Cancer vaccine target pinpointed
Read more by clicking HERE
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7415423.stm
Dendritic cell
Dendritic cells tell the immune system what to attack
Scientists may be one step closer to producing a specific targeted vaccine for killing cancer cells.
UK researchers have pinpointed a protein on immune cells which they hope will help them harness the body's defences to attack a tumour.
A vaccine designed to "home in" on the protein would deliver a message to the immune system to attack the invading cancer, they said.
The research is published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
The protein is unique to a type of immune cell called a dendritic cell, which is responsible for triggering the body's defence system.
The results of this research are an important step towards understanding how to create targeted cancer vaccines in the future
Dr Lesley Walker, Cancer Research UK
Its job is to present pathogens or foreign molecules to other cells of the immune system, which in turn eliminate them.
The team at Cancer Research UK's London Research Institute said scientists have been searching for proteins or "tags" on dendritic cells for over 30 years.
In theory a vaccine carrying a foreign molecule from a cancer cell could be targeted to the dendritic cells, which would then prompt the immune system to attack the "invading" cancer. The same approach could be used for treating HIV or malaria, the researchers said.
T cell army
Study leader Dr Caetano Reis e Sousa said the team had found a unique protein called DNGR-1, which could be used to deliver such a vaccine to the door of the dendritic cell.
"Vaccines work by triggering an army of immune cells, called T cells, to attack potentially dangerous foreign molecules, like those found on pathogens.
"Dendritic cells are the messengers, telling the T cells who to attack.
"Vaccines will carry a sample of the offending molecule and deliver it to DNGR-1 on the dendritic cells, which in turn will present the molecule to the armies of T cells and instruct them to attack."
Cancer Research UK's director of cancer information, Dr Lesley Walker, said: "Developing treatments that accurately target cancer and have few serious side-effects is one of Cancer Research UK's top goals.
"The results of this research are an important step towards understanding how to create targeted cancer vaccines in the future."
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Sunday, May 11, 2008
How secondhand smoking affects your family and environment!
Passive Smoking Effects
Read More by clicking HERE
http://www.chantixhome.com/passive_smoking_effects.html
How secondhand smoking affects your family and environment!
Passive smoking means the smoke in the ambience exhaled from the lungs of the smoker or the smoke that comes from a person’s burning end of cigarette, cigar or pipe and that inhaled by others. This is also known as involuntary smoking, secondhand smoking and Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS).
There are 4000 chemicals in tobacco having 100 identified poisons and 63 components that cause cancer. When the smokers are directly taking these poisons in, they are, at the same time, polluting the environment with the dangerous chemicals. Environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) causes death of an estimated 3,000 nonsmoking Americans per year due to lung cancer and 300,000 children undergo lower respiratory tract infections.
Worldwide research institutes have established the facts of short term and long term effects of environmental tobacco smoke. Let us understand these one by one;
Short Term Effects: It depends upon the susceptibility of a person to nicotine. Some can stay in a room with smokers for quite a long time apparently without being effected. Others may feel ill within a few minutes or an hour of exposure to environmental smoke.
* Asthma patients may experience attacks due to ETS exposure.
* Allergy patients experience all types of allergic symptoms like stuffy nose, watery eyes, runny nose, sneezing, wheezing etc.
* Coughing
* Headache
* Nausea
* Lethargy
* People who are trying to quit feel cravings for a smoke
Long Term Effects: There are quite a number of dangerous long term effects of environmental smoke depending upon the frequency of exposure to involuntery smoking. The likelihood of below mentioned diseases are increased by frequent exposure to passive smoking.
* Risk of lung cancer
* Risk of heart disease
* Risk of miscarriages and birth defects
* Risk of developing asthma in children and adults
* Risk of ear infections
* Aggravated asthma, allergies, and other conditions
* Learning difficulty in children
* Risk of lung infection
California Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and a review by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) identify the consequences of passive smoking
r e a d m o r e and
s p r e a d this
m e s s a g e.
AVOID BEING FACE TO FACE WITH CHRONIC SMOKERS
AT DISTANCES LESS THAN 12 INCHES.
SEND A MESSAGE THROUGH BODY LANGUAGE THAT YOU WANT THEM TO SAVE LIVES OF NON-SMOKERS
ONLY BY QUITTING SMOKING.
YES.
WHEN YOU QUIT SMOKING, YOU SAVE NOT YOUR LIFE ALONE
BUT SAVE THE LUNGS OF OTHERS TOO !!
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Plants and flowers can grow in Moon rocks
Plants and flowers can grow in Moon rocks
http://in.news.yahoo.com/ani/20080417/r_t_ani_sc/tsc-plants-and-flowers-can-grow-in-moon-f32bc39_1.html
Thu, Apr 17 01:05 PM
London, April 17 (ANI): Scientists with the European Space Agency (ESA) have shown that plants and flowers can be grown on the Moon by demonstrating that marigolds can grow in crushed rock very much like the lunar surface, with no need for plant food.
According to a report by BBC News, the new research was presented at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) meeting in Vienna.
"We would bring a system of water circulation and recovery, which is also the type of system that in any case you want to develop when you are going to manufacture a primitive sort of life support system," said Bernard Foing, a senior scientist with the European Space Research and Technology Centre (Estec) in the Netherlands.
"So it is also a kind of 'technological breadboard' for maintaining a simple life form in an extreme environment," he added.
The new step, taken in the experiments reported at the EGU, is to remove the need for bringing nutrients and soil from Earth.
A team led by Natasha Kozyrovska and Iryna Zaetz from the National Academy of Sciences in Kiev planted marigolds in crushed anorthosite, a type of rock found on Earth, which is very similar to much of the lunar surface.
In neat anorthosite, the plants fared very badly. But adding different types of bacteria made them thrive; the bacteria appeared to draw elements from the rock that the plants needed, such as potassium.
Dr Foing, who presented the study at the EGU meeting, said there was no reason in principle why the same idea could not bear fruit on the Moon itself. Tools could crush lunar rock and add bacteria and seeds.
"But, scientists could look to go further, by selecting plants or bacteria that are especially well adapted to lunar conditions, or even by genetically engineering new strains," he added.
According to Foing, growing plants on the Moon would be a useful as a tool to learn how life adapts to lunar conditions, and as a practical aid to establishing manned bases. (ANI)
http://in.news.yahoo.com/ani/20080417/r_t_ani_sc/tsc-plants-and-flowers-can-grow-in-moon-f32bc39_1.html
Thu, Apr 17 01:05 PM
London, April 17 (ANI): Scientists with the European Space Agency (ESA) have shown that plants and flowers can be grown on the Moon by demonstrating that marigolds can grow in crushed rock very much like the lunar surface, with no need for plant food.
According to a report by BBC News, the new research was presented at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) meeting in Vienna.
"We would bring a system of water circulation and recovery, which is also the type of system that in any case you want to develop when you are going to manufacture a primitive sort of life support system," said Bernard Foing, a senior scientist with the European Space Research and Technology Centre (Estec) in the Netherlands.
"So it is also a kind of 'technological breadboard' for maintaining a simple life form in an extreme environment," he added.
The new step, taken in the experiments reported at the EGU, is to remove the need for bringing nutrients and soil from Earth.
A team led by Natasha Kozyrovska and Iryna Zaetz from the National Academy of Sciences in Kiev planted marigolds in crushed anorthosite, a type of rock found on Earth, which is very similar to much of the lunar surface.
In neat anorthosite, the plants fared very badly. But adding different types of bacteria made them thrive; the bacteria appeared to draw elements from the rock that the plants needed, such as potassium.
Dr Foing, who presented the study at the EGU meeting, said there was no reason in principle why the same idea could not bear fruit on the Moon itself. Tools could crush lunar rock and add bacteria and seeds.
"But, scientists could look to go further, by selecting plants or bacteria that are especially well adapted to lunar conditions, or even by genetically engineering new strains," he added.
According to Foing, growing plants on the Moon would be a useful as a tool to learn how life adapts to lunar conditions, and as a practical aid to establishing manned bases. (ANI)
Friday, April 18, 2008
Evolition ! or Just a Deviation or a Birth Genetic Defect ?
Miracle baby' is feted in India
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7340091.stm
By Sanjoy Majumder
BBC News, Delhi
Mother Sushma holds her daughter Lali
There's even talk of a temple being built in Lali's honour.
They're calling her the miracle baby.
Barely a month old, baby Lali was born with a rare condition which has given her two faces.
It's called Craniofacial Duplication and she has two sets of eyes, noses and lips.
In the village where she was born, close to the edge of Delhi, her condition has made her an object of fascination and reverence.
'Blessed'
"When I first saw her, I was scared. It's natural," her father, Vinod Singh, tells me.
"But now I feel I'm blessed."
Doctors have told him them that despite having two faces Lali is healthy and normal.
She is able to drink milk through either mouth and breathe normally.
Mr Singh is a poor farm worker. At his mud and brick house at the end of a narrow dusty lane, a neighbour applies a fresh coat of paint to his front door.
Vinod Singh
We just want to enjoy time with our first born child
Vinod Singh
Inside, he stands surrounded by villagers, some sitting on sturdy hessian cots, others smoking pipes.
For the past few days, people have been lining up to see his daughter.
Many of them bring offerings of money, believing that Lali has special powers.
"When you see something unnatural, it can only be the miracle of God," says Jatinder Nagar, a neighbour who's taken on the self-appointed role of tour guide.
"It's something so magical that we believe that she's a goddess. We regard her as one."
Uncomfortable
Eighty-year-old Ballabh Saini is a grandmother and respected as a village elder.
But even she bows her head in reverence.
"She has brought us fame and she is blessed," she tells me.
"So many people have been coming to see her - travelling long distances on cars, motorbikes, horse-drawn carts."
But all this is making Vinod Singh increasingly uncomfortable and upset.
"She's my daughter. I don't want any more of this. I'm fed up," he says, throwing up his hands in despair.
But he's up against centuries of superstition.
Faced with something they're unable to comprehend, the villagers believe she is the reincarnation of a Hindu goddess.
There's even talk of a temple being built in her honour.
Her new found status is lost on Lali, as she lies cradled in her grandfather's arms.
Doctors in Delhi say there is no possibility of separating her head.
But they do want to carry out more medical tests to determine if her internal organs are normal.
But her parents won't allow them.
"What is the need? As far as we are concerned she's like any other child," says Vinod Singh.
"We just want to enjoy time with our first-born child."
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Chilling images of ice-shelf collapsing in the heat
Wed, Mar 26 02:50 PM
New York, March 26 (IANS) A US satellite has captured chilling images of over 400 square kilometres of Antarctica's massive Wilkins Ice Shelf collapsing because of rapid climate changes.
The area is part of the much larger shelf of nearly 13,000 square kilometres that is now supported only by a narrow strip of ice between two islands.
'If there is a little bit more retreat, this last 'ice buttress' could collapse and we'd likely lose about half the total ice shelf area in the next few years,' warned Ted Scambos of the University of Colorado at Boulder.
In the past 50 years, the western Antarctic Peninsula has experienced the biggest temperature increase on earth, rising by 17.27 degrees Celsius per decade.
READ MORE ...BY CLICKING HERE;http://in.news.yahoo.com/indiaabroad/20080326/r_t_ians_sc/tsc-chilling-images-of-ice-shelf-collaps-1bdf89b.html
New York, March 26 (IANS) A US satellite has captured chilling images of over 400 square kilometres of Antarctica's massive Wilkins Ice Shelf collapsing because of rapid climate changes.
The area is part of the much larger shelf of nearly 13,000 square kilometres that is now supported only by a narrow strip of ice between two islands.
'If there is a little bit more retreat, this last 'ice buttress' could collapse and we'd likely lose about half the total ice shelf area in the next few years,' warned Ted Scambos of the University of Colorado at Boulder.
In the past 50 years, the western Antarctic Peninsula has experienced the biggest temperature increase on earth, rising by 17.27 degrees Celsius per decade.
READ MORE ...BY CLICKING HERE;http://in.news.yahoo.com/indiaabroad/20080326/r_t_ians_sc/tsc-chilling-images-of-ice-shelf-collaps-1bdf89b.html
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Snakes Hear Through Their Jaws.
Washington, March 4 (ANI): A new research by US and German scientists has shown that snakes have a second hearing system through their jaws, which can provide valuable insight into their evolution.
According to a report in Discovery News, snakes pick up their prey's vibrations via their jaws, and then send these patterns to their brains for processing.
For years, it was assumed that snakes couldn't hear, that they sensed prey by smell, taste, and in some species, special heat-sensing pits near the nose.
Though basic experiments during the 1970s showed snakes could hear, they didn't explain how.
Now, the new research has proved that with each tiny footstep, a mouse or other prey radiates waves through the ground and air the same way drops of water ripple through a pool and produce a single drip sound.
Just as a ship bobs up and down in response to a wave in the ocean, a snake jaw resting on the ground responds to sound waves carried by the ground.
"The lower jaw of a snake is essentially a ridged cylinder," said Bruce Young, a biology professor at Washburn University. "So in that respect it's not terribly different from a ship," he added.
Therefore, for their research, the scientists borrowed techniques from nautical engineers.
The researchers used the exact equations that measure a ship's movement to model how a snake's jaw would move in response to waves moving through sand or earth.
Just as a ship can move in six different directions - heave, pitch, roll, etc, so can a snake's jaw - up, down, side to side, etc.
Also, just as a ship is more stable the deeper it rides in the water, snakes often bury themselves in sand to make their hearing more precise.
When buried, a snake can more easily detect the differences in the way its jaw moves.
After a snake's jawbones pick up a sound, it travels into the cochlea, where nerves pick up the signal and transmit it to the brain.
According to the researchers, by hearing through their jaw bone and through a traditional ear, snakes essentially evolved a second way to hear. (ANI)
http://in.news.yahoo.com/ani/20080304/r_t_ani_sc/tsc-snakes-can-hear-through-their-jaws-f32bc39.html
According to a report in Discovery News, snakes pick up their prey's vibrations via their jaws, and then send these patterns to their brains for processing.
For years, it was assumed that snakes couldn't hear, that they sensed prey by smell, taste, and in some species, special heat-sensing pits near the nose.
Though basic experiments during the 1970s showed snakes could hear, they didn't explain how.
Now, the new research has proved that with each tiny footstep, a mouse or other prey radiates waves through the ground and air the same way drops of water ripple through a pool and produce a single drip sound.
Just as a ship bobs up and down in response to a wave in the ocean, a snake jaw resting on the ground responds to sound waves carried by the ground.
"The lower jaw of a snake is essentially a ridged cylinder," said Bruce Young, a biology professor at Washburn University. "So in that respect it's not terribly different from a ship," he added.
Therefore, for their research, the scientists borrowed techniques from nautical engineers.
The researchers used the exact equations that measure a ship's movement to model how a snake's jaw would move in response to waves moving through sand or earth.
Just as a ship can move in six different directions - heave, pitch, roll, etc, so can a snake's jaw - up, down, side to side, etc.
Also, just as a ship is more stable the deeper it rides in the water, snakes often bury themselves in sand to make their hearing more precise.
When buried, a snake can more easily detect the differences in the way its jaw moves.
After a snake's jawbones pick up a sound, it travels into the cochlea, where nerves pick up the signal and transmit it to the brain.
According to the researchers, by hearing through their jaw bone and through a traditional ear, snakes essentially evolved a second way to hear. (ANI)
http://in.news.yahoo.com/ani/20080304/r_t_ani_sc/tsc-snakes-can-hear-through-their-jaws-f32bc39.html
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Who is in ourSpace ?
Who's Orbiting the Moon?
Click Here to know more.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/20feb_orbitingthemoon.htm
February 20, 2008: The space around Earth is a busy place, as teeming with traffic as a roundabout. More than 500 active satellites are bustling about up there right now. Some are transmitting radio, television, and telephone signals; others are gathering information about Earth's atmosphere and weather; still others are helping people navigate down here; and the rest are conducting space research.
Soon the space around the moon will be busy too. China, Japan, India, Russia, and the US either have sent or plan to send satellites there for a bird's-eye view of lunar features and resources.
Why is the moon such a draw?
Read More .by clicking at just below the title.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Machines 'to match man by 2029'
Machines will achieve human-level artificial intelligence by 2029, a leading US inventor has predicted.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7248875.stm
Humanity is on the brink of advances that will see tiny robots implanted in people's brains to make them more intelligent, said Ray Kurzweil.
The engineer believes machines and humans will eventually merge through devices implanted in the body to boost intelligence and health.
"It's really part of our civilisation," Mr Kurzweil explained.
"But that's not going to be an alien invasion of intelligent machines to displace us."
Machines were already doing hundreds of things humans used to do, at human levels of intelligence or better, in many different areas, he said.
Man versus machine
"I've made the case that we will have both the hardware and the software to achieve human level artificial intelligence with the broad suppleness of human intelligence including our emotional intelligence by 2029," he said.
We'll have intelligent nanobots go into our brains... to make us smarter
Ray Kurzweil
"We're already a human machine civilisation; we use our technology to expand our physical and mental horizons and this will be a further extension of that."
Humans and machines would eventually merge, by means of devices embedded in people's bodies to keep them healthy and improve their intelligence, predicted Mr Kurzweil.
"We'll have intelligent nanobots go into our brains through the capillaries and interact directly with our biological neurons," he told BBC News.
CHALLENGES FACING HUMANITY
Make solar energy affordable
Provide energy from fusion
Develop carbon sequestration
Manage the nitrogen cycle
Provide access to clean water
Reverse engineer the brain
Prevent nuclear terror
Secure cyberspace
Enhance virtual reality
Improve urban infrastructure
Advance health informatics
Engineer better medicines
Advance personalised learning
Explore natural frontiers
The nanobots, he said, would "make us smarter, remember things better and automatically go into full emergent virtual reality environments through the nervous system".
Mr Kurzweil is one of 18 influential thinkers chosen to identify the great technological challenges facing humanity in the 21st century by the US National Academy of Engineering.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7248875.stm
Humanity is on the brink of advances that will see tiny robots implanted in people's brains to make them more intelligent, said Ray Kurzweil.
The engineer believes machines and humans will eventually merge through devices implanted in the body to boost intelligence and health.
"It's really part of our civilisation," Mr Kurzweil explained.
"But that's not going to be an alien invasion of intelligent machines to displace us."
Machines were already doing hundreds of things humans used to do, at human levels of intelligence or better, in many different areas, he said.
Man versus machine
"I've made the case that we will have both the hardware and the software to achieve human level artificial intelligence with the broad suppleness of human intelligence including our emotional intelligence by 2029," he said.
We'll have intelligent nanobots go into our brains... to make us smarter
Ray Kurzweil
"We're already a human machine civilisation; we use our technology to expand our physical and mental horizons and this will be a further extension of that."
Humans and machines would eventually merge, by means of devices embedded in people's bodies to keep them healthy and improve their intelligence, predicted Mr Kurzweil.
"We'll have intelligent nanobots go into our brains through the capillaries and interact directly with our biological neurons," he told BBC News.
CHALLENGES FACING HUMANITY
Make solar energy affordable
Provide energy from fusion
Develop carbon sequestration
Manage the nitrogen cycle
Provide access to clean water
Reverse engineer the brain
Prevent nuclear terror
Secure cyberspace
Enhance virtual reality
Improve urban infrastructure
Advance health informatics
Engineer better medicines
Advance personalised learning
Explore natural frontiers
The nanobots, he said, would "make us smarter, remember things better and automatically go into full emergent virtual reality environments through the nervous system".
Mr Kurzweil is one of 18 influential thinkers chosen to identify the great technological challenges facing humanity in the 21st century by the US National Academy of Engineering.
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
3 PARENT EMBRYO FORMED IN LAB !!!!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7227861.stm
Three-parent embryo formed in lab
IVF treatment
The scientists have created the embryo in the lab
Scientists believe they have made a potential breakthrough in the treatment of serious disease by creating a human embryo with three separate parents.
The Newcastle University team believe the technique could help to eradicate a whole class of hereditary diseases, including some forms of epilepsy.
The embryos have been created using DNA from a man and two women in lab tests.
It could ensure women with genetic defects do not pass the diseases on to their children.
It is human beings they are experimenting with
Josephine Quintavalle
Comment on Reproductive Ethics
'Our aim is to help children'
The technique is intended to help women with diseases of the mitochondria - mini organelles that are found within individual cells.
They are sometimes described as "cellular power plants" because they generate most of the cell's energy.
Faults in the mitochondrial DNA can cause around 50 known diseases, some of which lead to disability and death.
Three-parent embryo formed in lab
IVF treatment
The scientists have created the embryo in the lab
Scientists believe they have made a potential breakthrough in the treatment of serious disease by creating a human embryo with three separate parents.
The Newcastle University team believe the technique could help to eradicate a whole class of hereditary diseases, including some forms of epilepsy.
The embryos have been created using DNA from a man and two women in lab tests.
It could ensure women with genetic defects do not pass the diseases on to their children.
It is human beings they are experimenting with
Josephine Quintavalle
Comment on Reproductive Ethics
'Our aim is to help children'
The technique is intended to help women with diseases of the mitochondria - mini organelles that are found within individual cells.
They are sometimes described as "cellular power plants" because they generate most of the cell's energy.
Faults in the mitochondrial DNA can cause around 50 known diseases, some of which lead to disability and death.
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