Ever wonder why that diet didn't work? An Israeli study tracking the blood sugar levels of 800 people over a week suggests that even if we all ate the same meal, how it's metabolized would differ from one person to another. The findings, published November 19 in Cell, demonstrate the power of personalized nutrition in helping people identify which foods can help or hinder their health goals.

Roundworm infection can increase the reproduction rate in Amazonian women, while hookworm infection can decrease it, a new study finds. Parasitic worms infect two billion people globally; while it's known that some parasites can cause cognitive and nutritional impairment, this study suggests that reproduction rates can also be affected by parasitic organisms. Furthermore, the authors propose an intriguing mechanism behind this correlation: the immune system. To gain a better understanding of the effects of parasites on reproduction rates, Aaron Blackwell et al. used data collected over nine years from Tsimane women in the lowlands of Bolivia, a population with an average birth rate of nine children per woman.

ROANOKE, Va., Nov. 16, 2015 - Scientists from the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute and clinicians from Carilion Clinic have discovered how to sensitize drug-resistant human glioblastoma cells to chemotherapy.

They published their results in Cancer Research, the scientific journal of the American Association of Cancer Research.

Glioblastoma accounts for almost half of all brain cancers. Fewer than one in 20 patients survive five years after their diagnosis, and treatment involves surgical removal of the cancerous tissue, followed by chemotherapy.

A team of Belgian researchers has shown that the yeasts used to ferment cocoa during chocolate production can modify the aroma of the resulting chocolate. "This makes it possible to create a whole range of boutique chocolates to match everyone's favorite flavor, similar to wines, tea, and coffee," says Jan Steensels, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Leuven, and the Flanders Institute for Biotechnology, Belgium.  

Due to disease-related changes in their brain, pain patients often suffer from an impaired tactile ability in their hands. In a pilot study conducted by scientists at the Ruhr-University Bochum, high frequency repetitive stimulation was investigated as a therapeutic approach for these patients. The results of this study have now been published in the journal "Frontiers in Neurology". They show that passive stimulation of this kind is a promising new therapy option.

Passive stimulation: a proven therapy approach

You were once a hollow shell. To sculpt that hollow ball into an organism with layers of internal organs, muscle and skin, portions of that embryonic 'shell' folded inwards. The same happens to fruit fly embryos, and researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have now identified a particular group of cells which are crucial for the first such fold. They also showed for the first time that the shape in which cells are arranged determines the direction in which they contract. Published today in Developmental Cell, the findings were obtained thanks to a new technique in which the scientists use a laser as a remote control.