NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 30th January 2008 09:11 PM GMT] A story by the BBC last week reporting that a treatment of infrared light through the scalp could reverse Alzheimer's disease has scientists -- and skeptical science writers -- scratching their heads.
Gordon Dougal, director of a UK-based company called Virulite, is leading a study that tests whether infrared light, beamed on the head from a special helmet, might boost cell growth in the brain (Virulite currently sells a product also based... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 30th January 2008 05:25 PM GMT] While researchers agree that the birth of new neurons plays an important role in the adult brain, they have long debated to which aspects of learning, memory and behavior the process contributes. A new study published today (January 30) in Nature has used a gene knockout approach to link adult neurogenesis to spatial learning.
The paper showed that... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 29th January 2008 04:25 PM GMT] In his State of the Union address last night, President Bush asked Congress to double the funding of basic research in the physical sciences, but asked life scientists to keep their work "ethical," reiterating his stance on the need for legislation banning human cloning.
To bolster his call to ban human cloning, the President cited recent research by Yamanaka and Thomson, who both reported last November that stem... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 28th January 2008 08:46 PM GMT] The National Institutes of Health is asking that the University of Connecticut return $65,005 in grant money for not complying with animal welfare laws, according to an Email sent to the university health center by the National Eye Institute.
The bulk of the money had been award to the university for research performed by neurologist David Waitzman. Between the fall of 2005 and summer of 2006, Waitzman received several citations from the... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 27th January 2008 06:05 PM GMT] With few approved drugs available to treat Alzheimer disease, researchers are working on new compounds that block amyloid formation. But many potential drugs in the pipeline for the disease and other amyloid-associated illnesses may not be as promising as thought, according to a new study published today (January 27) in Nature Chemical Biology.
The research, led by ... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 24th January 2008 04:45 PM GMT] Researchers have long debated the presence of stem cells in the pancreas that generate insulin-producing beta cells. Now researchers have shown that beta cells are indeed produced in the adult mouse pancreas, which means the tissue must contain stem cells.
The paper, published today (January 24) in Cell, "reconciles some conflicting observations that have... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 22nd January 2008 06:59 PM GMT] I just got a call from John Collins, former chair of the biochemistry and molecular biology department at the University of New Hampshire, who told me that as of today he is officially reinstated as a professor.
Collins had been banned from campus since last June after an incident involving another professor, and then dean of research, Stacia Sower, which you can read about here and... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 22nd January 2008 05:48 PM GMT] A nine-year-old girl enrolled in a stem cell therapy trial has died, according to the company running the trial, StemCells, Inc. An independent committee ruled that the death was not caused by the stem cell treatment.
The girl was one of six children being treated for a neurodegenerative disorder -- called Batten Disease -- with transplants of neural stem cells derived from fetal tissue. Nature's stem cell blog ... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 17th January 2008 03:13 PM GMT] A report published online today that researchers have cloned human embryos is not that much of an advance, according to one stem cell expert, Douglas Melton, at Harvard University.
Researchers at Stemagen Corporation in La Jolla, Ca, reported that they cloned human embryos from adult oocytes using somatic cell nuclear transfer, according to a report published... Click to continue
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NewsBlog: [Entry posted at 4th January 2008 07:57 PM GMT] The new mandate that requires NIH-funded researchers to make their published papers publicly available threatens publisher and author interests, according to a statement released yesterday (January 3) by the Association of American Publishers (AAP).
The mandate was signed into law by the president on December 26 as part of the 2008 appropriations bill, which went through many... Click to continue
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Andrea's blog
Andrea Gawrylewski
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