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Researchers are starting to discover the curing powers of plasma -- bringing the ion-based form of matter into medical realms. A kind of plasma called non-equilibrium atmospheric pressure plasma can help heal wounds, destroy cancer cells and kill harmful bacteria. The jets of plasma that doctors might use, however, often become turbulent with the direction and velocity changing dramatically. Now, researchers have found this turbulence likely emerges from heat-induced sound waves generated at the plasma electrodes. This new insight is critical for more consistent and effective medical therapies. "Now that we understand where the induced turbulence in atmospheric pressure plasma jets is coming from, it may be possible to better control it," said Amanda Lietz of the University of Michigan, who is an author of a new report discussing these results, based on computer simulations, appearing as the cover article this week in the journal  Applied Physics Letters , from AIP Pub...

An illustration of how cigarette smoke triggers epigenetic changes in airway cells. Credit: Jennifer Fairman Scientists at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center say they have preliminary evidence in laboratory-grown, human airway cells that a condensed form of cigarette smoke triggers so-called "epigenetic" changes in the cells consistent with the earliest steps toward lung cancer development. Epigenetic processes are essentially switches that control a gene's potentially heritable levels of protein production but without involving changes to underlying structure of a gene's DNA. One example of such an epigenetic change is methylation -- when cells add tiny methyl chemical groups to a beginning region of a gene's DNA sequence, often silencing the gene's activation. "Our study suggests that epigenetic changes to cells treated with cigarette smoke sensitize airway cells to genetic mutations known to cause lung cancers," says Stephe...

The discovery of a mechanism by which normal brain cells regulate the expression of the NFIA gene, which is important for both normal brain development and brain tumor growth, might one day help improve therapies to treat brain tumors. The study appears in the journal  Nature Neuroscience . "We began this project by studying how three components that regulate the expression of the NFIA gene interact with each other in the developing spinal cord in animal models," said corresponding author Dr. Benjamin Deneen, associate professor of neuroscience at the Center for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine and member of the Dan L Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center at Baylor College of Medicine. The researchers studied mostly glial cells, which represent 70 percent of the cells in the central nervous system and support the functions of the neurons. Gene expression, the process by which genes produce proteins, is regulated at different levels, in a coordinated fashion, but scie...

Neural exercise related to defensive responses in people shifts between two mind areas relying on the proximity of a menace, suggests neuroimaging information from two impartial samples of adults within the Netherlands printed in  The Journal of Neuroscience . In a single pattern, the findings counsel that emotional abuse throughout childhood might shift the steadiness of exercise between these areas. The amygdala and a carefully associated area known as the mattress nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST) are each activated in response to a menace, however it's unclear how these areas orchestrate defensive responses in people. Floris Klumpers and colleagues discovered that anticipation of an uncomfortable however innocent electrical shock was related to elevated exercise in BNST, which is strongly linked with different mind areas which may be concerned in deciding how to reply to a distant menace. In distinction, the shock itself was related to elevated exercise within the amyg...

Annually, greater than half 1,000,000 deaths amongst kids beneath 5 years of age around the globe are attributable to diarrheal illnesses -- largely attributable to inadequate entry to enough hygiene, sanitation and clear ingesting water. Whereas there are efficient preventive measures out there, together with vaccines, adoption is lagging in low-resource settings the place probably the most extreme instances happen. Analysis performed on the College of Maryland College of Medication (UM SOM), has recognized 4 pathogens are answerable for the overwhelming majority of diarrheal diseases -- main the best way for potential new therapies. In a latest paper printed in  Pediatric Clinics of North America , "The Burden and Etiology of Diarrheal Sickness in Growing International locations," Karen Kotloff, MD, Professor of Pediatrics and Head of the Division of Infectious Illness and Tropical Pediatrics at UM SOM, outlined the influence and challenges of diarrheal illnesses, reco...

A staff of researchers led by a bioinformatician on the College of California San Diego has developed a way to assist decide whether or not sure hard-to-study mutations within the human genome, known as brief tandem repeats or microsatellites, are more likely to be concerned in dangerous circumstances. The staff, which additionally consists of scientists from the New York Genome Middle, Harvard College, and the Massachusetts Institute of Know-how, particulars their findings within the Sept. 11 concern of Nature Genetics. In brief tandem repeats, sequences of 1 to 6 of DNA's primary elements, known as nucleotides, repeat again and again, generally as much as tons of or 1000's of occasions. These mutations have already got been implicated in about 30 circumstances. The very best identified is maybe Huntington's Illness , which causes the progressive breakdown of nerve cells within the mind. About 30,000 individuals undergo from the situation in america. These individual...

Engineered strands of DNA -- nanoscale instruments referred to as "nanoswitches" -- could possibly be the important thing to quicker, simpler, cheaper and extra delicate checks that may allow high-fidelity detection of biomarkers indicating the presence of various ailments, viral strains and even genetic variabilities as delicate as a single-gene mutation. "One important utility in each fundamental analysis and scientific observe is the detection of biomarkers in our our bodies, which convey important details about our present well being," says Wesley Wong, PhD. "Nevertheless, present strategies are usually both low cost and simple or extremely delicate, however usually not each." That is why Wong and his group have tailored their DNA nanoswitch know-how -- beforehand demonstrated to assist drug discovery and the measure of biochemical interactions -- into a brand new platform that they name the nanoswitch-linked immunosorbent assay (NLISA) for quick,...

A staff of scientists has revealed an inner clock inside stay human cells, a discovering that creates new alternatives for understanding the constructing blocks of life and the onset of illness. "Beforehand, a exact level of a cell in its life cycle may solely be decided by learning lifeless cells," explains Alexandra Zidovska, an assistant professor of physics at New York College and the senior writer of analysis, which seems within the newest situation of the journal  Proceedings of the Nationwide Academy of Sciences   (PNAS). "Nevertheless, with this discovery, which exhibits that the nucleus reveals fast fluctuations that lower through the life cycle of the cell, we will improve our data of each wholesome and diseased human cells." The examine, which additionally included Fang-Yi Chu, an NYU doctoral candidate, and Shannon Haley, an NYU undergraduate, sought to broaden our understanding of the cell nucleus through the cell cycle. It is lengthy been establi...

There are at present an estimated four.5 billion individuals world wide uncovered to ranges of particulate air air pollution which might be at the least twice what the World Well being Group (WHO) considers protected. But, the influence of sustained publicity to air pollution on an individual's life expectancy has largely remained a vexingly unanswered query -- till now. A examine printed as we speak within the  Proceedings of the Nationwide Academy of Sciences  finds Chinese language coverage is unintentionally inflicting individuals in northern China to dwell three.1 years lower than individuals within the south attributable to air air pollution concentrations which might be 46 % increased. These findings indicate that each further 10 micrograms per cubic meter of particulate matter air pollution (PM10) reduces life expectancy by zero.6 years. The elevated mortality is fully attributable to a rise in cardiorespiratory deaths, indicating that air air pollution is the reas...

To purify a pattern of DNA and extract the round DNA, College of Texas at Dallas researchers used a 50-year-old lab method. They added DNA to a dense salt resolution containing cesium chloride in a small check tube, then spun the pattern in an ultracentrifuge at very excessive speeds. Round DNA is denser and concentrates in a band close to the underside of the tube. Credit score: College of Texas at Dallas A 50-year-old lab method helps researchers higher perceive round DNA, a lesser-known and poorly understood cousin of the linear model generally related to life's genetic blueprint. With the help of a course of known as density gradient centrifugation, a analysis workforce, which included scientists from The College of Texas at Dallas and Stanford College College of Drugs, just lately printed a research that for the primary time characterizes all the round DNA within the worm  C. elegans , in addition to in three human cell varieties. What Is Round DNA? The DNA ...