Study links body fat, cancer risk

Hispanic women have been known to run a lower risk of developing breast cancer than most other women, but their breast cancer rates are climbing—and increasing obesity is one factor that might be to blame.

The weight that Hispanic women gain during adulthood and their body fat may put them at greater risk for breast cancer both before and after menopause, according to researchers from the Keck School of Medicine of USC, the University of New

Researchers from the University of Chicago have identified a gene defect that causes the development of leukemia in children with Down syndrome. The discovery, scheduled for Advance Online Publication on Nature Genetics’s website on 12 August, could speed diagnosis and provide a new target for therapy.

Children with Down syndrome are 10 to 20 times as likely as unaffected children to develop leukemia. They most commonly develop a type known as acute megakaryoblastic leukemia (AMKL), wh

Two articles in the latest issue of Critical Care reveal how intensive care therapy may be beneficial in the short but not in the long term. Being treated in intensive care units may help critically ill patients survive but the quality of life – if they survive – is often severely impaired. It is unclear whether this impairment is a complication of the illness or a complication of therapy.

Many intensive care doctors believe the battle has been won once a patient leaves the intensive care u

Using photon emissions from individual molecules of silver, researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have created what may be the world’s smallest electroluminescent light source.

Believed to be the first demonstration of electroluminescence from individual molecules, the work could lead to new types of nanometer-scale optical interconnects, high-resolution optical microscopy, nanometer-scale lithography and other applications that require very small light sources. And becaus

Birds may have a basic understanding of physics, recent research by Oxford zoologists suggests. In an article to be published in Science this week [Thursday], the researchers report the findings of an experiment in which New Caledonian crows bent wires to make hooks appropriate to retrieve food from a cylinder. This is the first time any animal has been found to show some understanding of cause and effect, and to make a new tool for a specific task.

The experiment built on a chance observat

Injecting a patient’s bone-marrow cells into their legs could help repair damaged circulatory systems in those with limb ischaemia, suggest authors of a trial in this week’s issue of THE LANCET.

Lower limb ischaemia is due to narrowing of the arteries and is a common condition, which if left untreated can lead to gangrene, amputation, and sometimes death. The disorder is usually associated with chronic peripheral arterial disease and can result in severe leg pain at rest and walking, as well