The International Council for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (ICIAM), the International Mathematical Union (IMU) and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS) today released the Citation Statistics report. The report is written from a mathematical perspective and states that while citation-based statistics such as impact factor are often used to assess scientific research they are not the best measures of research quality.

The use of citations in assessing research quality is a topic that is of increasing interest throughout the world's scientific community. The report cautions against the over-reliance on citation statistics such as the impact factor and h-index. These are often promoted because of the belief in their accuracy, objectivity, and simplicity, but these beliefs are unfounded.

Among the report’s key findings:

Male homosexuality is difficult to explain under strictly Darwinian evolutionary models, because carriers of genes predisposing towards male homosexuality would be likely to reproduce less than average, suggesting that alleles influencing homosexuality should progressively disappear from a population.

Partly due to that, homosexuality in males is thought to have both psycho-social factors and genetic components. This is suggested by the high concordance of sexual orientation in identical twins and the fact that homosexuality is more common in males belonging to the maternal line of male homosexuals. These effects have not been shown for female homosexuality, indicating that these two phenomena may have very different origins and dynamics.

An Italian research team, consisting of Andrea Camperio Ciani and Giovanni Zanzotto at the University of Padova and Paolo Cermelli at the University of Torino, found that the evolutionary origin and maintenance of male homosexuality in human populations could be explained by a model based around the idea of sexually antagonistic selection, in which genetic factors spread in the population by giving a reproductive advantage to one sex while disadvantaging the other.

Previous work by Camperio Ciani and collaborators, published in 2004, showed that females in the maternal line of male homosexuals were more fertile than average, giving less weight to the idea that alleles influencing homosexuality should progressively disappear from a population.

Want to get a male mouse excited? A group of steroids found in female mouse urine is all it takes, say researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. They found the compounds activate nerve cells in the male mouse's nose with unprecedented effectiveness.

"These particular steroids, known as glucocorticoids (GCCs), are involved in energy metabolism, stress and immune function," says senior author Timothy E. Holy, Ph.D., assistant professor of neurobiology and anatomy. "They control many important aspects of the mouse's physiology and theoretically could give any mouse that sniffs them a detailed insider's view of the health of the animal they came from."

Holy plans further research to see if activating the nerves in the male mouse's nose leads to particular behavioral responses. He probes the male mouse's reaction to chemical signals from female mice to advance understanding of pattern recognition and learning in the much more complex human brain. In 2005, he found that female mice or their odors cause male mice to sing. He doesn't know yet if the GCC steroids' effects on the male mouse nose help to trigger this behavior.

Female chimps think sleeping around is more important than finding the strongest mate, according to University of St Andrews scientists. They even go so far as to keep quiet during sex so that other females don't find out about it, thus preventing any unwanted competition.

The research, by psychologists Simon Townsend and Klaus Zuberbühler, sheds new light on the sophisticated mental capacities and social intelligence of our closest living relatives.

The researchers observed the behavior of chimps in the Budongo Forest, Uganda, in collaboration with Tobias Deschner of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig.

We like to think that newer ideas are always better and indoor plumbing may be one newer idea that should be reconsidered in the developing world, according to Michigan researchers.

Clean water scarcity is not as critical an issue as often thought say Michigan Technological University Associate Professor David Watkins, Professor James Mihelcic and PhD student Lauren Fry of the University's Sustainable Futures Institute. But installing water-guzzling appliances such as toilets can actually promote unsanitary conditions when the effluent is discharged untreated into once-clean rivers and streams.

Instead, a properly built latrine keeps sewage safely separate from drinking water. Diseases such as dysentery attack millions of people every year, often fatally, largely as a result of poor sanitation.

My name’s Ethan White and I’m currently trying to finish my PhD in Evolutionary Psychology. I’m interested in the evolution of creativity and language and how it relates to sexual and relationship behavior.

If anyone would be interested I have a survey I’d like you to take which would really help me out. It shouldn't take more than an hour and some people finish it in around 30 minutes.

Now you might say, "I don’t know you, you pervert. I'm not telling you any of that.

To which I would respond, "Good call.

How is it that a statement by the Vatican has delayed my annual report to the National Institutes of Health? Not being Catholic, I generally don't pay much attention to Papal announcements, but maybe I need to start listening. Apparently back in March, the Vatican suggested that "genetic manipulations which alter DNA" are mortal sins.

Since just about everything I do in the lab involves genetic manipulations which alter DNA (in fact the only organisms in our lab which aren't genetically engineered are the people who work there), I can add one more item to my long list of reasons for why I'm headed to eternal condemnation.

But before I get to Hell, I need to submit my annual NIH Fellowship update. I have a fellowship from the National Institutes of Health, which pays my not-so-large salary. In return for the money, I tell the NIH what I've been doing every year. That's fair enough - the NIH should expect something for their money.

Everything that I have done this year, however, has involved some sort of genetic engineering - which apparently upsets the Pope. This is unfortunate, because if we eliminated all genetic engineering, essentially all biomedical research would grind to a halt. Genetic engineering, in some restricted applications, has its risks, but the vast majority of genetic engineering that goes on every day in thousands of labs all over the world is essential to our efforts to understand both basic biology and the impact of genes on our health.

Mount Sinai researchers have discovered that polyphenolics derived from red grape seeds may be useful agents to prevent or treat Alzheimer's Disease(AD).

This new study explored the possibility of developing 'wine mimetic pills' that would replace the recommended beneficial glass of red wine a day for AD prevention.

Giulio Maria Pasinetti, senior author and Director of the NCCAM-NIH funded Center of Excellence for Research in Complementary and Alternative Medicine in Alzheimer's Disease at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and his collaborator Dr. Jun Wang of Mount Sinai, through a partnership between the Research Center at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and Dr. Anil Shrikhande, the Director of the Polyphenolics Division of Constellation Brands, a producer of biologically active grape products, tested the hypothesis that certain molecules contained in red wine, in particular in red grape seeds currently being developed with the name of Meganatural AZ, might offset disease progression in mice genetically modified to develop Alzheimer' disease.

The modern debate about protein has extended far beyond the Atkin's Diet and into a large part of our culture. On this site alone, you can find articles written by T. Colin Campbell, who says that 'complete' proteins in meat are a myth, to Seth Roberts and an intriguing interview with Gary Taubes.

New findings in the May issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition(1) describes the conclusions of a Protein Summit held last spring, which brought together the world's leading scientists in protein research and is certain to add fuel to the fire.

The summit's attendees report that eating a higher protein diet - still within the recommended range, but toward the top of it - may play a role in optimal health, as higher protein diets are linked with a lower risk for many health conditions such as type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular diseases and osteoporosis as well as sarcopenia, the degenerative loss of skeletal muscle mass and strength.

Nutrition researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have identified five common genetic variations that increase the risk of metabolic syndrome, a group of factors linked to heart disease and diabetes. Another variant they found appeared to protect against the condition.

People with metabolic syndrome have at least three of the following symptoms: abdominal obesity, high blood triglyceride levels, lower good cholesterol (HDL), elevated blood pressure and elevated fasting blood glucose. They are four times as likely to develop heart disease and at least seven times more likely to develop diabetes as individuals without metabolic syndrome.

The investigators, who report their findings in the June issue of the journal Human Molecular Genetics, looked for changes in the CD36 gene, which is located in a region of chromosome 7 that has been linked to metabolic syndrome in several genome-wide studies.