David Cyranoski Two teams of Chinese researchers have created live mice from induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, answering a lingering question about the developmental potential of the cells. Since Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University in Japan created the first iPS cells1 in 2006, researchers have wondered whether they could generate an entire mammalian body from iPS cells, as they have from true embryonic stem cells. Experiments reported online this week in Nature 2 and in Cell Stem Cell 3 suggest that, at least for mice, the answer is yes. For the first study, animal cloners Qi Zhou of the Institute of Zoology in Beijing and Fanyi Zeng of Shanghai Jiao Tong University started by creating iPS cells the same way as Yamanaka, by using viral vectors to introduce four genes into mouse fibroblast cells. The researchers hoped that the introduced factors would 'reprogram' the cells so that they could differentiate into any type of cell in the body. To check whether the reprogramming had worked, Zhou and Zeng first carried out a standard set of tests, including analysing whether their iPS cells had the same surface markers as embryonic stem cells. Going a step further, they then created a 'tetraploid' embryo by fusing two cells of an early-stage fertilized embryo. A tetraploid embryo develops a placenta and other cells necessary for development, but not the embryonic cells that would become the body. It is, in essence, a car without a driver. © 2009 Nature Publishing Group

Keyword: Stem Cells
Link ID: 13099 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By LISA W. FODERARO NORTH ELBA, N.Y. — It was built to be impenetrable, from its “super rugged transparent polycarbonate housing” to its intricate double-tabbed lid that would keep campers’ food in and bears’ paws out. The BearVault 500 withstood the ravages of the test bears at the Folsom City Zoo in California. It has stymied mighty grizzlies weighing up to 1,000 pounds in the backcountry of Yellowstone National Park. But in one corner of the Adirondacks, campers started to notice that the BearVault, a popular canister designed to keep food and other necessities safe, was being compromised. First through circumstantial evidence, then from witness reports, it became clear that in most cases, the conqueror was a relatively tiny, extremely shy middle-aged black bear named Yellow-Yellow. Some canisters fail in the testing stage when large bears are able to rip off the lid. But wildlife officials say that Yellow-Yellow, a 125-pound bear named for two yellow ear tags that help wildlife officials keep tabs on her, has managed to systematically decipher a complex locking system that confounds even some campers. In the process, she has emerged as a near-mythical creature in the High Peaks region of the northeastern Adirondacks. “She’s quite talented,” said Jamie Hogan, owner of BearVault, based in San Diego. “I’m an engineer, and if one genius bear can do it, sooner or later there might be two genius bears. We’re trying to work on a new design that we can hopefully test on her.” Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Intelligence; Evolution
Link ID: 13098 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Michael Price When it comes to keeping cool, toucans get top billing in the animal world. New research shows that the colorful bird uses its massive beak to rapidly radiate away heat, allowing it to chill out in tropical climates or when expending a lot of energy while flying. At its most efficient, the toucan is theoretically capable of jettisoning 100% of its overall body heat loss through its bill. Birds don't sweat. Neither do elephants or rabbits. Instead, these creatures flush an uninsulated body part--such as a beak or an ear--with blood and let the heat dissipate into the air. Glenn Tattersall, an evolutionary physiologist at Brock University in Canada, wanted to find out just how much of a cooling effect the toucan's giant beak provided. He and colleagues focused on the South American toco toucan (Ramphastos toco), which has the largest bill of any bird relative to its body size. (It can represent between 30% and 50% of the creature's overall body surface area.) The team then used infrared thermal scanners to record the bill's surface temperature while the bird was exposed to air ranging from 10° to 35°C--temperatures typical of the toucan's habitat--and also while flying. By comparing the temperature of the bill with the environmental temperature, Tattersall's team was able to gauge how much heat was being lost; the larger the difference, the more heat was escaping. The bill radiated a great deal of heat at high temperatures and when the toucan flew, indicating that, like elephants and rabbits do with their ears, the toucans flush their bills with blood to cool down. © 2009 American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 13097 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Ewen Callaway Apparently not content with a talk show, a monthly glossy and, well, mega-stardom, Oprah Winfrey has also penetrated the human brain. When people see her picture or hear her name, specialised "Oprah neurons" fire away, new research suggests. Other public figures shouldn't be jealous. Our heads are also flush with cells attuned to Jennifer Aniston, Halle Berry, and even Saddam Hussein. The study of epileptic patients with electrodes implanted in their brains isn't an investigation of our celebrity-obsessed culture. Rather, the research explains how distinct images and sounds of a person can trigger a general concept of them, says Rodrigo Quian Quiroga, a neuroscientist at the University of Leicester, UK. "If I see my mother, I'm not just recognising my mother," he says. "Many things are happening. I remember the last time I saw her; I remember what she looks like; I remember that I love her; I remember her cooking." Four years ago, Quian Quiroga's team made headlines when it reported the existence of neurons that fire at the sight of different pictures Jennifer Aniston, or in some cases her name spelled out on a computer screen. To determine if these cells respond to visual cues only, or to information from other senses as well, Quian Quiroga and his colleagues added sound to their tests. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd

Keyword: Hearing; Vision
Link ID: 13096 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Ewen Callaway It may not be obvious from the scratch marks cats dish out, but domestic felines favour one paw over the other. More often than not, females tend to be righties, while toms are lefties, say Deborah Wells and Sarah Millsopp, psychologists at Queen's University Belfast in Northern Ireland. However, these preferences only manifest when cats perform particularly dexterous feats. That's for the same reason we can open a door with either arm, yet struggle to write legibly with our non-dominant hand. "The more complex and challenging [the task], the more likely we're going to see true handedness," Wells says. She and Millsopp tasked 42 domestic cats to ferret out a bit of tuna in a jar too small for their heads. Among 21 females, all but one favoured the right paw across dozens of trials, while 20 out of 21 males preferentially used the left. One male proved ambidextrous. Not so for two simpler activities: pawing at a toy mouse suspended in the air or dragged on ground from a string. No matter their sex, all of the cats wielded their right and left paws about equally on these less demanding tasks. Hormone levels could explain sex differences in paw choice, Wells says. Previous research has linked prenatal testosterone exposure to left-handedness. While studies of two other domestic animals, dogs and horses, revealed similar sex biases. Journal reference: Animal Behaviour (DOI: 10.1016/j.anbehav.2009.06.010) © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd

Keyword: Laterality
Link ID: 13095 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Ewen Callaway Legend has it that before an execution, King Charles II of England closed one eye and aimed his blind spot on the head of the condemned man. This allowed Charles' brain to decapitate the prisoner before the axe took its turn. In the video above, you can take advantage of this ability by "decapitating" author and psychologist Richard Wiseman, just as Charles II did to his victims. When Wiseman's head falls into our blind spot, our brain makes sense of the mismatch by replacing his head with the yellow background. When Wiseman raises a black bar across his body, our brain jettisons the background to avoid splitting the bar into two discontinuous halves. Blind spots occur because of design quirk in the architecture of our eyes. Cells at the back of the eye, in a layer called the retina, gather light focused through our lens from everything that's in front of us. However, where a bundle of nerves connects our eyes to our brain these light-sensitive cells cannot grow. Hence, light that hits this bundle is not sensed and a blind spot is the result. Fortunately, our brain is good at filling in gaps in our field of vision, so even with one eye shut, we rarely notice our blind spot. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Vision
Link ID: 13094 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Jennifer Barone We live in a sonic world, immersed in vibrations that stimulate microscopic hair cells deep inside our ears. This unseen energy influences our mood, our learning, even our health. We experience it as comforting music, as information-laden speech, or—all too often—as irritating noise, a by-product of our increasingly mechanized world. Despite all the ways sound affects us, we often let it slip unnoticed into the background of our lives. Hoping to understand it better, I set out to explore the mysteries of sound in the course of one day. At 6:50 a.m., my alarm clock begins the assault on my ears as the groggy gray matter between them is rudely yanked toward consciousness. My eyes shoot open, and as awareness slowly crystallizes, a single idea crowds out all others: Make the noise stop. My right hand knows just what to do and immediately puts an end to the awful blare. The formal term for the unpleasant shock that jolts me awake is acoustic startle response. Loud, sudden noises can trigger movements involving the limbs, torso, and eyelids, as well as increases in heart rate and blood pressure. This stress reaction comes in handy when noise indicates danger from, say, a wild animal or a deadly explosion. It is less useful when the enemy is a clock. The rapid movement of an object (such as the speaker in my clock) throws surrounding air molecules into a frenzy. That disturbance produces waves of high and low pressure traveling at about 760 miles per hour, which we experience as sound.

Keyword: Hearing
Link ID: 13093 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Cassandra Willyard Anyone who has woken to a cacophony of squawks and chirps knows that birdsong, no matter how melodious, isn't always a welcome sound. Past research suggests that birds aren't keen on human din either. But a new study finds that not all birds think alike: Some species actually appear to seek out noisy environments. Among birds, noise does more than annoy. It can hinder their ability to communicate. In fact, some scientists suspect that noise pollution is at least partly responsible for the decline of bird populations. Researchers, however, have had a hard time teasing out the impacts of noise from the impacts of other noise-associated factors, such as traffic and development. To sort out whether noise alone can affect bird nesting and reproduction, community ecologist Clinton Francis of the University of Colorado, Boulder, and his colleagues spent three summers in the pinyon-juniper woodlands of northwestern New Mexico. They located nests belonging to a variety of bird species on 18 wooded plots adjacent to natural gas extraction wells; they then followed those nests throughout the summer to see whether the hatchlings fledged. The study plots were nearly identical except for one key difference: Half of the natural gas wells had compressors so loud the researchers had to shout to be heard. The other half were quiet. Contrary to the findings of previous studies, which were unable to separate the impact of noise from other confounding variables, the researchers found no difference in bird density: Noisy sites contained as many nests as quiet sites. The team did, however, see differences in species richness. © 2009 American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: Hearing
Link ID: 13092 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Scott O. Lilienfeld and Hal Arkowitz On May 22, 2001, radio talk show personality Laura Schlessinger, better known as Dr. Laura, received a call from a woman who was distressed by her sister’s decision to exclude their nephew from an upcoming family wedding. When the caller mentioned that the boy suffered from Tourette’s disorder (also sometimes called Tourette syndrome), Dr. Laura berated her for even thinking that it might be appropriate to invite a child who would “scream out vulgarities in the middle of the wedding.” As we’ll soon explain, Dr. Laura’s comments embody just one of several common myths regarding Tourette’s. Tourette’s disorder is the eponymous name for the condition first formally described in 1885 by French neurologist Georges Gilles de la Tourette, who dubbed it maladie des tics (“sickness of tics”). According to the current edition of the American Psychiatric Association’s di­agnostic manual, Tourette’s disorder is marked by a history of both motor (movement) tics and phonic (sound) tics. Motor tics include eye twitching, facial grimacing, tongue protrusion, head turning and shrugging of the shoulders, whereas phonic tics encompass grunting, coughing, throat clearing, yelling inappropriate words and even barking. Some tics are “complex,” meaning they are coordinated series of actions. For example, a Tourette’s patient might continually pick up and smell objects or repeat what someone else just said (echolalia). Often a tic is preceded by a “premonitory urge”—that is, a powerful desire to emit the tic, which some have likened to the feeling we experience immediately before sneezing. Tourette’s patients typically report short-term relief following the tic. © 1996-2009 Scientific American Inc.

Keyword: Tourettes
Link ID: 13091 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Researchers have confirmed what parents have long believed - running around in the day means your child may well fall asleep faster at night. But the study of 500 children provides a figure: for every hour they sit, they need three minutes longer to nod off. Interestingly, it was not relevant what the child did while they sat. TV was no more detrimental than quietly reading. And the Archives of Disease in Childhood found those who took longer to get to sleep were no worse behaved. Experts from Monash University in Melbourne and the University of Auckland looked at 519 seven-year-olds. The majority fell asleep within 45 minutes, and the average "sleep latency" - the time it took - was 26 minutes. Children who were very physically active during the day tended to take less time to fall asleep, but the more prominent association was between being sedentary and taking longer to drift off. Those who fell asleep faster also tended to sleep for longer. There has been much discussion about the impact of reduced sleep duration on children. "As short sleep duration is associated with obesity and lower cognitive performance, community emphasis on the importance of promoting healthy sleep in children is vitally important," the researchers wrote. "This study emphasises the importance of physical activity for children, not only for fitness, cardiovascular health and weight control, but also for sleep." (C)BBC

Keyword: Sleep; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 13090 - Posted: 07.23.2009

By RONI CARYN RABIN Many studies have suggested that a diet rich in fish is good for the heart. Now there is new evidence that such a diet may ward off dementia as well. One of the largest efforts to document a connection — and the first such study undertaken in the developing world — has found that older adults in Asia and Latin America were less likely to develop dementia if they regularly consumed fish. And the more fish they ate, the lower their risk, the report found. The findings appeared in the August issue of The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. The study, which included 15,000 people ages 65 and older in China, India, Cuba, Venezuela, Mexico, Peru and the Dominican Republic, found that those who ate fish nearly every day were almost 20 percent less likely to develop dementia than those who ate fish just a few days a week. Adults who ate fish a few days a week were almost 20 percent less likely to develop dementia than those who ate no fish at all. “There is a gradient effect, so the more fish you eat, the less likely you are to get dementia,” said Dr. Emiliano Albanese, a clinical epidemiologist at King’s College London and the senior author of the study. “Exactly the opposite is true for meat,” he added. “The more meat you eat, the more likely you are to have dementia.” Other studies have shown that red meat in particular may be bad for the brain. Fish, especially oily fish, may be protective against dementia because it is rich in omega-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids, which studies suggest may have numerous health benefits, among them anti-inflammatory properties. Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 13089 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Steve Connor, Science Editor The number of animals used in scientific research last year rose by 15 per cent on the previous year bringing the total to nearly 3.6 million - the greatest number of animals involved in laboratory experiments for almost 20 years. Statistics released today by the Home Office showed that the number of experiments involving animals that were started in 2008 also rose by about 14 per cent to just under 3.7 million "procedures", an increase that closely matched the total number of animals used. This represents a 39 per cent increase in animals experiments since Labour came to power in 1997. The number of animals used in experiments had begun to fall in the 1990s but in the past decade it has increased steadily each year largely due to the rise in the number of genetically modified mice used in biomedical research. Last year's increase in the number of animal experiments was the biggest for more than two decades. Lord West, the Home Office minister responsible for regulating animal research, said that an overall increase in the amount of biomedical research carried out in Britain largely explains why there has been such a large rise in the number of animals used in experiments as well as the increase in procedures. "Today's statistics show an increase in the number of procedures being undertaken, and the overall level of scientific procedures is determined by a number of factors, including the economic climate and global trends in scientific endeavour," Lord West said. ©independent.co.uk

Keyword: Animal Rights
Link ID: 13088 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Edmund S. Higgins A few years ago a single mother who had recently moved to town came to my office asking me to prescribe the stimulant drug Adderall for her sixth-grade son. The boy had been taking the medication for several years, and his mother had liked its effects: it made homework time easier and improved her son’s grades. At the time of this visit, the boy was off the medication, and I conducted a series of cognitive and behavioral tests on him. He performed wonderfully. I also noticed that off the medication he was friendly and playful. On a previous casual encounter, when the boy had been on Adderall, he had seemed reserved and quiet. His mother acknowledged this was a side effect of the Adderall. I told her that I did not think her son had attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and that he did not need medication. That was the last time I saw her. Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder afflicts about 5 percent of U.S. children—twice as many boys as girls—age six to 17, according to a recent survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As its name implies, people with the condition have trouble focusing and often are hyperactive or impulsive. An estimated 9 percent of boys and 4 percent of girls in the U.S. are taking stimulant medications as part of their therapy for ADHD, the CDC reported in 2005. The majority of patients take methylphenidate (Ritalin, Concerta), whereas most of the rest are prescribed an amphetamine such as Adderall. Although it sounds counterintuitive to give stimulants to a person who is hyperactive, these drugs are thought to boost activity in the parts of the brain responsible for attention and self-control. © 1996-2009 Scientific American Inc.

Keyword: ADHD; Drug Abuse
Link ID: 13087 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Lauran Neergaard WASHINGTON -- The best time to learn a foreign language: Between birth and age 7. Missed that window? New research is showing just how children's brains can become bilingual so easily, findings that scientists hope eventually could help the rest of us learn a new language a bit easier. "We think the magic that kids apply to this learning situation, some of the principles, can be imported into learning programs for adults," says Dr. Patricia Kuhl of the University of Washington, who is part of an international team now trying to turn those lessons into more teachable technology. Each language uses a unique set of sounds. Scientists now know babies are born with the ability to distinguish all of them, but that ability starts weakening even before they start talking, by the first birthday. Kuhl offers an example: Japanese doesn't distinguish between the "L" and "R" sounds of English -- "rake" and "lake" would sound the same. Her team proved that a 7-month-old in Tokyo and a 7-month-old in Seattle respond equally well to those different sounds. But by 11 months, the Japanese infant had lost a lot of that ability. Time out -- how do you test a baby? By tracking eye gaze. Make a fun toy appear on one side or the other whenever there's a particular sound. The baby quickly learns to look on that side whenever he or she hears a brand-new but similar sound. Noninvasive brain scans document how the brain is processing and imprinting language.

Keyword: Language; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 13086 - Posted: 07.23.2009

by Ewen Callaway For all their cognitive prowess, chimpanzees will never build four-stroke engines, stone pyramids, or even a simple wheel. Technological innovation and improvement seem to be uniquely human traits, despite culture and ample tool use in chimpanzees and other animals. New research on children and chimpanzees might explain why. "For culture to accumulate – to become more and more complex – requires innovations and one of the first ways in which hominins clearly went beyond chimpanzees was in making stone tools," says Andrew Whiten, a psychologist at St Andrew's University, UK. He and researchers in Germany argue that this difference comes down to the distinct ways in which humans and chimpanzees learn new tricks from others. Eyes on the prize For chimpanzees, culturally transmitted skills tend to focus on food, whether cracking nuts with rocks, or fishing insects out of the dirt with sticks. Overwhelming evidence now suggests that chimpanzees pass these traditions onto their brethren. For instance, individuals in Taï National Park in Ivory Coast feast on nuts, while chimpanzees in Gombe National Park in Tanzania ignore them. Less clear is what chimpanzees learn by watching another animal demonstrate a new trick. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Intelligence; Evolution
Link ID: 13085 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Linda Geddes YOU may be tempted to think men are becoming an optional extra in the mating game, but biochemical evidence in mice and people suggests that fathers may play a key role in the rearing of offspring. Previous studies have hinted at the importance of fathers in child-rearing. Some have shown that girls reach puberty younger, become sexually active earlier and are more likely to get pregnant in their teens if their father was absent when they were young. Others have suggested that the sons of absent fathers display lower intimacy and self-esteem. To investigate the biological basis of such differences, Gabriella Gobbi at McGill University Health Centre in Montreal, Canada, and colleagues turned to "California mice", which, like people, are monogamous and tend to rear their offspring together. The researchers removed the fathers but not the mothers from some of the mouse pups, from three days after birth until they were weaned at 30 to 40 days old. Then they looked at the activity of brain cells in the prefrontal cortex, an area involved in social interaction and expression of personality, in response to the hormone oxytocin and other neurotransmitters, including serotonin, dopamine and NMDA. Cells in pups deprived of fathers had a blunted response to oxytocin - the "cuddle chemical", which is normally released during social interactions and pair bonding. They also had an increased response to NMDA, which is involved in memory. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd

Keyword: Sexual Behavior; Hormones & Behavior
Link ID: 13084 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Michael Torrice Classical philosophers called humans "the rational animal." Clearly, they never looked closely at ants. A new study suggests that ant colonies avoid irrational decisions that people and other animals often make. Consider the following scenario: You want to buy a house with a big kitchen and a big yard, but there are only two homes on the market--one with a big kitchen and a small yard and the other with a small kitchen and a big yard. Studies show you'd be about 50% likely to choose either house--and either one would be a rational choice. But now, a new home comes on the market, this one with a large kitchen and no yard. This time, studies show, you'll make an irrational decision: Even though nothing has changed with the first two houses, you'll now favor the house with the big kitchen and small yard over the one with the small kitchen and big yard. Overall, scientists have found, people and other animals will often change their original preferences when presented with a third choice. Not so with ants. These insects also shop for homes but not quite in the way that humans do. Solitary worker ants spread out, looking for two main features: a small entrance and a dark cavity. If an ant finds an outstanding hole--such as the inside of an acorn or a rock crevice--it recruits another scout to check it out. As more scouts like the site, the number of workers in the new hole grows. Once the crowd reaches a critical mass, the ants race back to the old nest and start carrying the queen and larvae to move the entire colony. © 2009 American Association for the Advancement of Science

Keyword: Intelligence; Evolution
Link ID: 13083 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Nathan Seppa Elderly people with mild cognitive losses are at a heightened risk of progressing to Alzheimer’s disease if they have a combination of telltale compounds in their spinal fluid, researchers report in the July 22/29 Journal of the American Medical Association. By testing for a shortage of a sticky compound called amyloid-beta in the spinal fluid and for excess amounts of two kinds of a protein called tau, the scientists could identify people at greatest risk. The test isn’t foolproof, and a positive reading still warns of a disease for which there is no cure. But scientists are heartened by this and earlier studies (SN: 9/20/03, p. 179)because Alzheimer’s disease is difficult to foresee and its early symptoms are often mistaken for routine cognitive losses caused by aging. Niklas Mattsson of a Gothenburg University-affiliated hospital in Mölndal, Sweden, and an international group of scientists recruited 750 elderly people in Europe and the United States from 1990 to 2007. At the time of enrollment, the volunteers had mild cognitive impairment — a loss of memory or other mental faculties — that wasn’t attributable to aging alone but fell short of Alzheimer’s disease. Each volunteer contributed a cerebrospinal fluid sample by undergoing a spinal puncture. The participants, average age 69, were monitored for about three years during the study. © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2009

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 13082 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Celeste Biever If there's one thing worse than being in a coma, it's people thinking you are in one when you aren't. Yet a new comparison of methods for detecting consciousness suggests that around 40 per cent of people diagnosed as being in a vegetative state are in fact "minimally conscious". In the worst case scenario, such misdiagnoses could influence the decision to allow a patient to die, even though they have some vestiges of consciousness. But crucially it may deprive patients of treatments to make them more comfortable, more likely to recover, or to allow them to communicate with family, say researchers. In a vegetative state (VS), reflexes are intact and the patient can breathe unaided, but there is no awareness. A minimally conscious state (MCS) is a sort of twilight zone, only recently recognised, in which people may feel some physical pain, experience some emotion, and communicate to some extent. However, because consciousness is intermittent and incomplete in MCS, it can be sometimes very difficult to tell the difference between the two. In 2002 Joseph Giacino at the JFK Rehabilitation Institute in New Jersey and colleagues released the first diagnostic criteria for MCS. Then in 2004, Giacino released a revised coma recovery scale (CRS-R) – a series of behavioural tests based on criteria that can be used to distinguish between the two states. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 13081 - Posted: 06.24.2010

An immune system therapy given to cancer patients could have the added benefit of reducing the risk of Alzheimer's disease, a study suggests. A US team found patients who had received antibody treatment had more than 40% less risk of Alzheimer's than people who had not. Writing in Neurology, they said a bigger study was needed to confirm their findings. UK experts said immunotherapy was an important area of research. So far, scientists have been looking at it as a way of treating people who already have Alzheimer's. The idea is that immune based therapies affect the formation of beta-amyloid plaques in the brain, which are characteristic of Alzheimer's, possibly by suppressing the inflammatory response in the brain. People with the disease have lower levels of anti beta-amyloid antibodies, so experts are looking at ways of boosting levels - including immunisation. But this study investigated whether or not people who had been given the treatment already, for another condition, had some protection. The team from Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York looked at the records of 847 people who had been given at least one intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIg) treatment for cancers, such as leukaemia, or immune system disorders. All were over 65 and had received the treatment between April 2001 and August 2004. Their records were then compared with those of 847,000 people who had not needed the therapy who were similar Alzheimer's risk factors to the treated group. (C)BBC

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 13080 - Posted: 07.21.2009