Scientists have developed a new drug that blocks a transcription factor -- previously thought to be un-blockable -- that has been causally linked to leukemia and several other cancers of the lungs, ovaries, pancreas, and gastrointestinal tract, they report in linkurl:Nature;http://www.nature.com/nature/index.html this week. Bone marrow smear showing acute lymphoblastic leukemia Image: Furfur, Wikimedia Commons The Notch transcription factor regulates cell-cell communication in the Notch signal

A four-year-old promise to create a $5 billion publically funded competitive granting agency in Nigeria -- which would be the second such agency in Africa -- was revived last month, but leading African scientists remain skeptical that the plan will ever get off the ground. Image: MikeBlyth, Wikimedia Commons "We were really hopeful in the beginning," said linkurl:Mohamed Hassan,;http://www.interacademycouncil.net/?id=10084 chairman of Nigeria's Presidential Advisory Committee for Science and

The forensic scientists depicted in popular TV shows CSI and NCIS often work in slick, technologically-decked out labs solving case after scintillating case. But for forensic sculptor linkurl:Frank Bender,;http://www.frankbender.us/ reconstructing the faces of decomposing bodies or skeletons is a much more hands-on, creative process done in his paint-stained, converted-butcher-shop-studio in South Philadelphia. Frank Bender Image: Katherine BagleyThrough a career that's spanned 33 years, Bender

The Chilean science council was rocked by a funding scandal earlier this week -- almost a year to the day after the country embarked on a program to increase funding, research opportunities, and transparency in an effort to reduce its brain drain. Image: Towndown, Wikimedia CommonsThe controversy, which resulted in the dismissal of the council's president, Vivian Heyl, was sparked by an linkurl:internal investigation;http://blogs.elmercurio.com/cienciaytecnologia/2009/10/15/cambio-en-ponderacio

An analysis of 37 million year old primate fossils is fueling a debate over the existence of an evolutionary link between lemur-like and monkey-like primates -- a link that could more fully explain human evolution. The linkurl:study,;http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v461/n7267/ published in this week's issue of Nature, challenges the linkurl:claim;http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0005723 that Darwinius -- a rare, almost-complete skeleton whose unveiling cau

Pheromones may not initiate sexual attraction and mating, as commonly believed, new research suggests. Instead, the chemical signals may help flies distinguish between different genders and species while choosing a mate, researchers linkurl:report;http://www.nature.com/nature/index.html in this week's issue of Nature. The cells in Drosophila melanogaster that produce pheromones are located in the abdomen. These 'oenocytes' are revealed by expression of a protein fluorescing green. Image: Jea

Science funding in developing countries grew three times more rapidly than in developed countries between 2002 and 2007, says a linkurl:report;http://www.uis.unesco.org/ev.php?ID=7793_201&ID2=DO_TOPIC released last week (October 6) from the UNESCO Institute of Statistics in Montreal, Canada. But a country-by-country analysis shows that not all developing regions consider supporting research a priority. Image: CIA World Factbook "I am delighted with the increase in funding," said linkurl:Mohame

The 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine will go to Elizabeth Blackburn, a biochemist at the University of California, San Francisco, Carol Greider, a geneticist at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and Jack Szostak, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School for their discovery of telomeres and telomerases, which have helped scientists understand how chromosomes are completely copied during cell division and protected against degradation. Please check back later today for full coverage of

A trio of researchers whose work on telomeres and telomerases has helped explain how chromosomes are copied during cell division will receive the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. 

The Nobel Prize system is dated and in desperate need of an overhaul, a group of top scientists and engineers said today (September 30) in a linkurl:letter;http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17863-open-letter-to-the-nobel-prize-committee.html?full=true&print=true to the Nobel Foundation. Alfred Nobel Image: Wikimedia Commons In their letter, addressed to the foundation's executive director, Michael Sohlman, the researchers recommend that the awards should be broadened to include advancements

Mahlon Hoagland, a molecular biologist whose discoveries of transfer RNA and the mechanisms behind amino acid activation helped build the foundation of genetics, died in his home in Thetford, VT, on Friday. He was 87 years old. Mahlon Hoagland Image: VACE As a young scientist in the 1950s and 1960s, Hoagland studied RNA and DNA alongside Paul Zamecnik at Harvard Medical School and Francis Crick at Cambridge University. He made his most significant contributions to biology in his 30s and largely

Stress is commonly thought to increase susceptibility to disease, but a new study in Brain, Behavior, and Immunity finds short-term stress can actually boost the immune system and help reduce the number of skin cancer tumors in mice. Squamous cell carcinoma Image: Wikimedia Commons "It does not make sense that stress should always or necessarily be harmful since its most basic form is the fight-or-flight response," linkurl:Firdaus Dhabhar,;http://med.stanford.edu/profiles/frdActionServlet?choic