institutes of Health
Contact: Dawn Fuller
dawn.fuller@uc.edu
513-556-1823
University of Cincinnati
Public Release: 2-Apr-2007
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Rapid response was crucial to containing the 1918 flu pandemic
One of the persistent riddles of the deadly 1918 Spanish influenza pandemic is why it struck different cities with varying severity. Why were some municipalities such as St. Louis spared the fate of the hard-hit cities like Philadelphia when both implemented similar public health measures? What made the difference, according to two independent studies funded by the National Institutes of Health, was not only how but also how rapidly different cities responded.
NIH/National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
Contact: Jason Socrates Bardi
jbardi@niaid.nih.gov
301-402-1663
NIH/National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
Many Diagnoses of Depression May Be Misguided, Study Says
By BENEDICT CAREY
Published: April 3, 2007
About one in four people who appear to be depressed are in fact struggling with the normal mental fallout from a recent emotional blow, a new study suggests. To avoid unnecessary diagnoses and stigma, the standard definition of depression should be redrawn to specifically exclude such cases, the authors argue.
Vital Signs
At Risk: One Head Injury Sets the Stage for a Second One in Children
By ERIC NAGOURNEY
Published: April 3, 2007
Children who suffer a head injury are much more likely to have another one within six months, researchers reported Monday. The big question is why.
North Sinai Journal
Did the Red Sea Part? No Evidence, Archaeologists Say
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN
Published: April 3, 2007
On the eve of Passover, Egypt’s chief archaeologist took a bus full of journalists into the North Sinai to showcase his agency’s latest discovery  - some ancient buried walls of a military fort and a few pieces of volcanic lava. This bleak landscape,  excited Dr. Zahi Hawass because it provided physical evidence of stories told in hieroglyphics. It was proof of accounts from antiquity.  That prompted a reporter to ask about the Exodus. "Really, it's a myth," Dr. Hawass said of the story of the Exodus, as he stood at the foot of a wall built during what is called the New Kingdom.
Essay
A Patient’s Demands Versus a Doctor’s Convictions
By SANDEEP JAUHAR, M.D.
A patient’s right to self-determination is the prevailing ethic in medicine today, but in reality doctors routinely place limits on it.
Basics
A Mutinous Group of Cells on a Greedy, Destructive Path
By NATALIE ANGIER
Metastatic cancer remains one of the grimmest conditions a person can face, and a true understanding of ever-changing metastases eludes researchers. Public Release: 3-Apr-2007
Journal of the National Cancer Institute
PSA is poor predictor of lethal prostate cancer
The amount of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) in a man's bloodstream at the time of his prostate cancer diagnosis or its rate of change over the course of the disease does not adequately predict lethal prostate cancer, according to a study in the April 4 Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
Contact: Liz Savage
jncimedia@oxfordjournals.org
301-841-1287
Journal of the National Cancer Institute
Public Release: 3-Apr-2007
Journal of Neuroscience
Stop signs: Study identifies 'braking' mechanism in the brain
As wise as the counsel to "finish what you've started" may be, it is also sometimes critically important to do just the opposite -- stop. And the ability to stop quickly may depend on a few "cables" in the brain, according to research by UC San Diego cognitive neuroscientist Adam Aron.
Contact: Inga Kiderra
ikiderra@ucsd.edu
858-822-0661
University of California - San Diego
Public Release: 3-Apr-2007
Transfusion
Transfusion expert urges wider use of filtered blood
Filtering white cells from donor blood before a transfusion is much safer for patients and long overdue as a national standard for all surgical procedures, according to University of Rochester researchers who present their analysis in the April journal, Transfusion.
Contact: Leslie Orr
Leslie_Orr@urmc.rochester.edu
585-275-5774
University of Rochester Medical Center
Public Release: 3-Apr-2007
Journal of Infectious Diseases
Jefferson scientists find rabies-based vaccine could be effective against HIV
Rabies, a relentless, ancient scourge, may hold a key to defeating another implacable foe: HIV. Scientists have used a drastically weakened rabies virus to ferry HIV-related proteins into animals, in essence, vaccinating them against an AIDS-like disease. Early evidence indicates that the vaccine -- which doesn’t protect against infection -- prevents development of disease. Two years after the initial vaccination, four nonhuman primates were protected from disease, even after being "challenged" with a dangerous animal-human virus.
Contact: Steve Benowitz
steven.benowitz@jefferson.edu
215-955-5291
Thomas Jefferson University
Public Release: 4-Apr-2007
Neuron
Mechanism of nicotine's learning effects explored
While nicotine is highly addictive, researchers have also shown the drug to enhance learning and memory -- a property that has launched efforts to develop nicotine-like drugs to treat cognitive deficits in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, schizophrenia and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.
Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences and Center of Medical Systems Biology, Dutch Medical Research Council, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
Contact: Erin Doonan
edoonan@cell.com
617-397-2802
Cell Press Public Release: 4-Apr-2007
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
Research finds that culture is key to interpreting facial emotions
Research has uncovered that culture is a determining factor when interpreting facial emotions. The study reveals that in cultures where emotional control is the standard, such as Japan, focus is placed on the eyes to interpret emotions. Whereas in cultures where emotion is openly expressed, such as the United States, the focus is on the mouth to interpret emotion.
Contact: Kris Connor
kris.connor@ualberta.ca
780-492-9214 University of Alberta
The evolution of sex roles
Anthropologists are looking at how prehistoric tasks were divided, perhaps indicating the moment when we became truly human.
By Faye Flam
Inquirer Staff Writer
Public Release: 4-Apr-2007
Annals of the Rheumatic Disease
Ibuprofen may boost chance of heart problems in high risk patients with osteoarthritis
The common painkiller, ibuprofen, may boost the likelihood of heart problems in high risk patients who have osteoarthritis, suggests research published ahead of print in the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases. Previous studies have suggested that ibuprofen interferes with the effects of aspirin.
Contact: Emma Dickinson
edickinson@bmj.com
44-020-738-36529
BMJ Specialty Journals
Public Release: 4-Apr-2007
Journal of American Chemical Society
Northwestern chemists develop new method for synthesizing anti-cancer flavonoids
For years chemists have struggled to find a good way to make flavonoids -- the good-for-your-health compounds found in plants -- in the lab. Now a team of Northwestern University researchers has, for the first time, synthesized 10 different flavanones, a type of flavonoid, using a new general method they developed that takes advantage of one simple catalyst. This helps set the stage for the development of new cancer therapeutics based on flavanones with anti-cancer properties.
Northwestern University, Amgen, Abbott Laboratories, Boehringer-Ingelheim
Contact: Megan Fellman
fellman@northwestern.edu
847-491-3115
Northwestern University
Public Release: 4-Apr-2007
New technology offers hope of safe MRI exams
As the diagnostic capability of MRI continues to advance, and as the availability of MRI machines increases worldwide, so should the availability of implantable devices that are MRI safe. This advance is urgently needed says one executive.
Contact: Janet Vasquez
jvasquez@investorrelationsgroup.com
212-825-3210
Biophan Technologies
Public Release: 4-Apr-2007
Journal of Clinical Investigation
Glucose triggers brain cell death in rats after hypoglycemic coma
Brain damage that was thought to be caused by hypoglycemic coma actually occurs when glucose is administered to treat the coma, according to a study in rodents led by researchers at the San Francisco VA Medical Center.
US Department of Veteran's Affairs, Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, National Institutes of Health
Contact: Steve Tokar
steve.tokar@ncire.org
415-221-4810 x5202
University of California - San Francisco Personal Health
A Classroom of Monkey Bars and Slides
By JANE E. BRODY
From a child development perspective, children need access to an environment that allows them to play out what is natural to them - physical, dramatic, constructive and spontaneous games.  But in our high-tech society, children go indoors right after school and eat junk food and play video games.
Time in the Animal Mind
By CARL ZIMMER
Several recent experiments suggest that animals can visit the past and future in their minds, in ways similar to humans.
Public Release: 8-Apr-2007
Nature Medicine
Research explores herbal treatment for recurring urinary tract infections
A common herbal extract available in health food stores can greatly reduce urinary tract infections and could potentially enhance the ability of antibiotics to kill the bacteria that cause 90 percent of infections in the bladder.
National Institutes of Health
Contact: Richard Merritt
Merri006@mc.duke.edu
919-684-4148
Duke University Medical Center