Affinium Pharmaceuticals announced today that full recruitment has been achieved in its multi-center Phase 2 clinical trial evaluating oral AFN-1252 in acute bacterial skin&skin structure infections ("ABSSSI"). This Phase 2 trial is the first human efficacy study conducted with a new class of antibiotics designed to specifically inhibit staphylococcal fatty acid biosynthesis via a new drug target, the fatty acid synthase II (FASII) system. Results expected in late 2012 will represent a significant proof-of-concept milestone for this unique, Staphylococcus-specific antibiotic, AFN-1252. 

In the last year, I've had the occasion to review several books that deal with the unconscious mind. Each author has had an interesting take on the same material, and it's been illuminating to see how writers with different areas of expertise handle the unconscious mind and render the research readable for a popular audience.

Everyone knows insects have adhesion on dry surfaces - the liquid surface tension between air, liquids and solids known as the capillary force. In order to stick to dry surfaces insects use  capillary forces with the aid of their oil-covered adhesive setae.  The ability to stay on slippery plants after a rain is a bigger mystery, though.

The landing of a cute robot on Mars really resonated with American popular culture this past weekend; and so the first few images Curiosity snapped have caught fire as well, including a blotch that was no longer there in later pictures.

Curiosity landed at 10:32 p.m. Aug. 5 PDT near the foot of a mountain three miles tall inside Gale Crater, which is 96 miles in diameter. Curiosity is the largest mission ever sent to another planet. Its 9 month, 350 million mile journey ended with 'seven minutes of terror' and no one knew precisely where it would end up or when it would get down to business.

200 milliseconds after the HazCam shutter opened it caught a hazy shimmer in the distance.

A face, a remarkably complete lower jaw, and part of a second lower jaw are exciting new fossils discovered east of Lake Turkana which confirm that there were two additional species of our genus living alongside our direct human ancestral species, Homo erectus, almost two million years ago.

The finds were uncovered between 2007 and 2009 by the Koobi Fora Research Project (KFRP), led by Meave and Louise Leakey. 

Husbands and wives express love differently in marriage, according to a new study.

 Looking at survey results collected at four time points over 13 years of marriage, researchers ("Do Men and Women Show Love Differently in Marriage?" Schoenfeld et al., Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, November 2012) found that while both genders were equally likely to show love through affection, wives expressed love by being less antagonistic while husbands showed love by initiating sex or sharing activities together. 

The earthquake that shook Sumatra on on April 11, 2012 is distinct, not just because it was  magnitude-8.6 but also because it was both larger than scientists thought an earthquake of its type could ever be and it was rupturing along multiple faults that lie at nearly right angles to one another.

Like an underwater earthquake in a maze. 

A little nuclear robot on Mars is getting all of the attention this week but Earth has plenty of undiscovered life - a third of Earth's organisms live in our planet's rocks and sediments and they are almost a complete mystery.

As a newly minted, 1 year old professor, this is the deep end of the astronomy edu cation pool. I am swimming in the insights and experiences of people with more experience than me. I recommend attending an Astronomical Society of the Pacific meeting for this very reason. This is where you can find the answers to questions you hadn't yet realized were questions.

It will take a while for me to assimilate (and type; I am using a nook), but here are three tidbits.

If you give a planetarium show about supernovas providing the elements of life, and your visuals show supernovae, your audience will walk out raving about your cool show that taught them about.... how supernovas occur. The visuals were the story, not the voice-over narrative.