Patients with pancreatic cancer have a different and distinct profile of specific bacteria in their saliva compared to healthy controls and even patients with other cancers or pancreatic diseases, according to research presented today at the annual meeting of the American Society for Microbiology. These findings could form the basis for a test to diagnose the disease in its early stages.

"Our studies suggest that ratios of particular types of bacteria found in saliva may be indicative of pancreatic cancer," says Pedro Torres of San Diego State University who presented the research.

Researchers have devised a way to watch newly forming AIDS virus particles emerge or "budd" from infected human cells.

They have also found that a protein named ALIX gets involved during the final stages of virus replication, not earlier, as was believed previously.

The vast majority of so-called "super-frequent user" patients who seek care in the Emergency Department - a patient is considered a super-frequent user if they visit the emergency room at least 10 times a year  - have a substance abuse addiction, according to a Henry Ford Hospital analysis.

ER physicians have long said that patients who frequent the ER for their care have a substance abuse addiction but few studies have actually measured the rate of addiction of these patients.

The  findings presented Saturday at the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine (SAEM) annual meeting in Dallas found that super-frequent users seeking pain-relief narcotics were more often women. 

The study's key findings:

When most people think of modern birds they don't often picture dinosaurs - but that is the case. Dinosaurs rule the sky as they once ruled land and there are even modern raptors - eagles.

Athens, 17 May 2014: Negative iron balance predicts survival in patients with acute heart failure, according to research presented for the first time today at the Heart Failure Congress 2014 in Athens, Greece. The Congress is the main annual meeting of the Heart Failure Association of the European Society of Cardiology.

Professor Ewa Jankowska, first author of the study, said: "Patients with acute heart failure have a major collapse in homeostasis. Iron is a key micronutrient that is required for the maintenance of homeostasis. Iron is needed for cellular metabolism and deficiency leads to severely impaired energy metabolism and mitochondrial dysfunction."

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today allowed marketing of the DEKA Arm System, the first prosthetic arm that can perform multiple, simultaneous powered movements controlled by electrical signals from electromyogram (EMG) electrodes.

Deka calls it "Luke", after Luke Skywalker of "Star Wars" fame, and the project was funded by DARPA.

EMG electrodes detect electrical activity caused by the contraction of muscles close to where the prosthesis is attached. The electrodes send the electrical signals to a computer processor in the prosthesis that translates them to a specific movement or movements.