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BGI, Covaris partner to provide next generation sequencing technology

BGI and Covaris, Inc. today announced a deal that will integrate Covaris' Adaptive Focused Acoustics AFA DNA shearing technology across several BGI laboratories in China.

11 Jul 2011

Illumina, Sequenom sign three-year supply agreement

Sequenom, Inc., a life sciences company providing innovative genetic analysis solutions, today announced it has signed a three-year supply agreement with Illumina, Inc., a leading developer and manufacturer of life sciences tools for the large-scale analysis of genetic variation and function.

From Illumina, Inc. 11 Jul 2011

'The Aging Myth' achieves top rank in New York Times Best Seller List

In only its first week of bookstore sales, "The Aging Myth," by Joseph Chang, Ph.D., has already reached #2 on the New York Times Best Seller List for its frank look at aging and a scientific approach to understanding how to combat aging at the genetic level.

11 Jul 2011

USPTO issues notice of allowance to PROLOR Biotech's CTP platform

PROLOR Biotech, Inc., today announced that it has received a notice of allowance from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) for a patent application covering the company's CTP platform, which has the potential to extend the duration of activity of virtually all therapeutic proteins.

11 Jul 2011

Amgen, Micromet to expand development of BiTE antibodies against solid tumors

Micromet, Inc. announced today that it has entered into a collaboration agreement with Amgen Inc. for the research of BiTE antibodies against three undisclosed solid tumor targets.

11 Jul 2011

Insights into how brain can preserve memory and prevent forgetting

As any student who's had to study for multiple exams can tell you, trying to learn two different sets of facts one after another is challenging. As you study for the physics exam, almost inevitably some of the information for the history exam is forgotten.

11 Jul 2011

Study links OBEs with neural instability and errors in body representation

Although out-of-body experiences (OBEs) are typically associated with migraine, epilepsy and psychopathology, they are quite common in healthy and psychologically normal individuals as well. However, they are poorly understood.

11 Jul 2011

New research on Alzheimer's

Advancing age is a major risk factor for Alzheimer's disease and is associated with build- up of the peptide amyloid β in the brain. New research published in BioMed Central's open access journal Fluids and Barriers of the CNS shows that removal of amyloid β from the brain depends on vitamin D and also on an age-related alteration in the production of transporter proteins which move amyloid β in and out of the brain.

11 Jul 2011

Scientists unravel how memories are 'read out' in fly brain

What happens if you cannot recall your memory correctly? You are able to associate and store the name and face of a person, yet you might be unable to remember them when you meet that person. In this example, the recall of the information is temporarily impaired. How such associative memories are "read out" in the brain remains one of the great mysteries of modern neurobiology.

11 Jul 2011

New tool reveals mutations that cause HIV-drug resistance

Protease inhibitor drugs are one of the major weapons in the fight against HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, but their effectiveness is limited as the virus mutates and develops resistance to the drugs over time.

11 Jul 2011

Nature journal publishes landmark genetic study of ovarian cancer

A University of Houston researcher is an author on a landmark multi-institutional genetic study of the most aggressive and common form of ovarian cancer that is published in the current issue of the scientific journal Nature.

11 Jul 2011

Scientists identify de novo mutations linked to schizophrenia

De novo mutations - genetic errors that are present in patients but not in their parents - are more frequent in schizophrenic patients than in normal individuals, according to an international group of scientists led by Dr. Guy A. Rouleau of the University of Montreal and CHU Sainte-Justine Hospital.

11 Jul 2011

Environmental factors play a critical role in development of autism

A study published this week again confirms that environmental factors play a critical role in the development of autism. Genetic Heritability and Shared Environmental Factors Among Twin Pairs With Autism, funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), provides further confirmation that genes alone cannot explain the exponential rise in autism rates over the past two decades.

11 Jul 2011

Combination therapy shows promise against HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer

Adding Afinitor to Herceptin, the main treatment for HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer, helps some women with disease that has been resistant to previous Herceptin-based therapies, according to a study led by researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

11 Jul 2011

MicroOCT technology can reveal cellular features of coronary artery disease

Researchers at the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have developed a one-micrometer-resolution version of the intravascular imaging technology optical coherence tomography (OCT) that can reveal cellular and subcellular features of coronary artery disease.

11 Jul 2011

Researchers discover how genetic mutations cause rare human diseases

Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco and in Michigan, North Carolina and Spain have discovered how genetic mutations cause a number of rare human diseases, which include Meckel syndrome, Joubert syndrome and several other disorders.

11 Jul 2011

New genetic research on Ankylosing Spondylitis

The team of researchers from the Universities of Bristol, Queensland, Oxford, Texas and Toronto, used a technique called genome-wide association where millions of genetic markers are measured in thousands of people that have the disease and thousands of healthy individuals.

11 Jul 2011

Scientists convert brain cells into cardiomyocytes

For the past decade, researchers have tried to reprogram the identity of all kinds of cell types. Heart cells are one of the most sought-after cells in regenerative medicine because researchers anticipate that they may help to repair injured hearts by replacing lost tissue.

11 Jul 2011

New genetic clues about ankylosing spondylitis

A study involving over 5,000 people living with the joint disorder ankylosing spondylitis has identified a series of genetic variants associated with increased susceptibility to the condition as well as providing new clues to how the condition may be treated in the future.

11 Jul 2011

Research targets malignant glioma stem cells

Cleveland Clinic researchers have identified a cellular pathway that cancer stem cells use to promote tumor growth in malignant glioma, an aggressive brain tumor.

11 Jul 2011