Imagine that an invisible, microscopic invader has found its way into your body and hijacked the cellular machinery that keeps you healthy. Inhabiting the gray area between living and nonliving, the invader can only reproduce once it makes its new home inside of your cells, eventually causing you to fall ill. How do physicians and scientists combat this uninvited guest? (more…)
IBM’s SoftLayer cloud-enabled World Community Grid to provide free virtual supercomputer power to The Scripps Research Institute to speed screening of promising chemical compounds
ARMONK, NY & LA JOLLA, CA – 03 Dec 2014: Although some medical therapies show promise as treatments for Ebola, scientists are still looking urgently for a definitive cure.
For the first time, anyone with access to a computer or Android-based mobile device can help scientists perform this critical research — no financial contribution, passport, or PhD necessary. In fact, volunteers can be asleep, traveling or on a coffee break when they help researchers search for an Ebola cure. (more…)
Here’s yet another reason to focus on kids’ early years. Children who grow up in well-managed households, enjoy school, and have friends who stay out of trouble report fewer sexually transmitted diseases in young adulthood, according to a new analysis.
The findings, from University of Washington longitudinal surveys of nearly 2,000 participants, suggest that efforts to curb the spread of sexually transmitted diseases should begin years before most people start having sex. (more…)
Opens new applications for the nearly 5.5 billion pounds of PET bottles and jars available annually for recycling
SAN JOSE, Calif – 09 Dec 2013: Researchers from IBM and the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology have made a nanomedicine breakthrough in which they converted common plastic materials like polyethylene terephthalate (PET) into non-toxic and biocompatible materials designed to specifically target and attack fungal infections. This research was published today in the peer-reviewed journal, Nature Comm. (more…)
The history of women with HIV/AIDS in the United States is really a story of racial and ethnic health disparities.
Overall, the rate of American women contracting the disease relative to men has climbed from 8 percent in the 1980s to 25 percent today. But most of this burden is in underserved communities: one in 32 African-American women will be diagnosed with HIV in their lifetime, as will one in 106 Latina women. Meanwhile, one in 526 Caucasian and Asian women will contract the virus. Death rates are also higher for African-American and Latina women, making it one of the leading causes of death for those groups. (more…)
A model of great ape history during the past 15 million years has been fashioned through the study of genetic variation in a large panel of humans, chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans. The catalog of great ape genetic diversity, the most comprehensive ever, elucidates the evolution and population histories of great apes from Africa and Indonesia. The resource will likely also aid in current and future conservation efforts which strive to preserve natural genetic diversity in populations.
More than 75 scientists and wildlife conservationists from around the world assisted the genetic analysis of 79 wild and captive-born great apes. They represent all six great ape species: chimpanzee, bonobo, Sumatran orangutan, Bornean orangutan, eastern gorilla, and western lowland gorilla, and seven subspecies. Nine human genomes were included in the sampling. (more…)
A multidisciplinary team of researchers from UCLA and India has found that a new type of intervention program, in which lay women in the rural Indian province of Andra Pradesh were trained as social health activists to assist women who have HIV/AIDS, significantly improved patients’ adherence to antiretroviral therapy and boosted their immune-cell counts and nutrition levels.
The lay women were trained by the research team to serve as accredited social health activists, or ASHA, and their work was overseen by rural nurses and physicians. These ASHA then provided counseling and support to the women with HIV/AIDS, as well as assistance aimed at removing the barriers they face in accessing health care and treatment. (more…)
White House Applauds Citizen Science, Big Data Initiative
CAMBRIDGE, MA – 24 Jun 2013: The search for more versatile and less expensive materials for solar energy received a boost today as Harvard launched a free database that catalogues the suitability of 2.3 million organic, carbon compounds for converting sunlight into electricity.
Harvard’s Clean Energy project — which screened the molecules using World Community Grid, an IBM-managed virtual supercomputer that harnesses the surplus computer power donated by volunteers — is believed to be the most extensive investigation of quantum chemicals ever performed. (more…)
