Health Meaning

A striking case in Japan confirmed that pregnant women with cancer can transmit the disease to their fetuses. These transmissions normally blocked by the placenta are rare, so the work will not likely change how doctors screen or care for pregnant women. But scientists say the case could help illuminate how cancer foils the body's immune system.

In early 07, a 28-year-old Japanese woman gave birth to a daughter. Thirty-six days later, the mother was hospitalized with vaginal bleeding, which became uncontrollable. Doctors diagnosed leukemia, and she died soon. The baby developed normally until age 11 months, when a huge tumor appeared in her cheek. A biopsy determined the cancer has not been sarcoma - a cancer of some connective tissues -. But leukemic tumor somehow trapped in the cheek of the child

The doctors alerted cell biologist Mel Greaves of the Institute of Cancer Research in Sutton Surrey, UK, who studies transmissible cancers. Scientists had suspected the mother-fetus cancer in other cases with circumstantial evidence (especially leukemia and melanoma, which both metastasize easily). But nobody had done genetic tests to prove that the cancer had grown from a single source and was not just an unfortunate coincidence.

In their investigation, Greaves and his colleagues discovered incipient cancer cells in routine blood samples taken from the child at birth, which strongly suggests that transmission happened in utero. They also examined a unique DNA sequence in each case of leukemia, BCR-ABL1 sequence. It was identical to the mother and daughter. Finally, the tests showed the cancer cells of children were almost all maternal cells without genetic material from the father. This indicated that the route of transmission is from mother to fetus, and not the reverse. The team has its evidence in a paper published online October 12 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences .

Greaves and his colleagues also determined how cancer survived inside the fetus, whose immune system would destroy the cells of the mother. They found that the cancer cells are absent a large area from a section of the sixth human chromosome known under the name 6p, which produces surface markers of immune cells which bind to the. In short, Greaves said, "Cancer has succeeded because it was immunologically invisible."

Knowing the molecular details of how evaded detection cells enable scientists to probe how other cancers slide by our immune system, said Howard Weinstein, a pediatric cancer specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

Despite the findings, mothers should not panic, says Greaves. with only a few dozen cases of transmission of cancer mother-fetus reported since the first in 1866, the risk for pregnant women is minimal, he said, and the transfer of advanced cancer in infants are not necessarily fatal. - the Japanese girl was successfully treated and is still alive. But Greaves said his team's work challenges the assumption that the placenta is a fully effective barrier between mothers and fetuses. "I'm more inclined to think that perhaps the cells obtained by modest numbers all the time," he said. "You can learn a lot of very strange case in medicine."

Pandemic make strange bedfellows in this case, advocates of public health and the falcons defense.

Commission on the Prevention of WMD and terrorism posted a video that asks why the United States is still based on a centuries-old technology based on eggs makes its vaccine against influenza. "Do was it would be nice if the H1N1 vaccine had been available for our children to school before the school year began?" Asks former Governor and Senator Bob Graham (D-FL) and former Senator Jim Talent (R-MO).

politics, president and vice president retired from the board, take us back to the year each man graduated from high school to remind us that technology egg-based vaccines is as much a relic as telephone line, disco dancing and the AMC Gremlin. the video does not specify that attempts to move the last eggs are underway in the United States, although it is explained on the website of the commission. But the video, it is clear that when it comes to vaccines against influenza, we live in the technological stone age.

Here is an overview of some of the stories that we followed on science political blog of science Insider:

a petition presented earlier this year at the direction of the American Physical society Council to change the official statement of the company in 07 to climate change fell in (carbon neutral) flames. The 07 statement warned that "if no mitigation measures are taken, significant disruptions in the physical and ecological systems of the Earth, social systems, security and human health are likely to occur."

Leading African science academies say in a report published yesterday in Ghana that the intensification of affordable medical interventions such as vaccination of 20% could save the lives of about 770,000 children and young mothers each year in nine countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

in the new film men who Stare at goats , George Clooney plays a former member of a secret sect of the soldiers trained by the . US military to deploy a weapon against the enemy crowd paranormal fatal their talents are meant the ability to kill a goat by psychokinesis - watching the beast they can make his heart stop with thought alone. The film takes some liberties in the name of comedy, but the program it is based on is real.

Scientists and policy experts will gather in March next year to hash rules for conducting field experiments on the controversial subject of geoengineering . Styled after the Asilomar conference 1975 mark on recombinant DNA, the conference has attracted top scientists to support climate and environmental groups. But he is also facing questions and criticism about its opening and the origins of some of the organizers.

Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) finally got his call vote to strip long-awaited political science studies of the 2010 budget of National Science Foundation (NSF). And while his amendment was soundly defeated, 36 to 62, it was not strictly a party-line vote. Five moderate Democrats - Senators Max Baucus of Montana, Evan Bayh of Indiana, Claire McCaskill of Missouri, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, and Jim Webb of Virginia - apparently agree with the argument that Coburn NSF, with a budget of $ 6.9 billion is "wasting" federal funds by spending $ 9 million per year to support research in the field.

National Institutes of Health is again taken to task for doing too little to manage potential conflicts of researchers interest, such as consulting for drug companies. This time federal investigators say NIH should strengthen the rules that now provide the ability to NIH funding too much latitude in what they have to report.

The criticism comes from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Inspector General (IG), which in 08 revealed that the NIH did not pay enough attention to how institutions manage its donees conflicts of interest. In a follow-up report dated 18 November, the IG has reviewed the information donees 41 institutions submitted to the NIH in 06, and the documents retained by institutions such as disclosure forms. The most common conflict, he found was equity-owned 111 165 researchers had equity such as shares of a company, and six had equity of a value of over $ 100,000.

Seven members of the faculty received more than $ 50,000 in royalties or compensation. In most cases, the institutions "manage" these conflicts by requiring researchers describe in talks and papers, not get rid of them, the IG found.

The report found "vulnerabilities" in how universities monitor conflicts. For example, 0% of the 41 institutions allow researchers themselves to decide whether their financial interests are related to their research, and about half did not ask for specific amounts. Nor did they check to verify that researchers report honestly.

"There is a need for more transparency about and monitoring of grantees institutions," the report concludes. The report repeats previous advice that NIH make the institutions relate details on how they are managing conflict. It also lists several steps NIH should require institutions such as asking faculty members to report all possible conflicts, not just those they think are relevant, and the collection of specific dollar amounts.

Others have also called on the institutions to gather more information on the conflict, including an Institute of Medicine committee earlier this year. And many of the recommendations of IG HHS appear in a notice published in July on possible modifications regulatory conflicts of interest of public health services. NIH plans to publish proposed regulations in the coming weeks.

biomedical research leaders often complain that the research funding system on specific projects US stifles risk taking and creativity. A better model, they say, would be to give the long-term price researchers unconditionally. Now some MIT economists say they have thoroughly tested this idea for the first time and found that scientists with public funding are indeed more productive and creative.

There are two basic biomedical science funding models in the United States. The National Institutes of Health provides the bulk of its grant money as a 3 or 4-year grants, called R01, for research projects on specific topics with detailed objectives. Then there is the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the nonprofit giant that supports more than 300 researchers across the country for 5 years or more depending on their qualifications, not personal what they study. "People, not projects" is the mantra of HHMI, and proponents say it supports the most creative science.

But so far there has been no "serious efforts "to test this idea, says MIT economist Pierre Azoulay So he and two colleagues compared the careers of two groups. seventy-three were HHMI investigators who were appointed in the early 190s, and about 400 were scientists of the same age who have received prestigious "early career" from sources such as the Pew Charitable trusts and the Packard Foundation. (About 70% of HHMI investigators started with one of these awards, said Azoulay.) they also compared a group of scientists who received a long term, prestigious, specific to the NIH project, called a MERIT award.

the HHMI investigators clearly won, producing twice as many documents the top 5% of citations as the first career winners, for example, the team concludes AZOULAY in a working paper. They were closer to the MERIT beneficiaries in production, but 50% more written documents in the top 1% by citation. HHMI group were also more likely to change the keywords in their resumes over time, suggesting that they were moving in new directions, creative.

makes sense, but the study to fully control that the HHMI scientists might be more gifted to begin with? "We can not. We are very open about it," said Azoulay. To really know if the type of funding makes a difference, you must assign randomly equally qualified researchers to either get an HHMI-type or R01 funding, who admits he is unlikely to occur.

he adds that the study is not intended as an "exercise NIH-bashing." While the NIH has some new types of awards following HHMI model, such as the price of Pioneer, he does not think the agency should R01 gap altogether, said Azoulay. Science requires a mixture of work "incremental" and "breakthrough", especially to translate the results, he said. And the document concludes:

Only scientists showing outstanding qualities are eligible HHMI appointments and our results may not generalize to the overall population of eligible scientists to a subsidy, which include individuals gifted and those with more modest talent. In addition, HHMI provides a detailed evaluation and feedback to investigators. The richness of this feedback resource intensive, especially the time of elite scientists who serve on review panels, and its quality may deteriorate if the program was expanded drastically.

But Azoulay think NIH is making a mistake now: he is not collecting data, be aware if scientists funded by the new models are more productive effect. "We can never learn how effective it was," he said.

Chalk another win patent to the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Its powerful IP-complement the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) -appears have knocked a biotechnology partner, Xenon Pharmaceuticals Inc., Burnaby, Canada, said he tried to exploit a discovery laboratories Biochem Wisconsin without paying the university some disputed charges.

researchers from Wisconsin and Xenon worked 9 years ago to study the enzyme stearoyl-CoA desaturase (SCD), the anti-cholesterol they both patented properties. Xenon helped fund this research. But a federal appeals court ruled yesterday that Xenon evil tried to cut his own license agreement with Novartis, excluding WARF, create drugs based SCD. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals backed a lower court that ruled several years ago that Xenon violated a partnership agreement by failing to share revenues from Novartis "sublicense" deal. And the appeals court went even further than the lower court.

He said that after learning the Novartis case of a press release, WARF has the right to terminate the contract itself and claim ownership of some discoveries that have come out of the project. Specifically, the decision states that Wisconsin has property rights in the compounds of potential drugs studied by a biochemist from the University, Mark Gray-Keller, who was hired by Xenon on a consultancy agreement to test the activity the company's materials he wanted to check.

Xenon declined to comment. Calling the decision a "sweep" last night, the Advocate General of WARF Michael Falk, issued a statement saying, "We are extremely pleased with this decision. WARF is now free and clear to move the technology forward commercially and intends to do so. "

"Mine, all mine!" This is what the vaccinia virus seems to say after it invades a cell and prevents his companions to follow suit. But the behavior is selfish sentence. The researchers found that the strategy actually helps spread the virus as it speeds up the targeting of uninfected cells. This previously unknown mechanism may lead to new ways to fight against viral infections.

vaccinia does not cause disease in humans, but it helped us to fight them. Thank you to its resemblance to the smallpox virus, the researchers were able to use the vaccine as a vaccine against the disease, eventually leading to its eradication in the late 1970. Since then, scientists have continued to study vaccinia as a platform to develop vaccines against other diseases.

Nevertheless this study, researchers have lacked a curious feature of the biology of the virus, said virologist Geoffrey Smith of Imperial College London. While carefully watching the fields of cell destruction caused by the virus - called plaques - he and his colleagues noticed that vaccinia spread four times faster than its replication cycle would. "Nobody seemed to have done the math," says Smith.

So, Smith and colleagues dug a little deeper. They found that the vaccine produces two proteins right after it infects a cell. proteins work together to form a complex on the cell surface which prevents other vaccinia virus particles from entering (a process called superinfection). When other vaccinia virus impinge, long projections of another protein, actin, grows from the cell membrane, causing the virus to bounce. "the novelty here, with vaccinia, is that it is not only prevent the superinfecting virus, but physically it is repelling the virus away, "said Smith, whose team reports its findings today in Science .

many other viruses, such as herpes simplex virus, seem use similar infection strategies, Mr. Smith. Assuming they use the same protein complex as vaccinia, he says, researchers might be able to fight these infections by blocking the interaction of the two proteins.

cell biologist Michael Way of the London Research Institute accepts that other viruses can also use the strategy of infection with vaccinia virus. "I think it may be more general than people realize."

A veterinary drug that kills the worms in cattle can also fight against river blindness, a debilitating infection parasite that affects 37 million people across the world, researchers say. But experts warn against the temptation of the compound in humans yet.

blind people contract rivers, also known as onchocerciasis, when bitten by black flies that carry a nematode known as volvulus Onchocerca . Worm larvae mature and mate, producing up to 1000 "microfillariae" offspring per day, which migrate to the surface of the skin and eyes. When microfillariae die, they cause itchy lesions that can lead to blindness. The disease often forces farmers to abandon the many lush river valleys with black flies infected for less fertile areas.

Doctors currently treat river blindness Ivermectin, a drug that kills the microfillariae and reduces the fertility of adult worms. Ivermectin has reduced cases of blindness and injuries in countries such as Senegal and Mali. But ivermectin does not target to nearly mature that cause new infections through the bite of a black fly. Instead, the drug control symptoms until the worms eventually die out. Scientists are still searching a compound that could block infection altogether, for example by killing the teenagers to arrival.

Researchers led by Kim Janda, a chemist at the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego, California, decided to focus on an enzyme called chitinase, which breaks down and rebuilds O. volvulus outer housing larvae during the final molt before adulthood. They screened 1,500 drugs, looking for one that blocked the enzyme. The best candidate turned out to be a veterinary drug known as closantel, which kills liver parasites in cattle. When Janda's team cultivated O almost mature. volvulus larvae in solutions that contained various amounts of the drug for 6 days, only 1.4% of closantel-dosed larvae had moulted against 60% in the control group, reports Team online this week in Proceedings of the national Academy of sciences .

If closantel has the same effect in humans, it could prevent infections begin, said Roger Prichard, parasitology at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. And because it works in a completely different way of ivermectin, he said, all strains of O. volvulus , which show resistance to ivermectin in the future could be treated with closantel.

Janda said he is optimistic about working with closantel as it has already proved safe in farm animals. "This moves the drug discovery process along more quickly."

But Prichard warns that the highway can not be so fast. Closantel is not approved for use in all animals in all countries, including the United States, he said. And it binds to a protein present in the blood, which might lead to side effects in humans. In addition, the team would have to prove that Janda Closantel lasts long enough to provide protection from intermittent doses; one of the reasons why ivermectin works so well is that it should be taken once or twice a year. "It is far from showing inhibition of the enzyme to actually have a drug," said Prichard. "There are significant barriers that must be overcome."

SAN DIEGO -Is babies born through IVF different from those born naturally? And new fertility treatment creating a larger population of infertile? "The answer is maybe yes," said Andre Van Steirteghem of the Brussels University Hospital Center for Reproductive Medicine. In this short podcast Science Robert Frederick listening that Van Steirteghem and other experts have said about the future of assisted reproduction here at the annual meeting of the American Association for the advancement of science (which publishes science NOW).

Frustrated by the cost and slow death pace of drug development, a group of researchers today launched a new unique strategy for clinical trials execution. Their goals are bold. They want to bring many products being tested in a single framework, validation of new biomarkers, data from the public, maintain uniform standards across a wide range of drug candidates, and quickly eliminate the losers. Predicted to cost $ 26 million over 5 years, the project will begin testing new therapies for breast cancer. The leaders say they hope that clinicians working on other diseases copy their experience and melanoma may be next. The experience is launched just about 60% funded, according to its developer, the independent Foundation for the National Institutes of Health.

The project is called I-SPY 2, which just means "the series of studies Survey to predict therapeutic response with your molecular imaging and analysis 2." (It follows a trial driver called I-SPY 1.) the first patients will be enrolled next week, said Laura Esserman, a surgeon at the University of California, San Francisco, who briefed reporters at the National Press Club in Washington, DC She is clinical head the trial. She said five therapeutic agents were selected for initial testing.

Anna Barker, deputy director of the National cancer Institute, said a systemic reform of the trial system is " long overdue. "

One of the promised benefits of the project is a coherent set of knowledge, said Janet Woodcock, director of the Center for evaluation and research on drugs at the US Food and Drug Administration. She called an "experience with a high probability of success." Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania (D) appeared at the briefing to give I-SPY 2 his blessing and remind people that he pushed to increase the annual budget of the national Institutes of health from $ 30 billion to $ 40 billion.

the main objective of I-SPY 2, according to Esserman and others, is to reduce the time it takes for a green or red light for a new drug against the potential breast cancer 10 years to 1 year. other objectives are to identify drugs that work best for cancer patients, using new biomarkers to describe more precisely than before the game between the subtypes and disease treatments. the new strategy provides for the administration of drugs before surgery, usually doctors make the first imaging and surgery precisely the response of tumors before to move to a prolonged medication.

The approach also requires a new set of statistical methods to enable to obtain credible results small test groups. The plan is to predict early drugs that are likely to succeed and which are not, and quickly promote the winners to greater (phase III) trials, which would most likely be run by private companies, without sharing data. Biostatistician Don Berry MDAnderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas, oversees the data analysis I-SPY 2. The concept, he said, is to continually add new drugs to several weapons in the process, promote few, and remove the rest. Berry concluded: "We hope this trial will last forever"

US farmers have benefited from the introduction of genetically modified crops, according to a new report ^* published today by the National research Council of the National Academies. Farmers who switched from conventional crops have seen higher profits and a reduced environmental impact, the committee concluded. However, many benefits such as improving water quality, need to be better quantified, and some biotech crops are threatened by the development of weeds resistant to herbicides.

Over 80% of corn, soybean, and cotton acreage in the US is planted with modified crops to resist pests and improve weed control. During the last decade, groups of experts convened by the National Research Council examined the potential risks to human health and the environment, such as gene flow between agencies. But they had not taken a broad look at what the impact was on farms that grow biotech crops. For example, NRC commissioned a group of 10 experts combing the scientific literature.

"The evidence is quite strong is that these technologies have both economic and environmental benefits," says David Ervin of Portland State University economist in Oregon, who chaired the panel. But many effects need to be better studied. The committee recommended, for example, the US Geological Survey to study the impact of reduced tillage has had on water quality.

Charles Benbrook, chief scientist of the OrganicCenter in Enterprise, Oregon, is unsure of the persistence of the economic benefits. Benbrook, who was not on the NRC panel, said that strong price increases biotech seeds, which began in 07, could erode economic gains for farmers.

The group also highlighted several risks. One of the most important is that the resistance of insects or weeds will make genetically modified crops inefficient farmers and strength to return to more toxic chemicals or plowing causing soil erosion. Economist Dermot Hayes Ames says State University of Iowa, he is optimistic that new types of crops and biotechnology management will solve the problem of resistance, but Benbrook is less optimistic. "It's a crisis now," he said.

A news story about the report published in this week's issue of Science .

^* The impact of GM crops on agricultural sustainability in the US . Washington The National Academies Press, 2010.

Sufferers of Gilles de la Tourette syndrome are plagued by unwanted movement and verbal tics that range from extra winks and Grimaces involuntary grunts or even curse. Although the disease tends to run in families, little is known about its genetic basis. The researchers found a mutated gene that seems to cause the disorder in a family with nine extremely rare sufferers. While this mutation is the cause of most cases of Tourette's syndrome, it can push researchers to study treatment and potential mechanism they otherwise would not have considered.

Since the French neurologist Georges Gilles de la Tourette first described its namesake state 125 years ago, scientists have puzzled over the cause. Many recent attention has focused on a brain region called the basal ganglia, which is involved in repetitive behaviors and the neurotransmitter dopamine. In 05, a team led by child psychiatrist and geneticist Matthew State of the School of Medicine at Yale University, reported one of the first genetic clues to disease, a mutation in a gene called SLITRK1 seems to be responsible for a rare handful of cases. But the function of SLITRK1 and its contribution to Tourette syndrome is still largely a mystery.

In the new study, the State and his colleagues examined a family in which the father and eight children (six son and two daughters) have the syndrome. Many genetic detective work led them to a mutation in a gene called HDC , which encodes L-histidine decarboxylase, an enzyme involved in the production of histamine, a signaling molecule with a wide variety roles in the body. The same mutation was present in all members of the family who had Tourette's, but was absent in the thousands of DNA samples from control subjects, which included non-related people of similar ethnic backgrounds, as well as a group of 720 Tourette patients, the researchers report today in the New England Journal of Medicine . The mutated version of HDC Genes likely results in a truncated version of the enzyme, which would result in reduced levels of histamine, State said.

histamine may be best known for her role in triggering sneezing and itchy eyes during allergy season, but it also functions as a neurotransmitter in the brain. Exactly how histamine abnormalities contribute to the symptoms of Tourette's syndrome is unclear, but the State notes that knocking out the equivalent of HDC gene makes mice more prone to bobbing head, spinning, and other repetitive behaviors. In addition, he said, there is evidence that some histamine receptors cluster in the basal ganglia and the signaling of histamine can act as a brake on the signaling of dopamine.

"They make a very convincing argument that this mutation in this family is responsible for Tourette's," says Jon McClellan, a psychiatrist at the University of Washington, Seattle. "If histamine is actually an active player in Gilles de la Tourette syndrome, it would really open a new way of treatment" involving drugs that stimulate histamine, says Jeremiah Scharf, a behavioral neurologist and the Neurogeneticist Harvard Medical School in Boston. But he warned that much more work is needed to determine if the results of this family can be leveraged to help thousands of other people with the disorder.

23andMe has informed customers it wrongly mixed samples of less than 96 people, leaving at least one parent would worry that his daughter had been at birth with another baby. The company has not yet commented publicly error, publishing information only to its customers, the reprocessing of samples in question and considering ways to prevent a repeat.

Criticism of Avandia diabetes therapy reached its climax. The drug has been in the spotlight since 07, when it was linked to heart attacks. Yesterday, two new results analysis studies for hundreds of thousands of people have reaffirmed that the drug can be dangerous for the heart and hang the degree of risk close to the conclusion of 07. The company that makes Avandia, GlaxoSmithKline, fired back with a denial that Avandia is dangerous. But the pressure to get the market is running high, and two advisory groups to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) meet in a few weeks to discuss what to do.

The new studies were conducted by researchers who have long expressed concerns about Avandia, also known by its generic name rosiglitazone. The first was published online by The Journal of the American Medical Association . There, David Graham, who works in drug safety at the FDA, and colleagues turned to a database of 227.571 people on Medicare, meaning they were older than 65. each of them had been treated with either Avandia or Actos (pioglitazone), a similar drug.

Data on medication use were available through the prescription drug Medicare, which took effect in January. 06 The group of Graham found that people taking Avandia had about a 18% higher risk of heart attack, stroke, heart failure or death compared to those on Actos, which other studies have shown is just as effective.

The second study was conducted by cardiologist Steven Nissen at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio; Nissen who was there 3 years, triggered the storm with Avandia meta-analysis of 42 trials of Avandia that he said suggested an increased risk of heart attack. In his latest article, published with his colleague Kathy Wolski, published online yesterday in Archives of Internal Medicine , Nissen has updated its previous meta-analysis by analyzing 56 trials and found an additional heart attack for every 52 patients on the drug.

Although both studies have limitations, an accompanying editorial Graham reviewed the convincing conclusions: "Accumulation concerns about rosiglitazone advance difficultto a convincing argument regarding the reason which, exactly, a patient might want to receive the drug. "FDA advisers meet July 13 to give their own judgment whether the drug is safe enough to be used.

A cancer genomics researcher at Duke University was put on leave after administrators learned that falsely claimed he was a Rhodes scholar. The school took the action after Letter cancer in Washington, DC, newsletter, investigated allegations of Anil Potti of being a Rhodes Scholar to several grant applications. The online newsletter reported on Thursday that he learned of the foundation that Rhodes Potti never received the prestigious award, which is given for the study at the University of Oxford in the UK.

Potti explained in an e-mail sent to the newsletter was a candidate for the award, Letter cancer reports. The newsletter was also able to confirm other details in various Potti biographies, including two awards, he said, to have received research organizations on cancer. On Friday, officials told the Duke The News & Observer they put on administrative leave Potti while investigating the allegations.

The American Cancer Society has suspended payments on a research grant to Potti $ 729,000.

Potti is a co-investigator on the research at Duke led by Joseph Nevins on the use of gene expression networks to predict the response of a cancer patient to chemotherapy. Two external statisticians found serious errors in key publications by the Duke group, according to Letter cancer .

The decision of the court yesterday temporarily blocking federal funding for work with human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) left researchers working with cells in limbo government lawyers decide how to react.

Judge Royce Lamberth of the US District Court for the District of Columbia issued a temporary injunction blocking the federal government to implement national current Institutes of Health (NIH) guidelines governing research with hESCs. In his 15-page ruling, Lamberth said that "ESC research necessarily depends upon the destruction of a human embryo." And because Congress each year since 1996 adopted the so-called Dickey-Wicker Amendment, which prevents Government funding "research in which a human embryo or embryos are destroyed," the government can not finance the work with cells.

the decision comes as part of a lawsuit filed a year ago by Christian groups opposed to embryo research. the US district court dismissed the complaint because it found the applicants, including some embryos listed with names, had no legal status . But in June, the Court of the United States of Washington of appeal reinstated the suit. the court ruled that two doctors on the suit, the stem cell scientists James Sherley and Theresa Deisher, do have standing because the lines NIH stem cell guidelines aggrieved by decreasing their chance of receiving funding for work on adult stem cells.

Although the prosecution was led on the rules of the Obama administration to increase funding for hESC research, Lamberth's opinion strongly suggests that funding under the Bush administration was also illegal under the Dickey Amendment.

It is unclear this morning if researchers who had received money from the grant to study hESC-a total of $ 137 million in 2010, could continue their projects. NIH referred journalists to the Ministry of Justice; a spokesman for the Department of Justice said that the department review the decision and had no further comment.

Mazzaschi Anthony, Director of Scientific Affairs of the Association of American Medical Colleges in Washington, DC, sees two options for the Obama administration to avoid the judgment of the current research. Federal lawyers could ask the appellate court to stay the injunction after a trial is held. Or they could issue a restrictive interpretation of the decision which allows continuous research to proceed and see if it is. "We need to take a deep breath and see what the plans of justice are," said Mazzaschi.

Harvard University said its researchers as NIH informed them otherwise, they could continue work on previous grants. But some scientists were taking no chances. George Daley, a researcher on stem cells at the Harvard stem cell Institute, said he had asked his lab members to keep separate any work with the hESC materials purchased with NIH money. "I read the decision, and I would be surprised if someone else can find a way to interpret this as nothing less than a general ban on the use of federal funds for research on human ES cells, "he said.

If the injunction holds the only way for federal funding of hESC research could continue is if Congress passes a law replacing the Dickey Amendment. Representative Diana DeGette (D-CO), co-sponsor of a bill to codify Obama stem cell policy, issued a statement calling the decision "deeply disappointing" and saying that "we have to pass sensible legislation seeking embryonic stem cells. " As an alternative to a stand-alone bill, Congress could add an amendment to a current bill ending the Dickey-Wicker rule.

But Mazzaschi said he is certain that legislators will want to take the legislation on stem cells during the "madness" of a year midterm elections when many Democrats and Republican moderates are vulnerable.

Science Insider will relay updates on the consequences of the injunction.

For more information on the prohibition of stem cells, see our full coverage.

Does the human embryonic stem cell (hESC) research violating the law? And is it logical to stop federal funding of work while the courts weigh this question?

Yesterday, the Chief Justice Royce Lamberth of the US District Court in Washington ruled that the prohibition of funding, it imposed two weeks ago stick for now. The Department of Justice is expected to appeal the decision, which makes it even more complicated case. Meanwhile, scientists of the country, particularly the National Institutes of Health (NIH), where all the work of hESCs is stopped, are exasperated and deeply disturbed by the case.

Although moral opposition to hESC research is certainly helping drive Sherley v. Sebelius , the case also includes complex legal issues. Lawyers say there are three distinct parts the case, and dissect each, it is easier to understand where the judge comes and where ambiguities are.

First, the complainants, scientists studying adult stem cells, have the right to bring this matter? Second, is that their argument hESC research violates the Dickey Amendment, which prohibits federal funding for research that destroys embryos or night it reasonable? And thirdly, what is behind the preliminary funding stop order for Lamberth while it decides the case?

This is Science stab Insider to analyze each of these issues.

In the legal world, the first point is called "standing", that is, if the applicants have the right to bring a case to court. To have standing, the plaintiff "must have suffered actual damage caused by the action of the accused," said Suzanna Sherry expert from Vanderbilt University Law School in Nashville. Initially, Lamberth did not favorably position complainants, who at first were a larger group, including embryos, as an organization, Nightlight Christian Adoptions, which provides embryo-adoption services. He dismissed the case and the plaintiffs appealed. the Court of appeal agreed with DC partially Lamberth, but he found that two of the original scientific-plaintiffs James Sherley and Theresa Deisher-have been harmed by the funding of NIH research on hESCs. both remained on the suit while the rest has been removed.

This may seem exaggerated to scientists who claim, rightly, that the NIH fund much more research on adult stem cells as embryonic cells. But 'injury' from a legal point of view should not always be painful to count in courts. "The court has hesitated on the direct and immediate way of harm must be," said Sherry. Here, she believes, "evil is quite clear from their reserve fund is reduced." It may even be speculative-Sherry agrees that it's not as if the grant Sherley was denied because he went directly to an ES cell researcher. But, she adds, some courts consider "permanent should be interpreted very liberally because we want to pull people from the court "could have a case.

Standing requires not only that someone was hurt, but that with a favorable court decision, evil dissipate. And it is almost certain here, said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California, Irvine, School of Law. "I am very surprised that they found standing in this case," he said. There is no indication that Sherley and Deisher (who never asked for NIH grant) funding would be allocated if the support hESC research has ended.

Harm also should be considered through the prism of wrongdoing. It's not like any scientist whose grant will unfunded can successfully pursue NIH. However, Sherry said, they claimed that the agency flipping a coin to make grants and to distribute funds to friends NIH officials, then they have a case.

Here, Sherley and Deisher allege that NIH violates an act of Congress in 1995 called the Dickey Amendment. Dickey-Wicker prohibits the Department of Health and human Services (HHS), which includes NIH to fund the destruction of human embryos or research funding which embryos are destroyed. When Dickey-Wicker was written 15 years ago, the hESC research has not yet begun. "All we talked about was directly on research on the embryo," for example, to improve the treatment of infertility or to better understand the biology of cancer, said R. Alta Charo, a law professor and bioethicist at the University of Wisconsin Law School who was a member of the NIH human embryo research Panel in the mid-190s, which examined how embryos can be used in research. "Dickey-Wicker was a reaction to that."

In 1999, Harriet Rabb, then Advocate General at HHS, found that Dickey-Wicker has not stopped government support for hESC research. The prohibition of funding, she wrote, "is not applicable to research using human pluripotent stem cells because these cells are not a human embryo in the legal definition." This argument was accepted by the Clinton, Bush and the Obama administration and Congress to appropriate money for hESC research. Rabb declined to comment for this story.

What Sherley and Deisher have a case that funding for hESC research violates Dickey -Wicker is tricky, say some scientists. for one, "we can say that there is a tension" which has just separated the destruction of the embryo for research on the resulting cells, says John Robertson, who is studying law and bioethics at the University of Texas School of law. Another problem is that in July 09 its guidelines on Human Research of stem cells, NIH statement of specific requirements regarding embryo donation for the newly derived lines, said Pilar Ossorio, a lawyer who studies ethics research at the University of Wisconsin Law School. The donation process is entirely separate from the search on the resulting cells. But NIH included this information in its guidelines to ensure that no undue influence on embryo donation for research, said Ossorio. An unintended consequence is that some may ask, "If NIH has not even finance the destruction of embryos, why these guidelines even talk about this?" She said.

advocates "The complainants stressed this in their brief on Friday. The Dickey-Wicker Amendment forbids the funding of research in which embryos are "knowingly subjected to risk of injury or death," they note. They then argue that "By creating a financial incentive for embryonic stem cell research an incentive that the confession even NIH will invest" hundreds of millions of dollars "-and specifying the precise means by which embryos are be destroyed in order to qualify for federal funding, the NIH necessarily and knowingly submits embryos at significant risk of injury or death. "

on the other hand, agreed with the plaintiffs" is to say that the [federal] agencies were wrong "all these years, Charo said. The courts tend to defer to federal agencies on the interpretation of laws as Dickey-Wicker, and the fact that the interpretation HHS has been consistent and has not been challenged in court until now may weaken because of complainants.

Ultimately, Robertson said, if you agree with Lamberth comes down to how you define "research". Lamberth, he said, is "a lumper, not a divider." In its preliminary injunction on August 23, Lamberth wrote that "if a step or 'piece of research' of an ESC research results in the destruction an embryo, the entire project is precluded from receiving federal funding by the Dickey-Wicker Amendment. "

This is" mushing things together in the real world of science are quite distinct "says Robertson. How hESCs are grown, that genetic or chemical signals cause them to differentiate into different cell types, how pluripotency is preserved- "each of them is almost a mini-world to among researchers." Important that this separation is key to assessing the case.

One of the most confusing elements of Sherley v. Sebelius is whether Bush rules, which allowed research on hESC lines that existed in 01, violates Dickey Wicker. In order yesterday, Lamberth wrote that they have not "The prior [Bush Administration] guidelines, of course, allowed research only on existing stem cell lines, excluding the additional destruction embryos. "

the current guidelines allow NIH research with newly derived lines, which Lamberth considered inseparable from the destruction of embryos." by his own logic, "says Charo, the ban Lamberth on financing "should apply to ... cell lines that are derived now." Cell lines derived 3 months or a year ago "have yet to be eligible for funding," she said.

A place where Lamberth is on shaky ground, lawyers believe, is in its decision to issue a preliminary injunction it 2 weeks ago. One case cited above by Lamberth called preliminary injunctions "an extraordinary remedy." They are granted only when it is considered very likely that the parties seek are likely to succeed in their case; when they suffer irreparable harm without one; and when an injunction will not "substantially" hurt others with an interest in the result and promote the public good.

Experts are particularly skeptical about the injury to Sherley and Deisher if funding for hESC research should continue while the judge considers the case.

The interest plaintiffs here "look very slight indeed, [and] do not seem dangerous enough ... to justify a preliminary injunction," said Robertson. This is especially true when considering the damage caused to the NIH and science programs that are now in chaos, he added.

Resolution may need to come from Congress, but we do not know exactly what that would entail. Undoing Dickey-Wicker entirely that could, legally speaking, the safest bet, but it may not be politically acceptable for legislators, particularly in an election year.

See our full coverage of this issue.

The father of in vitro fertilization (IVF) won the Nobel Prize this year in physiology or medicine. Robert G. Edwards, professor emeritus at the University of Cambridge, U.K., is the only prize winner. "His achievements have helped treat infertility, a medical condition that affects many parts of humanity including more than 10% of all couples worldwide," the Nobel Committee wrote, noting that nearly 4 million children have been born following IVF.

Edwards is seriously ill and was apparently unable to make the phone call from the Nobel Committee notifying the price. Göran Hansson, secretary of the Nobel Assembly in 2010, said he had spoken to the woman of Edwards, who said she was very happy and was sure Edwards would as well.

In the 1950s, inspired by the work that has shown that egg cells from rabbits could be fertilized in the lab and give birth to children, Edwards has been working to understand the biology of human cells to eggs, sperm and embryos. His research clarified how human eggs mature, how hormones regulate their maturation, and when the eggs can be fertilized by sperm. He has also been on the necessary conditions to enable the sperm and fertilize the egg. In 1969, he and his colleagues managed to impregnate a human egg in vitro for the first time. But the embryo was fragile and has not developed.

Edwards worked with gynecologist Patrick Steptoe, who developed the technique of laparoscopy to recover mature eggs from the ovaries. The embryos that resulted from fertilizing the oocytes developed further, but the pair ran into strong opposition to their research, and in 1971, the Medical Research Council U.K. refused their request for additional funding. A private donation allowed them to continue their work. Ultimately, in 1978, Louise Brown, the first "test tube baby" was born. Steptoe died in 1988; because the Nobel Prizes are awarded only to living scientists, it could not have been included.

Edwards was actively involved in ethical debates from the start, as he said in a 1999 speech "We are interested in the ethical situation before we started. The first ethical papers were written by my colleagues and myself, "said Edwards." We wrote ethical papers in 1970 Nature , and before that in other newspapers. ... and no one can ethicists say that ran the ethical debate on in vitro fertilization. They do not. "

"They were definitely swim upstream" says embryologist and stem cell researcher Roger Pedersen of the University of Cambridge. "The medical community has not been receptive" of what they were trying to do he said. "But of course, what happened is that they have revolutionized the treatment of infertility." the award, he says, is a powerful recognition "that fertility is a health problem."

the work of Edwards also allowed researchers to finally draw the human embryonic stem cells, Pedersen said: "This was part of his original vision." However, the Karolinska Institute cell biologist and member of the Nobel Christer Hoog-Assembly who also wrote a paper outlining why Edwards deserved a Nobel-said in an official interview after the announcement that the price was not to make a statement about the research on stem cells. "This price is only for the core technology" of IVF, he said.

Despite being famous lips tight, the Nobel organization seems to have sprung a leak this year. This morning, a story by the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet Edwards tipped as the likely winner. (Apparently confident in its case, the paper also translated the story, written by medical journalist Inger Atterstam in English.) When press conference this morning, Hansson said he was "very shocked" by the leak. Höög said he could not say whether there will be a formal investigation.

WASHINGTON, DC .- Tens of geneticists have shown at a public meeting today at the center one day conference here and expressed concern about a planned register of genetic testing administered by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The gathering, an opportunity to discuss concerns anyone in the community has with the register highlighted ongoing concerns about how the registry will work and whether it will let consumers who think that it tests listed are all scientifically sound.

The registry aims to provide information on genetic testing for health care providers, researchers and consumers. But from the moment it was first announced in March, it has been criticized for being voluntary, ie not to require companies list their tests, something that NIH does not have the legal power to do. NIH also does not plan to conduct a scientific review of the tests listed in the database.

Since NIH put the word on its register, genetic tests have been even more control than ever before, making the register both potentially most important, there is nothing another like him there, but also generate more scrutiny. FDA crushed an attempt by Pathway Genomics to sell genetic tests Walgreens chain pharmacies, and an office of the Government Accountability (GAO) investigation of the summer found that genetic testing companies representatives provided information false or doubtful customers.

At the beginning of today's meeting, James Ostell, head of the Information Engineering Branch at the NIH National Center for Biotechnology Information, unveiled a prototype of the database . To address some of the 68 NIH comments received, the page featured example of a tab marked "powers" where companies could list their licenses and certifications. There was also a green marker indicating FDA approval.

However, participants in the meeting were impressed. Many, including Sherri Bale, co-president and clinical director of GeneDX, a company that specializes in genetic testing for rare diseases, called for the database to be limited to only highly validated tests. "Medically relevant genetic testing Only the highest quality should be represented in the register," she said.

This could be the ideal-have some sort of scientific review of test-listed is just not an option for NIH at this time, said director Francis Collins, who spoke at the beginning of the day. "To be honest, it will require resources beyond our means and authority […] to primary performance data," he said.

But without independent reviews, many at the meeting argued, health care providers or consumers may feel the test is clinically validated just because it is included in a database NIH sponsored data. Many of the participants at the meeting hoped that the database at least featured an optional review process.

"Leaving aside professional assessment, I think, would be a mistake," said Robert Nussbaum, a medical geneticist at the University of California, San Francisco. "If we will do it, do it right."

NIH plans to weigh these issues over the coming months. It is hoping to launch the full database in spring 2011.

The Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) today announced a new competition to help scientists born abroad trained in the United States are building research programs after they return to their country of origin. early career scientists from 18 countries are eligible for 5 years, $ 650,000 price, and up to 35 grants will be made.

HHMI President Robert Tjian said the program is part of an effort to broaden the scope of international programs of the Institute, which now receive about $ 10 million $ 827 million Hughes spends each year on research and education. The United States leads a "large number" of foreign postdocs, that "I am absolutely," said Tjian. But many obstacles facing their scientific careers after their return home. "The goal is to provide those who want to go back with the ability" to continue to make high-end research, he said.

To be eligible, applicants must have completed graduate or medical school or a postdoc in the United States and started a laboratory in the last 7 years. Those selected will receive $ 250,000 the first year and $ 100,000 per year for 4 years. They will also attend meetings with the 350 HHMI investigators supports the United States.

Hughes began its international programs in 1991, with prices to scientists in Canada, Mexico, and later in South America and Eastern Europe. The 18 countries eligible for the new competition are "a new set of players," said Tjian. Canada, Uruguay, Venezuela, Peru, and nine East European countries have been abandoned, and China, Egypt, India, Italy, Portugal, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Taiwan, and Turkey have been added. The countries were chosen because they have the infrastructure - like good education systems still support scientific news can not provide all the research funding they need for HHMI calls "potentially transformative projects research. "the applications are due February 23.

Bruce Stillman, a member of the medical advisory board of HHMI, said the new program will export the model to enable young scientists to work in the United States regardless . in many countries, Stillman said, the system is "very hierarchical" and dominated by older scientific or "scientific socialism", in which it is difficult for the best stand. "I think it's a good move . Hughes should put its money where it will make a difference, "said Stillman, president of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York. The program joins another new HHMI international company, a $ 60 million center in South Africa who will review co-incidence of HIV and tuberculosis.

Tjian also phases out programs based on geographical institute for researchers at all career stages and another international program focused on infectious and parasitic diseases, which together support about 100 investigators . HHMI has not yet decided what, if anything, will replace the funding it provides to these scientists established after the last grants managed in December 2011. "There may be a short break," said Tjian while the Institute evaluates the results of early-career program.

Some international researchers say they are not concerned about losing their HHMI support. But others, excluded from the new initiative because they do not qualify as early career researchers or do not form in the United States, expressed their frustration at the lack of information on Hughes plans for them . Marta Miaczynska International Institute of Molecular Biology and Cell in Warsaw says Poland is the overhaul of its subsidy system and is not sure how it will replace its HHMI funding, which covers 20% to 25% of costs his laboratory. "I regret that we can not seek renewal of our HHMI grants," said Miaczynska.

molecular biologist Alberto Kornblihtt of the University of Buenos Aires used 9 years of HHMI support to expand its laboratory and publishing a series of publications in high impact journals. But he is worried that this success will come to an end. the local funding "will not be sufficient alone to support the kind of science, we have managed to do through HHMI, "Kornblihtt said, that is not eligible for the new prices

Testimony on the brain activity of a convicted murderer may have saved him from the death penalty.

Earlier this month, a Miami jury rejected the death penalty and chose life in prison for Grady Nelson, who in 05 stabbed his wife 61 times, killing, and stabbed and raped his 11-year daughter with mental disabilities. A report in The Miami Herald last weekend suggests that measures of Nelson of brain activity have influenced some members of the jury who saw the results as proof of a brain injury that partly explain his behavior. But some scientists criticize the way this technology was used in the case. During the sentencing phase, the court heard the testimony of Robert Thatcher, a neuroscientist and president of Applied Neuroscience Inc. of St. Petersburg, Florida. Company Thatcher Nelson examined using a method called quantitative electroencephalography (QEEG). As in the standard EEG, technicians place the electrodes on the skull to record the electrical activity in the brain. In QEEG, a computer program analyzes these records to locate the abnormal activity areas. In the case of Nelson, there was an obvious anomaly in the left frontal lobe, Thatcher said.

Thatcher also testified that Nelson had "sharp waves" from the region. These large peaks in the EEG traces are usually seen in people with epilepsy. Grady is not epileptic, but it has a history of three or traumatic brain injuries, Thatcher said yesterday in an interview.

In the courtyard, Thatcher said the injuries Nelson suffered head could cause this type of EEG abnormality. He also told the court that the frontal lobes are important for controlling behavior. "When the frontal lobes are damaged, people have difficulty removing actions ... and do not understand the consequences of their actions," said Thatcher ScienceInsider .

The data presented QEEG Thatcher were riddled with artifacts, and its analysis has been undermined by serious flaws statistics, said Charles Epstein, a neurologist at Emory University in Atlanta, who testified for the prosecution . Epstein added that the strong waves brought Thatcher looked more blips caused by the contraction of the muscles of the head. "I treat people with head trauma all the time," he said. "I see in people with a brain injury."

But at least some members of the jury may have been influenced by the testimony of Thatcher. Six jurors voted for the death penalty. But two of those who voted against him said the Miami Herald that the QEEG evidence was influential:

Delores Cannon, secretary of the hospital, said she leaned toward the death until the technology was introduced. "But then, when he entered, the facts about the QEEG, some of us have changed our minds," she said.

John Howard, a service of the airport worker fleet, he said, too, was prepared to recommend death. "It is my decision all around," said the QEEG Howard [sic]. "The technology really influenced me ... After seing the brain scans, I am convinced that this guy had some kind of brain problem."

Counsel for Nelson certainly think. "This may be the first time in a criminal courtroom in the United States where QEEG analysis has been deemed admissible and respected for its ability to provide vital information about brain injuries and disorders," said the attorney Terence Lenamon defense in a press release that appears to have been issued to Nelson.

This may be a stretch. in an affidavit filed with the court, Thatcher provided a "partial list" of 18 previous cases where QEEG was used to establish that someone had suffered a traumatic brain injury. (There are also cases where judges have ruled that the QEEG evidence is not eligible.)

in Nelson's case, however, QEEG was used to explain his behavior. This type of application is much more problematic than using it to establish an injury, said Andrew Leuchter, a neurologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, who was not involved in the case.

Leuchter uses QEEG research and said it has several uses such as clinical valid distinguishing Alzheimer's disease from other types of dementia. "You can certainly say with a high degree of confidence in this type of test that a person's brain does not function properly, and you can sometimes tell what caused" says Leuchter. "The only thing you can not do is to link the actions of someone in their abnormal brain function. This is far beyond anything we can do right now."

Cancer researchers have discovered a new genetic abnormality in tumor cells that distinguishes them from normal cells. In mice and humans, the angled cancer cells in large quantities of a specific type of RNA that has been ignored so far. This discovery could shed light on how cancer develops and could give pathologists a new marker for detecting cancer cells in a biopsy.

Postdoctoral researcher David Ting and his colleagues in the laboratory of geneticist Cancer Daniel Haber of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston have found their new marker using next generation sequencing machine to measure RNA molecules, or transcripts which are encoded by the DNA of a cancer cell. Unlike traditional microarray dotted with DNA probes that measure the activity of a subset of the 20,000 genes of a cell, this gene expression analysis "digital" has collected all of the transcripts of RNA.

To the surprise of scientists, a significant fraction of the RNA transcripts in the first sample they tested a mouse-pancreatic tumor was encoded by a DNA sequence type called repetitions satellite. These are short, repeated DNA stretches that do not encode proteins. Because the satellite repeats are not considered important, do not test microarrays for expression, said Haber.

In eight of the 10 pancreatic tumors in mice, the level of transcribed satellite was a stunning 40 times higher than in normal mouse pancreatic cells, the team announced today online science . The findings were similar in human tumors. high levels of a particular satellite RNA in 15 of 15 human pancreatic cancers as well as in a small sample of the prostate, lung, kidney and ovarian tumors compared to normal human cells

When team Haber stained this satellite RNA in tissues of the pancreas had been removed for biopsy, they showed that cancer cells are clearly (see image), even in the early stages of the disease. The marker could improve diagnosis of cancer, the researchers say. Often, doctors who suspect cancer in an organ will use a needle to collect a few cells and examine their form. Although this test is less invasive than a surgical biopsy, it is not as accurate-ting said that only 60% to 80% of pancreatic samples obtained in this manner are correctly diagnosed. Pathologist Ralph Hruban of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland, says that cell staining is "pretty impressive," recognizes that it might help with biopsies that are difficult to interpret.

The Haber group hopes to use the marker to improve tumor cell (CTC) chip in circulation, a device that captures cancer cells floating in a blood sample of a patient. The method is based on protein markers to distinguish cancer cells from normal cells trapped by the chip, but no existing markers cutting all types of cancer. (Although the cancer cells still carry mutations and abnormally expressed genes, so far no individual cancer cells genetic glitch distinguished from normal cells.) "This seems to be so radically different," said Haber. However, his group n has not yet worked out how to detect the satellite RNA in the cells trapped by a CTC chip.

on the road, the high expression levels by satellite could help reveal how cancer develops . "It is surprising and it means something. But at this stage we do not know what that means, "says Tyler Jacks cancer biologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. The group Haber found that high RNA levels correlate with the expression of certain genes involved in embryonic development, suggesting that cancer could be using normal development programs to evolve. But researchers still need to understand why satellite RNA levels are so high and whether they contribute to cancer or are simply a side effect of another process.

A National Institutes of Health program (NIH) to track down the causes of mysterious diseases fruit bearing. A multidisciplinary team of physicians and genetic researchers discovered the genetic cause of a strange illness afflicting vascular sisters that leads to an accumulation of calcium in the arterial walls, which causes hardening and joint pain.

The document of the group, published in tomorrow's issue of The New England Journal of Medicine , is the first report of a new genetic disease out of 3 years non Disease Program NIH diagnosed. It is a consortium of researchers from across NIH and volunteer experts from academic medical centers across the country that receive referrals for patients whose doctors were unable to diagnose. "A success like this we buoys emotionally and encourages us," the program director and co-author William Gahl, who is also clinical director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, said in a press conference Tuesday.

Since its inception in 08, the Undiagnosed Diseases Program received 1,700 customers and accepted 330 of them; researchers report seeing 150 to 0 patients a year. The objective of the program, Gahl said, is twofold: to diagnose patients whose disease escaped medical knowledge and to conduct research.

In 09, the program received a recommendation from a doctor to Kentucky two sisters, Paula Allen and Louise Benge, who suffered from joint pain and showed accumulation of calcium in the arteries in the X (above) rays. The images "amazed us," Gahl said. Team DNA samples obtained sisters and other family members (three siblings and Allen Benge had the same recessive disease) and scanned DNA markers called single nucleotide polymorphisms that researchers used to refine the location of the disease gene. Also examining the genetic region in two other families with similar disorders, the researchers were able to identify a mutation in a specific gene, NT5E , which is involved in the degradation calcification in the arteries.

The researchers named the ACDC disease (arterial calcification due to CD73 deficiency). The discovery revealed a previously unknown molecular mechanism for preventing calcification and may open approaches for treating patients suffering from the most common diseases of atherosclerosis and osteoporosis, said study lead author Manfred Boehm NIH.

Allen and Benge praised the "impressive" work by the NIH. "Even if they can not help us, maybe one day they can help someone else with these problems," said Benge. Boehm said a clinical trial of a drug to treat the sisters and other ACDC is currently being reviewed by an ethics committee.

The Undiagnosed Diseases Program is "marvelous; ... We were delighted when it started, "said Mary Dunkle, spokesman of the National Organization for Rare Disorders (NORD), a group of patient advocacy based in Washington DC. NORTH evoked a number of patients at NIH. "in our world, a lot of times the knowledge is acquired in small increments," said Dunkle. "There is always progress when they are able to identify something that is a complete new entity."

* This article has been corrected to reflect this February 4 study co-author William Gahl is the clinical director of the National Institute for Research on the human genome.

Driven by concerns about a US-sponsored study ethics in the 1940s, bioethics advisers to President Barack Obama formed an international panel today will consider whether current rules adequately protect volunteers in global clinical trials.

A historian at Wellesley College last October shocked the nation with the revelation that, from 1946 to 1948, an American researcher Public Health Service deliberately exposed Guatemalan prisoners, soldiers, and other syphilis and gonorrhea. Experiments have drawn comparisons with Tuskegee study of 40 known in Alabama began in 1932 in which American researchers has hundreds of African American men with syphilis were not treated.

In response, President Obama asked his Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues to consider whether "the current rules for research participants protect people against evil or otherwise processing ethics, nationally and internationally. "Obama also asked the Institute of medicine (IOM) to investigate the Guatemala study. But the investigative work also fell to the bioethics commission after IOM realized that five of its members were involved in the study. the committee is chaired by the University of Pennsylvania President Amy Gutmann and vice-chaired by Emory University President James Wagner.

today, Gutmann announced the members of a committee that will examine the "relevance" standard "in the field of international research today," she said. members include four experts of the Committee Bioethics and 10 others from 10 countries, from Belgium to Uganda to India. The panel will meet three times before reporting to the Committee in August the Gutmann panel will also receive notice of Guatemala's vice president, Jose Rafeal Espada, former cardiothoracic surgeon.

A team of 12 staff members of the commission and several academic consultants have already started digging into 477 boxes of documents on Guatemala studies. They want to respond to these "core issues" like who knew the study, when they knew it, and what they did about it, the commission said Executive Director Valerie Bonham. His staff plan to complete its report by the summer.

At today's meeting, the Commission heard from various experts on the landscape of international trials. clinical researcher Robert Califf Duke University described a surge in the number of tests in the last decade, companies seeking to reduce costs and avoid the inefficiencies of the US-based assays. He identified payments to patients that far exceed local standards as the most common ethical problem.

University of Washington researcher on HIV Lawrence Corey, head of the vaccine against HIV Trials Network US-funded, described the efforts of his team in partnership with local researchers so that the community benefits from the results, for example, on circumcision for reducing HIV transmission.

University of Wisconsin, Madison, historian Susan Lederer briefly reviewed the ethics of medical research in the early and mid 20th century. She said the control groups were a new idea when experiments like those of Guatemala and Tuskegee a team of US syphilogists expected, and researchers still do not use written protocols. The case of Guatemala "is unlikely that the only study of its kind out there lurking in the archives," said Lederer. (More studies contrary to ethics were revealed by the Associated Press yesterday.)

Yet ethicist Dan Brock of Harvard Medical School in Boston said it is "quite unlikely" that the study Guatemala could happen now. "Everybody now agrees" on what was wrong, he said, suggesting that "does not provide much new work of the commission." But Indiana University, Indianapolis, ethicist Eric Meslin in disagreement. "it could happen today" even the United States, he said, because the so-called common rule for the protection of US human subjects, not about research not funded by the government or submitted to the US Food and Drug Administration.

Guttmann said lots the commission to do so because of increased testing and because the general rule was not revised "for decades. "the Guatemala study are" a reminder of the historical injustices, "she said Science Insider." We have to ask ourselves, as a committee, are there practices against people seeking to return today as [being as] unethical practices that we plan to return to Guatemala? "

The presentation of the international jury is looking only research funded by the US government. But Gutmann said, "We are free to move beyond" for tests conducted by pharmaceutical companies Bioethics Committee will report to the President by the end of this year, says Gutmann

.. yesterday, the commission began discussing the ethics of genetic and neuroimaging, including the opportunity to say study volunteers about unexpected results that are not directly related to the research. the panel "refine the subject "before its next meeting in May, says Gutmann.

Health concerns have increased in Japan after the government found unacceptable levels of radiation in milk and vegetables from several regions and in drinking water Tokyo. The radiation comes from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. But how worrying are the levels of radiation? And when the food and water supply is safe again?

According to reports today, two tap water samples tested at Tokyo contained 10 and 210 becquerels / kilogram (Bq / kg) of iodine-131. This level is almost double the limit of 100 Bq / kg for infants that is considered safe by officials of Japan's health.

In response, the Japanese authorities advised parents not to give babies tap water or use it in the formula. Children are of particular concern because any iodine-131 will be absorbed by ingestion of development of the thyroid gland and can lead to thyroid cancer. (The security level is three times higher for adults.)

However, the risk to babies is small, said epidemiologist Richard Wakeford of the University of Manchester in the UK. According to his calculations, a child drinking water tap for a year that contained twice the level of security for iodine-131 would receive a dose of about 0.8 millisieverts. By comparison, the dose from natural background sources is 2.5 millisieverts per year, he said.

nuclear engineer Shih-Chen Yew US Department of Argonne National Laboratory Energy in Illinois says he is "not at all surprised" that iodine-131 is showing in water from Tokyo because if the wind blows to the south of the plant, it could carry radiation far. Without knowing the source of drinking water in Tokyo, however, he said it is difficult to say exactly how iodine entered the water supply. But most likely, it came from airborne dust or fell in the rain or snow fed lakes, rivers and reservoirs .

the good news is that iodine-131 has a half-life of only eight days, so that all radiation from the Fukushima plant will have disappeared from the water within a couple months after the leaks are stopped.

Japan has also banned the sale of raw milk and some vegetables from Fukushima Prefecture and other prefectures after dangerous levels of iodine-131 and cesium-137 were detected in the samples. (The United States banned imports of dairy products and produce from several regions.) Milk is likely became infected when fed cows in pastures sprinkled fallout. Spinach, which had some of the highest detected radiation levels, has large leaves that collect the most radioactive dust that nonleafy vegetables.

As with tap water, the security levels are defined according to ingesting large quantities of food over a long period. "Unless you have consumed continuously at a high level," the level of exposure would be minimal, said Chen.

The threat of iodine-131 in food will also quickly disappear once cessation of discharges. But cesium-137 is a different story. once the cesium enters the soil, its half-life of 30 years became a "long-term problem for sure," Chen said, and it will appear in vegetables, meat and milk.

How much of a problem depends on the soil type, the retirement said Colorado State University radioecologist F. Ward Whicker. Clay binds the metal and keeps the plants to take up. But if the soil is sandy and clay poor, cesium "can be recycled from the soil for planting in the ground for a long, long time," says Wicker. The authorities dealt with the problem after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986 turning on a deep layer of soil to bury the radioactive dust.

for our complete coverage of the crisis in Japan, see our Japan Earthquake page . to Science s answers to readers' questions about the crisis, see our Quake issues .

Suppose you are one of many scientists racing to design mosquitoes unable to transmit malaria or other major scourge and you succeed. Now what? You can free the creatures in the real world, but if they are not a unique advantage, they are largely outnumbered by the billions of natural mosquitoes already there.

Now scientists have developed a new genetic trick that might help mosquitoes resistant to diseases spread like wildfire. The system, a so-called gene drive, is published online today in Nature .

The new study is part of an explosion in genetic research mosquitoes is to stop mosquitoes from transmitting malaria-which killed about 800,000 people in 09 and several other diseases. Already, scientists have identified several genes that mosquitoes when tinkered, reduce the ability of mosquitoes to transmit a virus or a parasite; they also gave the insects new genes that do the same thing.

But questions clouding the future of the area was how to "replace" natural populations with these new and improved mosquito. For this, scientists need a system that will help high lab mosquitoes take over wild populations, to ensure that resistance genes become ubiquitous. Scientists are working on several strategies; have many supposedly selfish genes, strange stretches of DNA from natural origin that have the means to spread in populations of almost parasitically. The idea is that these genes could be harnessed to others who mess with the parasite's life cycle and to those who spread as well. But although researchers have had some success in fruit flies, no one was able to get a gene drive system is in mosquitoes.

The new study, conducted by molecular biologists Andrea Crisanti and Austin Burt of Imperial College London, was done in Anopheles gambiae , the mosquito species is by far the support the most important of malaria. The scientists used a gene called homing endonuclease (HEG), a selfish gene found in fungi, plants and bacteria that has the ability to create a second copy of itself in people who have a alone. This ensures that all offspring have the gene as well, and it is one of the fastest genes can spread in nature means, said insect geneticist Jason Rasgon of the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health at Bloomberg Baltimore, Maryland who was not involved in the new study.

To show that they can harness that power, researchers have a high population of Anopheles mosquitoes that glowed in the dark, with a green fluorescent protein. They then released into their cages small numbers of mosquitoes with HEG specifically designed to break the gene of the fluorescent protein in sperm cells and to fit into the same location on the chromosome, thereby ensuring its propagation in the next generation. In this way, the team could simply monitor the spread of the HEG by counting the number of mosquitoes in each generation was lit in green.

As scientific models have predicted, cages quickly grew darker over time. If, for example, only 1% of mosquitoes were HEG early experience, about 60% were 12 generations later. This means that the gene has the ability to turn even large populations in a short period of time, said Crisanti.

The next step, he says, is to not break the HEG gene fluorescent protein but which is crucial to the transmission of malaria. It could be an odor recognition gene that helps the mosquito finds its host, for example, or one that the malaria parasite needs to enter in the salivary glands of the mosquito; the team already 10 to 15 candidates.

Rasgon welcomes the study as the first to show that a gene can drive in mosquitoes, which has long been a critical challenge in the field. "They still have a long way to go," said Rasgon. "But as a proof of principle, it is quite impressive."

evidence "overwhelmingly" suggests that cholera was inadvertently brought to Haiti by peacekeepers of the UN, an independent group concludes in a report to the Secretary General of UN Ban Ki-moon, which was published yesterday. the report is based on a review of genetic and epidemiological data and a study of the sanitation system of a UN camp near the site of the first cases. so beware not to assign blame, the report presents a series of recommendations aimed at preventing similar disasters in the future, including UN personnel screening in cholera endemic areas for the presence of Vibrio cholerae before leaving the house and giving them prophylactic antibiotic dose.

Shortly after the beginning of the outbreak, which has sickened nearly 300,000 people and killed nearly 5,000 Haitians fingering the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), which has a camp populated of Nepalese soldiers in Mirebalais in the Centre department, very close to where the first cases of cholera occurred. The camp was also blamed in an epidemiological report released by a French expert from cholera Renaud Piarroux the University of the Mediterranean in Marseille, written at the request of the Haitian government. Several genetic studies have shown that other Haitian cholera strain strongly resembled recently found in South Asia, although not specifically identified Nepal.

Yet some scientists, including cholera Rita Colwell, considered by many as a giant in the field, argued that the bacteria were more likely found in local waters, and that the epidemic was triggered by a combination of factors environment.

The panel of four members, headed by Alejandro Cravioto the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh, unambiguously rejects that theory. Microbes isolated from patients in different parts of Haiti are genetically identical, suggesting an introduction to a single point, the report said. Genetically, the Haiti strain is very similar to the South Asian strains of V. cholerae . "Analysis of the available data refutes the argument that the Haitian strains arose locally from the Haitian environment," the panel wrote.

Mirebalais, the site of a camp of Nepalese MINUSTAH, is probably the place where this introductory happened, the committee concluded. Not only the first case, it should, but the times when new cases occurred a few days later on the Artibonite river water velocity data are compatible with an introduction near Mirebalais which was carried out downstream of the river .

In addition, there was ample opportunity for germs of cholera to enter the Meye Tributary System of the Artibonite River in Nepal and around the camp. At the camp, the so-called "black water" is water containing human waste material was collected in six tanks 2500 liters fiberglass. But the pipe in the shower and toilet main camp area was poor, and there was "great potential" for sewage leaks in a drainage ditch running through the camp and ends in Meye system.

Another site of contamination was just outside the camp. Twice a week, a Haitian contractor would send a truck to collect wastewater from the camp and transport containers in an open septic tank (photo) on a nearby hill that was far from assured. "There is no fence around the site, and children were observed playing and stray animals in the area around the pit," the report said. The pit overflow in the system depends Meye during rainfall.

The wastewater from two other camps for the forces of Nepal MINUSATH in the Central Department (called Hinche and Red Earth) was also trucked to the pit, meaning they too could cause of the epidemic.

The report concludes that sanitation in and around the camps MINUSTAH was "not enough" and recommended that UN installations worldwide "treat feces using on-site systems inactivate pathogens before disposal. " But perhaps not to fan the flames, he stops blaming Nepalese or MINUSTAH. Instead, the report stresses that the disease has become a major disaster in the wake of a series of circumstances, including bad drinking water in Haiti and sanitation infrastructure and lack of medical services. The epidemic "was not the fault, or deliberate action of a group or an individual," he said.

The researchers say that the report should put scientific controversy to rest. "Personally, I am glad that I am able to read the tea leaves correctly, because God knows I took some colleagues flack, "says molecular biologist John Mekalanos of Harvard Medical School in Boston, who has published evidence that the strain came from South Asia in an article the New England Journal of Medicine in January.

Piarroux, who had been worried that the truth might never come out, said he feels justified because the report confirms many of the conclusions in its report to the Haitian government. "They did a great job," he said. A paper describing the findings has been accepted by Emerging Infectious Diseases , said Piarroux.