Researchers planted 4,200 seeds in soils expected to mimic those in potential greenhouses on Mars and on the moon. Courtesy of Wieger Wamelink http://on.fb.me/1rYkF8p

By Patricia Waldron, Inside Science

(Inside Science) -- Any explorers visiting Mars and the moon will have to boldly grow where no man has grown before.

"Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny" biologists once said - meaning that an animal's "ontogeny", its embryonic development, replays its entire evolutionary history.

Today our understanding a more nuanced and a better way to figure out how animals evolved is to compare regulatory networks that control gene expression patterns, particularly embryonic ones, across species.  But that task can be humbling, according to Stowers Institute for Medical Research Scientific Director Robb Krumlauf, Ph.D. and colleagues, who show that the sea lamprey Petromyzon marinus, a survivor of ancient jawless vertebrates, exhibits a pattern of gene expression that is reminiscent of its jawed cousins, who evolved much, much later.

At nearly 100 feet long and weighing as much as 170 tons, the blue whale is the largest creature on the planet, and by far the heaviest living thing ever seen on Earth. So there's no way it could have anything in common with the tiniest fish larvae, which measure millimeters in length and tip the scales at a fraction of a gram, right?

Not so fast, says L. Mahadevan, Professor of Applied Mathematics, Organismic and Evolutionary Biology and of Physics at Harvard. 

Using simple hydrodynamics, Mahadevan and colleagues that a handful of principles govern how virtually every animal -- from the tiniest fish to birds to gigantic whales propel themselves though the water. 

The saying goes that we shouldn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good, so while there is no cure for muscular dystrophy, rather than solely focusing on the underlying genetic defect might not help people right now as directly targeting muscle repair. 

Muscular dystrophies are a group of muscle diseases characterized by skeletal muscle wasting and weakness. Mutations in certain proteins, most commonly the protein dystrophin, cause muscular dystrophy in humans and also in mice.

A tiny fragment of Martian meteorite 1.3 billion years old contains a 'cell-like' structure, which investigators say once held water, according to findings published in Astrobiology.

While investigating the Martian meteorite, known as Nakhla, Dr. Elias Chatzitheodoridis of the National Technical University of Athens found an unusual feature embedded deep within the rock. In a bid to understand what it might be, he teamed up with long-time friend and collaborator Professor Ian Lyon at the University of Manchester. 

The Asian monsoon was believed to have begun about 25 million years ago  as a result of the uplift of the Tibetan Plateau and the Himalaya Mountains but a new study finds it existed 40 million years ago - a time when atmospheric carbon dioxide was 4X what it is now. The monsoon then weakened 34 million years ago when atmospheric CO2 then decreased by 50 percent and an ice age occurred. 

The monsoon, the largest climate system in the world, governs the climate in much of mainland Asia, bringing torrential summer rains and dry winters. 

The authors make the surprising claim in Nature that the monsoon is as much a result of global climate as it is a result of topography.   

There was a time when medicine was considered 'at all costs' but the costs were a lot lower. With malpractice attorneys on call and 'defensive medicine' to include every test so that during fact-finding all of the bases are covered, costs have skyrocketed.

But governments that fund health care want to get the most effective treatment for the money. Both the vaguely defined "pre-diabetes" and hypertension drugs for low-risk people are worrying trends. In a new paper, Dr. Stephen Martin and colleagues urge clinicians to be cautious about treating low risk patients with blood pressure lowering drugs.

A third of the inherited risk of prostate cancer is closer to being identifiable with 23 new genetic variants associated with increased risk of the disease.

But there are a lot of factors. The total number of common genetic variants linked to prostate cancer is about 100, and testing for them can identify men with risk almost six times as high as the population average - but that is still just 1%.

Yogurt with probiotics are one of the latest health fads, but no one is sure they are doing anything at all and, if they are, that it is helping. 

Probiotics are defined by marketing groups as "live micro-organisms which, when administered in adequate amounts, confer a health benefit on the host, beyond the common nutritional effects." Proponents believe they facilitate fiber digestion, might boost the immune system and prevent or treat diarrhea. Dozens of bifidobacteria and lactobacilli are marketed in foods like yogurts and fermented milk products.

A decade ago there was mass hysteria among the fringes of science academia because American President George W. Bush limited federal funding for human embryonic stem cells to existing lines. Accompanying claims were that Alzheimer's Disease wouldn't be cured and Republicans hated science. 

In 2014, it is difficult to remember what all the fuss was about. California wants its $3 billion in hESC funding back, though that money did finally produce one paper, and adult stem cells have done all of the things hESC research was speculated to be able to do. Now, a final hurdle is about to be crossed: researchers have successfully 'reset' human pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) to a fully pristine state, the point of their greatest developmental potential.