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SUNDAY - May 27, 2007---------------------------- Previous Week News Alerts / Return to Today's News Alerts
Childhood Kidney Cancer Turns Off Protein Destruction Complex.
New evidence from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute researcher Randall Moon and colleagues reports in the May 18, 2007, issue of Science that Wilms tumor - a rare kidney cancer that affects children - hijacks the Wnt pathway in an entirely different way than expected with the introduction of the WTX protein. Misguided Wnt signaling is now recognised as the culprit in a variety of cancers and other diseases. Normally, Wnt works closely with a cellular foot soldier called ß-catenin, to trigger changes within cells. For example, the absence of Wnt, will trigger the destruction of ß-catenin. Identifying the elements of intracellular communication is essential to developing treatments for cancers. By confirming that WTX antagonizes the Wnt signaling pathway, more effective drugs can be developed to target this specific protein pathway.
Adult Stem Cells from Umbilical Cord Blood Make Insulin.
Dr. Randall J. Urban, senior author, professor and chair of internal medicine at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston and director of UTMB's Nelda C. and Lutcher H. J. Stark Diabetes Center, announced findings capping nearly four years of research, in the June 2007 issue of the medical journal Cell Proliferation. The researchers tested human adult stem cells in the laboratory to ensure that they were predisposed to divide. Then using a previously identified and successful method, an embryonic mouse pancreas was induced to direct these adult stem cells to begin developing, or "differentiating," into islet-like cells. Evidence of a characteristic marker, known as SSEA-4, thought to exist only in embryonic cells, was identified as excreted by the pancreas. They also found that, just as embryonic cells have been shown to do, these adult stem cells produced both C-peptide, a part of the insulin precursor protein, and insulin itself. This preliminary research is the first rung on the ladder to working with adult stem cells rather than embryonic stem cells for the production of viable regenerative medicine techniques. Eventually, scientists might be able to extract stem cells from an individual's blood, grow them in the laboratory to large numbers and tweak them so that they are directed to create, or repair, a needed organ.
New Method For Crossing Blood-Brain Barrier Patented.
The blood-brain barrier is a group of cells that line the brain’s blood vessels, protecting vital brain structures from foreign substances. The barrier has posed enormous difficulties for researchers who want to deliver therapeutic drugs to the brain to treat tumors, infections and degenerative brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Researchers at the Blanchette Rockefeller Neurosciences Institute (BRNI) of West Virginia University have patented a new tool to treat brain diseases using low-density lipoproteins (LDLs), a class of molecules that naturally occur in the blood. To help the LDL particles reach their target, BRNI researchers have coated the particles with a natural protein known as apolipoprotein E, which helps direct the particles to receptors on the blood-brain barrier cells. These receptors then assist the particle, which can contain any drug in its central lipid core, across the barrier into the brain.
A Second Sleep Gene Identified.
A gene that controls the flow of potassium into cells is required to maintain normal sleep in fruit flies, according to researchers at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health (SMPH). Hyperkinetic (Hk) is the second gene identified by the SMPH group to have a profound effect on sleep in flies. The finding supports growing evidence that potassium channels - found in humans and fruit flies alike - play a critical role in generating sleep. "Without potassium channels, you don't get slow waves, the oscillations shown by groups of neurons across the brain that are the hallmark of deep sleep," says Chiara Cirelli, SMPH psychiatry professor and senior author on the latest study, which appeared in the May 16, 2007, Journal of Neuroscience.
See Those Fingers? Do the Math.
In men, the ring (fourth) finger is usually longer than the index (second); their so-called 2D:4D ratio is lower than 1. In females, the two fingers are more likely to be the same length. Because of this sex difference, some scientists believe that a low ratio could be a marker for higher prenatal testosterone levels. Researchers at the University of Bath in the United Kingdom photocopied the hands of 74 boys and girls aged 6 and 7. They compared the measurements of the second and fourth fingers with the children's scores on a standard U.K. test of math and literacy. In boys, the lower the ratio, the better their math scores, the team reports in the May issue of the British Journal of Psychology. The boys with the lowest ratios also were the ones whose abilities were most skewed in the direction of math rather than literacy. However, psychologist S. Marc Breedlove of Michigan State University calls finger length "a very noisy, imperfect marker at best."
SATURDAY - May 26, 2007---------------------------- Previous Week News Alerts / Return to Today's News Alerts
Babies Can Tell When You Switch Languages.
Researchers at the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Canada have shown that at four months babies can tell when a person switches to a different language just by watching their face. Results were published in the journal Science. Babies can tell when people switch to a different language from the change in rhythm of their mouth and face movements. As they get older, babies who are not exposed to more than one language lose this ability, but babies growing up in a bilingual environment retain it. "Visual Language Discrimination in Infancy." Whitney M. Weikum, Athena Vouloumanos, Jordi Navarra, Salvador Soto-Faraco, Núria Sebastián-Gallés, and Janet F. Werker. Science 25 May 2007, Vol. 316. no. 5828, p. 1159 DOI: 10.1126/science.1137686
microRNAs (miRNAs) May Increase Cancer Susceptibility.
MiRNAs play a number of roles in biological regulation, including development and cell differentiation, helping to determine what type a cell ultimately becomes. But when damaged, they can contribute to cancer by either turning on cancer-causing genes or by inhibiting tumor-blocking genes. Researchers identified changes in the DNA sequences surrounding several miRNAs that were located at or near the susceptibility areas in mouse strains with a variety of tumor types. They isolated cancer-resistant and cancer-susceptible miRNAs, five of which had changes within their promoter regions - the miRNAs that turn on and potentially regulate which genes are "working." "These miRNAs ... could influence a person's lifetime risk of cancer." says Linda Siracusa, Ph.D., associate professor of microbiology and immunology at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University.
Experimental Gene Therapy 'Cures' Arthritis/Lessens Damage.
In this current study, researchers found that one injection of a newly designed gene therapy relieved 100 percent of osteoarthritic pain in the mouse study model. In addition, researchers were surprised to find that the therapy also brought about a nearly 35 percent reduction in permanent structural damage to joints caused by round and after round of osteoarthritic inflammation. Gene therapy inserts tailor-made genes into cells that can direct cells to build more of a needed protein. To deliver the genes into cells, researchers use harmless viruses called vectors to insert the new DNA. Partnering with researchers at the National Institute on Drug Abuse, part of the National Institutes of Health, Stephanos Kyrkanides, D.D.S., Ph.D., associate professor of Dentistry at the University of Rochester Medical Center and his team, will - if successful - provide the proof of principle needed for the team to apply for phase I human clinical trials, perhaps within 18 months.
Brain NRG1 Gene Abnormalities Identified in Schizophrenia.
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) researchers have identified a function of neuregulin1 (NRG1), a gene previously linked to schizophrenia but whose role in the disease was unknown. Knowing the connections between genes and how they impact synapses and circuits in the brain, is guiding the development of new diagnostic strategies and treatment. Published on May 24, 2007 in the journal Neuron, this latest research helps define schizophrenia as a disease resulting from multiple factors, including genetic defects and developmental abnormalities. A lynchpin in this research is the altered development of the glutamate system of the brain, which when suppressed, leads to schizophrenic symptoms.
Stem Cells May Only Mimic the Look of Malignant Bone Marrow.
University of Florida researchers have found that bone marrow stem cells attracted to the site of a cancerous growth often adopt the appearance of the malignant cells - without being the seed of the cancer. "They have the same kind of surface proteins," said study author Dr. Chris Cogle, an assistant professor of medicine. "Our results indicate these cells act as developmental mimics; they come in and look like the surrounding neoplastic tissue but they aren't actually the seed of cancer." The study is to appear in the August issue of the journal Stem Cells.
Analysis Reveals a DNA Repair Army of 700 Proteins.
DNA damage response is a routine event in the life of any cell. If mutations are left unchecked, they can accumulate over time and lead, ultimately, to cancer or diabetes. Two critical enzymes, known in scientific shorthand as ATM and ATR, act like sensors to detect trouble and initiate the DNA damage response by engaging the cell's molecular repair apparatus. In the journal Science, a team of researchers from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Harvard Medical School provide the first detailed portrait of an army of more than 700 proteins that help maintain DNA's integrity.
FRIDAY - May 25, 2007---------------------------- Previous Week News Alerts / Return to Today's News Alerts
Link Between Parkinson’s and Narcolepsy.
Parkinson's disease is well-known for its progression of motor disorders: stiffness, slowness, tremors, difficulties walking and talking. Less well known is that Parkinson's shares other symptoms with narcolepsy, a sleep disorder characterized by sudden and uncontrollable episodes of deep sleep, severe fatigue and general sleep disorder. Now a team of University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and Veterans Affairs researchers think they know why - Parkinson's disease patients have severe damage to the same small group of neurons whose loss causes narcolepsy. This latest research suggests that treatment of Parkinson's disease patients with hypocretin or hypocretin analogs may reverse these symptoms.
Doctor Told FDA of Glaxo's Avandia Risk in 2000.
A leading doctor expressed concerns about the heart risks of GlaxoSmithKline Plc's diabetes drug Avandia in a letter to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration seven years ago. John Buse, president-elect of the American Diabetes Association and faculty member at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, cited "a worrisome trend in cardiovascular deaths and severe adverse events" among patients using the drug in a letter to the agency in March 2000. This news comes after a pooled analysis of dozens of trials, published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Monday, concluded that Avandia increased the risk of heart attack by 43 percent and cardiac-related death by 64 percent.
Medication Errors Common in U.S. Kids With Cancer.
Children with cancer often get the wrong dose of chemotherapy or are given the drug at the wrong time, and many require treatment because of the errors, U.S. researchers say. The problem has a lot to do with a lack of common standards for delivering these life-saving, but highly toxic, drugs, said Dr. Marlene Miller, director of quality and safety at Johns Hopkins Children's Center in Baltimore. Miller likens the problem to the issues most parents face when trying to figure out how much of the analgesic ibuprofen to give a child because the dose must be calculated based on weight and age. "That is a reality for every single dose of medicine we give to children. There is no normal dose. There is no comfort level. There is no ability to say that is clearly, egregiously, too much for this age," Miller said.
Alcohol In Pregnancy = Greater Risk Extreme Preterm Delivery.
Preterm delivery, and particularly "extreme prematurity" - less than 32 weeks of gestation - are major contributors to perinatal sickness and death worldwide. A new study has found that maternal alcohol use during pregnancy can contribute to a substantial increase in risk for extreme preterm delivery. Findings indicated that alcohol and cocaine, but not cigarette, use were associated with an increased risk of extreme preterm delivery; alcohol accounted for the lion's share of the risk. The effects were greater in pregnancies among women 30 years or older. Researchers have seen what appears to be a greater susceptibility to neurobehavioral effects and anatomic congenital anomalies in pregnancies among older women. "This is an important finding," said Robert J. Sokol, distinguished professor of obstetrics and gynecology and Director of the C.S. Mott Center for Human Growth and Development at Wayne State University, "because a woman could have been drinking during pregnancy when she was younger and had no effects, but could be more susceptible later."
Smoking During Pregnancy Can Increase Risk Of ADHD In Child.
Women smokers who become pregnant have long been encouraged to reduce or eliminate their nicotine intake. A new study being published in the June 15th issue of Biological Psychiatry provides further reason. It reveals that in utero exposure to smoking is associated with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) problems in genetically susceptible children. The effects were greater in pregnancies among women older than 30, said Editor of Biological Psychiatry and affiliated with both Yale University School of Medicine and the VA Connecticut Healthcare System. Although there is less clarity on why the effects of alcohol on prematurity were more pronounced among women aged 30 years and older, said said Robert J. Sokol, distinguished professor of obstetrics and gynecology and Director of the C.S. Mott Center for Human Growth and Development at Wayne State University.Sokol said he and other researchers have seen what appears to be a greater susceptibility to neurobehavioral effects and anatomic congenital anomalies in pregnancies among older women. "This is an important finding," he said, "because a woman could have been drinking during pregnancy when she was younger and had no effects, but could be more susceptible later.".
THURSDAY - May 24, 2007---------------------------- Previous Week News Alerts / Return to Today's News Alerts
Diabetes: The Fat Pitch.
According to a report released Thursday by Medco Health Solutions, spending on diabetes drugs could rise 70% by 2009. The population of people with pre-diabetes is growing. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there are 51 million Americans with pre-diabetes. While these sad statistics are bad news to the millions who suffer from diabetes and the millions more that will soon join them, pharmaceutical and medical device companies are jumping for joy.
Premature Babies Fare Worse at Non-Specialist Units.
Well over 1,000 very small babies in California died from 1991 to 2000 probably because they were born in hospitals lacking expertise with the tiniest premature infants, U.S. researchers reported on Wednesday. They said a trend toward smaller neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) may be contributing to the deaths of the smallest newborns.
Primitive Fish Had Genetic Wiring for Limbs.
Primitive fish already may have possessed the genetic wiring needed to grow hands and feet well before the appearance of the first animals with limbs roughly 365 million years ago, scientists say. University of Chicago researchers were seeking clues behind a momentous milestone in the evolution of life on Earth - when four-legged amphibians that descended from fish first colonized dry land. These first amphibians paved the way for reptiles, birds and mammals, including people.
Virtual Human Puts Doctors Inside Their Patients.
Canadian researchers say they have developed the most detailed model of a human yet, a movable "4D" image that doctors can use to plan complex surgery or show patients what ailments look like inside their bodies. Called CAVEman, the larger-than-life computer image encompasses more than 3,000 distinct body parts, all viewed in a booth that gives the image height, width and depth, the researchers said. CAVEman also plots the passage of time - the fourth "D".
Tissue Engineering Offers New Sources for Adult Stem Cells.
Tissue engineering and regenerative medicine offer future patients greater options for treatment and cure of a wide array of urologic conditions. Developers from around the world are researching new sources for and applications of adult stem cells as reported in a special session of the American Urological Association currently being held in Ahaheim, California.
Pregnant Pause.
Some say a vaccine could prevent the deadly bacterium GBS, but others remain concerned about inoculating mothers-to-be. Twenty-five percent of pregnant women in the United States carry a common, potentially deadly bacterium called group B streptococcus (or GBS) that can infect their babies during childbirth or soon after. Although doctors frequently administer antibiotics during labor to prevent them, GBS infections kill or injure several thousand babies each year - within hours or weeks of their birth. Advocates say vaccinating pregnant women could avert those tragedies - unfortunately, no vaccine for GBS exists. Nor is any drug company likely to develop one, and most doctors probably wouldn't use one if it were available.
Baltimore Sun Examines Debate Over Providing Pregnant Women With Vaccines Against Various Diseases
WEDNESDAY - May 23, 2007---------------------------- Previous Week News Alerts / Return to Today's News Alerts
New Heart Guidelines Aim to Stop Newborn Defects.
The American Heart Association released new recommendations on Tuesday to help women reduce the risk of giving birth to children with heart defects. The first recommendation is that prospective mothers see their doctor and be checked for diabetes, rubella (German or three-day measles) and influenza. A second recommendation is for women to take a daily multivitamin containing 400 micrograms (mcg) of folic acid or a folic acid supplement. Finally, the association said prospective mothers should avoid contact with people who have the flu or other illnesses that can cause fevers.
Freebirthers Dismiss Fear and Bring Babies Home.
Britain's Department of Health frowns on the practice of freebirthing and says every woman should have a midwife. Delivering their own babies at home, often alone, freebirthers dismiss what they say is "fearmongering" by doctors and midwives and confidently catch their offspring as they leave the womb. "Dr Crippen", a British National Health Service doctor who writes an award-winning blog on the Internet, says "giving birth is the most dangerous thing that most woman will do during their life." If a baby were to die during a freebirth, Dr Crippen argues the mother should be prosecuted for manslaughter.
U.S. Health Care Crisis Squeezes Families.
While many industrialized countries provide care for all, the United States covers only the elderly and the poor. Some 45 million, or 15 percent, of people in the world's richest nation lacked health insurance in 2005, up 3 percent on the previous year. That number is widely believed to be higher today as healthcare costs skyrocket, employers slash worker benefits and insurers gut coverage and cherry-pick the healthiest customers.
Helpline Delivers Hope for India's Expectant Mothers.
According to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), India accounts for almost 20 percent of the world's maternal mortality cases: 301 for every 100,000 live births in 2006. But across the deserts of Rajasthan, low literacy, poor infrastructure and poverty drive that ratio up to 445 per 100,000 births, according to a 2001-2003 government survey. "Most of the deaths are avoidable and are caused by poor nutrition, no antenatal care, home births where complications arise and poor access to health clinics," said Pavitra Mohan, health project officer for UNICEF in Rajasthan. An hour away from the Taj Mahal - the most famous monument dedicated to a woman who died in childbirth - scores of women in Guddi's Dholpur district continue to die needlessly every month.
Scavenger Cells May Block Obesity, Study Shows.
Macrophages - the scavenger cells of the body's immune system - are known as troublemakers for the role they play in obesity, but Stanford University School of Medicine researchers have found that the cells can also be saviors when it comes to metabolism. They have identified a molecular "switch" that can shift the cells into the more desirable mode, a finding that could play a role in blocking the development of insulin resistance and type-2 diabetes seen with obesity.
STRICTLY SCIENCE
Two Oppositely Localised Frizzled RNAs as Axis Determinants in a Cnidarian Embryo.
How do different animal body parts form in the correct arrangement during development? Often, the explanation is provided by “determinant” molecules, prepositioned in the egg cell before it is fertilised. These determinant molecules initiate spatially localized programmes of gene expression, causing the various body parts to form in the appropriate place. Many determinants work by activating the Wnt signalling pathway; however, few concrete examples of determinant molecules have yet been discovered. We have found a new example of such a molecule by studying embryos of a jellyfish called Clytia. This molecule, found on one side of the egg, belongs to the “Frizzled” group of membrane proteins that activate Wnt signalling. Unexpectedly, we also found a second type of Frizzled molecule on the other side of the egg, which has a counterbalancing role in the embryo. Comparison of our findings in Clytia with those in other animals suggests that the molecular mechanisms responsible for body patterning via asymmetric Wnt pathway activation have not been tightly constrained during evolution. Citation: Momose T, Houliston E (2007) Two Oppositely Localised Frizzled RNAs as Axis Determinants in a Cnidarian Embryo. PLoS Biol 5(4): e70 doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.0050070 Received: September 6, 2006; Accepted: January 8, 2007; Published: March 13, 2007.
TUESDAY - May 22, 2007---------------------------- Previous Week News Alerts / Return to Today's News Alerts
'Healthy' Children With Smoking Parents Aren't Really So Healthy.
"Everyone knows that children of smokers have more respiratory problems - more puffing, wheezing, cases of pneumonia - but until now we haven't known if lung function is impaired in children of smokers who don't have any respiratory complaints or diagnosed lung problems," says researcher Bert Arets, M.D., Ph.D., University Medical Center Utrecht in the Netherlands. Researchers found that children of smoking parents had significantly reduced lung function similar to that seen in smokers. Smoking after birth appeared to be more harmful than smoking during pregnancy alone.
Apples/Fish In Pregnancy Protect Against Asthma And Allergies.
The SEATON study, conducted at the University of Aberdeen, UK, found that the children of mothers who ate the most apples were less likely to ever have wheezed or have doctor-confirmed asthma at the age of 5 years, compared to children of mothers who had the lowest apple consumption. Children of mothers who ate fish once or more a week were less likely to have had eczema than children of mothers who never ate fish. The study did not find any protective effect against asthma or allergic diseases from many other foods, including vegetables, fruit juice, citrus or kiwi fruit, whole grain products, fat from dairy products or margarine or other low-fat spreads. Issued from a news release issued by American Thoracic Society.
Gel Made From Patient's Blood Speeds Healing.
Treating skin wounds with a gel made from a patient's own blood platelets speeded healing, researchers said in a study showing how doctors may be able to harness the body's innate healing ability. Skin wounds treated with this gel healed about 10 percent more quickly than wounds in the same people treated with only an antibiotic ointment, Monday's study in the Archives of Facial Plastic Surgery showed. Researchers cautioned that this was a small pilot study - only eight people were examined - but said the concept could change the way doctors deal with wounds, from surgical incisions to, potentially, internal injuries. The study was conducted at the University of Minnesota.
Lubiprostone May Improve Symptom Relief In Adults With IBS-C.
These results were presented as a late-breaker at Digestive Disease Week 2007, the largest annual international meeting of digestive disease specialists. "In this study, patients receiving lubiprostone were nearly twice as likely to achieve an overall response from symptoms of IBS-C compared to those receiving placebo," said Douglas A. Drossman, M.D., primary investigator, UNC Center for Functional GI and Motility Disorders, University of North Carolina, and the Chair of the Rome Committee. "As a result, lubiprostone may represent an important treatment for IBS-C sufferers." However, the safety of AMITIZA in pregnancy has not been evaluated in humans. In guinea pigs, lubiprostone has been shown to have the potential to cause fetal loss.
Engineered Protein Effective Against Staphylococcus.
A research team led by the University of Illinois has developed a treatment for exposure to enterotoxin B, a noxious substance produced by the Staphylococcus aureus bacterium. The team engineered a protein, which successfully tested in rabbits, that could one day be used to treat humans exposed to the enterotoxin. The research team, led by U. of I. professor of biochemistry David M. Kranz, included scientists and clinicians from the Boston Biomedical Research Institute and the University of Minnesota Medical School. Their findings appeared 5/21/07 in the online edition of Nature Medicine. “E. coli is the cheapest source for making proteins,” Kranz said. “Whenever you can express a protein in E. coli you do so because it is inexpensive, easy and fast.”
Study Suggests Cure for Hepatitis C.
Researchers are reporting a potential "cure" for hepatitis C, a blood-borne viral infection that's the leading cause of cirrhosis, liver cancer and the need for liver transplants in the United States. Use of the drug peginterferon, either alone or in combination with the drug ribavirin, reduced levels of the virus to undetectable levels for up to seven years. "This paper strongly suggests, for the first time, that hepatitis C is a curable disease," said lead researcher Dr. Mitchell Shiffman, a professor at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine and chief of hepatology and medical director of the school's Liver Transplant Program. "After treatment, 99.6 percent of the patients remained virus undetectable for over five years." PRESENTED: May 21, 2007, presentation, 38th annual Digestive Disease Week conference, Washington, D.C.
MONDAY - May 21, 2007---------------------------- Previous Week News Alerts / Return to Today's News Alerts
How Insulin Cells Develop: Finding Could Help Prevent Diabetes.
A key aspect of how embryos create the cells which secrete insulin is revealed in a new study published 18 May in the Journal of Biological Chemistry. The researchers hope that their findings will enable the development of new therapies for diabetes, a condition caused by insufficient levels of insulin. Scientists, from Imperial College London and an INSERM Unit at Necker Hospital, Paris, hope that understanding how to switch on the gene that produces beta cells could eventually enable researchers to create these cells from stem cells. They could then transplant beta cells into patients with type 1 diabetes.
Fighting Cancer With Salmonella.
Disease-causing bacteria can help in the fight against cancer, in the future bacteria could form the basis for innovative tumor therapies. Researchers at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research in Braunschweig have succeeded in planting "remote-controlled" salmonella in the tumors of cancer-bearing mice. The genetically modified microbes can produce substances on command. "Perhaps at some point," hopes Helmholtz scientist Dr. Holger Loessner, "we will be able to make these bacteria secrete cell toxins precisely where they are needed: in the middle of cancerous tissue.”
Restrictions Rachet Up Massachusetts' Biotech Costs.
Local researchers say they’re wasting millions of dollars buying duplicative lab equipment - from expensive microscopes to pens and pencils - in order to comply with President Bush’s funding restrictions on human embryonic stem-cell research. The redundant expenses and bureaucratic hassles have a direct impact on the ability of life science institutions to operate efficiently in the Bay State, which some observers say will increasingly rely on stem-cell research to help keep the state economically competitive.
Healthier With Herpesviruses?
Doctors see them as harmless hitchhikers at best and dangerous pathogens at worst. But a new study of mice shows that herpesviruses, which most of us carry for life, may have a surprising benefit: They offer protection from bacterial pathogens, including the one that causes plague. The effect is a rare example of a beneficial relationship between a virus and its host. Eight human herpesviruses are known, and most people are infected with several of them at an early age. They can cause serious disease: The cytomegalovirus (CMV), for instance, can blind people with compromised immune systems, and the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) can cause tumors. But in the vast majority of cases, herpesviruses become latent: They just hang out in the body.
STRICTLY SCIENCE
Childhood Conditions Influence Adult Progesterone Levels.
Researchers conducted a migrant study among first- and second-generation Bangladeshi women aged 19–39 who migrated to London, UK at different points in the life-course, women still resident in Bangladesh, and women of European descent living in neighbourhoods similar to those of the migrants in London (total n = 227). Results from multiple linear regression, controlled for anthropometric and reproductive variables, show that women who spend their childhood in conditions of low energy expenditure, stable energy intake, good sanitation, low immune challenges, and good health care in the UK have up to 103% higher levels of salivary progesterone and an earlier maturation than women who develop in less optimal conditions in Sylhet, Bangladesh (F9,178 = 5.05, p < 0.001, standard error of the mean = 0.32; adjusted R2 = 0.16). Our results point to the period prior to puberty as a sensitive phase when changes in environmental conditions positively impact developmental tempos such as menarcheal age (F2,81 = 3.21, p = 0.03) and patterns of ovarian function as measured using salivary progesterone (F2,81 = 3.14, p = 0.04).
Alejandra Núñez-de la Mora 1*, Robert T. Chatterton 2, Osul A. Choudhury 3, Dora A. Napolitano 1, Gillian R. Bentley 1
1 Department of Anthropology, University College London, London, United Kingdom, 2 Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois, United States of America, 3 Department of Microbiology, Sylhet Osmani Medical College, Sylhet, Bangladesh.
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