Most teenagers wouldn’t have a clue what agarose gel electrophoresis means, but middle school student Andrew Trigiano does - and as a result he's the youngest author to ever publish in the American Society of Horticultural Science’s journal HortTechnology.

One of the most frequently used tools in biochemistry and biotechnology, agarose gel electrophoresis is a common forensic technique often used in genetic or DNA fingerprinting. The procedure is achieved by moving negatively charged nucleic acid molecules through a gelatinous substance known as agarose by using an electric field.

It's time to think about a return to the moon. Thanks to being able to stand on the shoulders of giants, we know where to watch for problems - even in the dust. Dust could be more than a housekeeping issue for astronauts who visit the moon because the health of astronauts may depend on the amount of exposure they have to the tiny particles.

During the Apollo lunar missions in the late 1960s and 1970s, the clingy particles were easily transported via spacesuits into the lunar lander following moonwalks. The amount of dust inside the vehicle was so great some astronauts reported they could smell it.

Even though there were no known illnesses due to exposure, lunar dust is a concern because it has properties comparable to that of fresh-fractured quartz, a highly toxic substance. However, the Apollo flights lasted only a few days. During the proposed return to the moon, astronauts will be exposed to lunar dust for longer periods of time, including missions that could last months.

A type of plastic that exhibits metallic and semi-conductor-like properties will be described in an inaugural doctoral lecture at the University of Leicester on Wednesday June 4th(*).

In his lecture, Dr. M. A. Mohamoud will discuss a novel class of materials called “conducting polymers.” Conducting polymers are smart materials that can mimic biological systems and can be used as components of artificial nerves, electronic noses/tongues, drug-release-and-delivering systems, and artificial muscles.

They can also be used as energy storage devices in battery technology, electrochromic display devices (in smart window technology and light emitting diodes), and biological sensor technology.

Satellites currently use radio waves to exchange data. Now the data rate has been increased a hundredfold in two test satellites by using lasers instead of radio signals.

The tests between German satellite TerraSAR-X and US satellite NFIRE, covering more than 5000 kilometers in space without any errors, was special in that the space tests recently performed by Tesat-Spacecom was that the data was transmitted by laser.

The bandwidth achieved in the test was a hundred times greater than during conventional communication by radio waves, enabling a data rate equivalent to roughly 400 DVDs per hour. This could make it possible to transmit large data packets between several satellites in the future, for instance to send image data from Earth observation satellites to a ground station. That has not been possible until now, as the bandwidth of radio waves is not large enough. Another advantage of this new form of communication is that lasers are easier to focus than radio waves, which means that data transmissions can be directed more accurately.

A new study released today in the online edition of Physiological Genomics finds that individuals with a specific genetic variation consistently consume more sugary foods. The study offers the first evidence of the role that a variation in the GLUT2 gene – a gene that controls sugar entry into the cells – has on sugar intake, and may help explain individual preferences for foods high in sugar.

Summary of the Study

Food preferences are influenced by the environment as well as genetics. Cravings for foods high in sugar vary from person to person, but the reasons why are still unclear. To better understand the mechanism, the research team examined the effect of a common variation in a gene that controls the entry of sugar (glucose) into cells.

Long-term harmful effects of marijuana include risk for heart attacks and strokes in addition to impaired learning and memory.

The active chemical in marijuana, called delta-9-tetrahyrdocannabinol (THC), is believed to exert these effects by binding to cannabinoid (CB) receptors located on several cell types in various organs.

Scientists have found CB receptors in many organs including the brain, heart, liver, kidney, and spleen. In this study, researchers investigated if persistent heavy marijuana use might be associated with changes in different blood proteins in order to check if the abnormalities in the identified proteins might be related to other side-effects of marijuana.

In March, the US House Energy and Commerce Committee launched an investigation into potential conflicts of interest in scientific panels that advise the Environmental Protection Agency on the human health effects of toxic chemicals.

The committee identified eight scientists that served as consultants or members of EPA science advisory panels while getting research support from the chemical industry to study the chemicals under review. Two scientists were actually employed by companies that made or worked with manufacturers of the chemicals under review.

Such conflicts, Chairman John Dingell (D-Mich.) noted, stand in stark contrast to the agency’s dismissal last summer of highly respected public health scientist Deborah Rice, an expert in toxicology, from a panel examining the health impacts of the flame retardant deca. The EPA fired Rice after the chemical industry’s trade group, the American Chemistry Council, complained that she could not provide an objective scientific review because she had spoken out about the health hazards posed by deca.

Women who breast feed for longer have a smaller chance of getting rheumatoid arthritis, suggests a study published online ahead of print in the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases.

The study also found that taking oral contraceptives, which are suspected to protect against the disease because they contain hormones that are raised in pregnancy, did not have the same effect. Also, simply having children and not breast feeding also did not seem to be protective.

The researchers compared 136 women with rheumatoid arthritis with 544 women of a similar age without the disease. They found that that those who had breast fed for longer were much less likely to get rheumatoid arthritis.

A goal that remained elusive for 25 years has now allowed astronomers to obtain the most precise measurement of the cosmic temperature at an incredible distance; in a well-hidden galaxy whose light has taken almost 11 billion years to reach us - about 80% of the age of the universe.

The only way this galaxy can be seen is through the imprint its interstellar gas leaves on the spectrum of an even more remote quasar [1]. “Quasars are here only used as a beacon in the very distant Universe. Interstellar clouds of gas in galaxies, located between the quasars and us on the same line of sight, absorb parts of the light emitted by the quasars. The resulting spectrum consequently presents dark ‘valleys’ that can be attributed to well-known elements and possibly molecules,” explains Raghunathan Srianand (Pune, India), who led the team making the observations.

600 million years of evolution has taken two unlikely distant cousins, turkeys and scallops, down very different physical paths from their common ancestor but a motor protein, myosin 2, remains structurally identical in both creatures.

Myosin molecules generate tension in smooth muscle by adhering to form a filament, which grabs hold of a neighbouring filament, and relaxes by letting go. When the muscle is in a relaxed state, myosin molecule folds itself up into a compact structure.

The discovery suggests that the tiny motor protein is much more important than previously thought – and for humans it may even hold a key to understanding potentially fatal conditions such as aneurisms.