Engineered stem cells seek out and kill HIV in living mice
Expanding on previous research providing proof-of-principle that human stem cells can be genetically engineered into HIV-fighting cells, a team of UCLA researchers have now demonstrated that these cells can actually attack HIV-infected cells in a living organism. The study, published April 12 in the journal PLoS Pathogens, demonstrates for the first time that engineering stem cells to form immune cells that target HIV is effective in suppressing the virus in living tissues in an animal model, said lead investigator Scott G. Kitchen, an assistant professor of medicine in the division of hematology and oncology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and a member of the UCLA AIDS Institute. "We believe that this study lays the groundwork for the potential use of this type of an approach in combating HIV infection in infected individuals, in hopes of eradicating the virus from the body," he said.
BBC Nature - Great apes may have 'mid-life crisis', a study suggests
19 November 2012Last updated at 20:00 By Jeremy Coles Reporter, BBC Nature Do chimpanzees experience a midlife low in happiness? Chimpanzees and orangutans may experience a "mid-life crisis" like humans, a study suggests. An international team of researchers assessed the well-being and happiness of the great apes. They found well-being was high in youth, fell to a low in midlife and rose again in old age, similar to the "U-shape curve" of happiness in humans. The study brought together experts such as psychologists, primatologists and economists. Results are published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "What we are testing is whether the U-shaped curve can describe the association between age and well-being in non-human primates as it does in humans," psychologist and lead author Dr Alexander Weiss of the University of Edinburgh told BBC Nature. Testing times Dr Weiss said that the similarities between humans, chimps and orangutans go beyond genetics and physiology.
Witchcraft in Tudor and Stuart Essex
[From Mary Douglas (ed.), Witchcraft, Confessions and Accusations (Tavistock, London, 1970)] Alan Macfarlane Witchcraft in Tudor and Stuart Essex (1) p.81 This paper will assume a knowledge of the historical background to witchcraft prosecutions in sixteenth- and seventeenth- century . There are many topics that, like witchcraft, need serious investigation by the historian of pre-industrial equipped with contemporary anthropological ideas. In the year 1593 a literary character was made to say- concerning witches: 'I heare of much harme done by them: they lame men and kill their cattle, yea they destroy both men and children. The first object of this paper will be to see how far the assertion that there was 'scarce any towne or village' without its witch was true. Court records, principally those of the Assize and ecclesiastical courts, provide the bulk of the actual prosecutions for witchcraft in Essex. Yet even these numbers seriously underestimate the amount of interest in witchcraft. 1.
John Shea, Human Evolution, and Behavioral Variability – Not Behavioral Modernity
Hello there! If you enjoy the content on Neuroanthropology, consider subscribing for future posts via email or RSS feed. John Shea, a professor of anthropology at Stony Brook University, gives us a double whammy of actual human evolution this month, rather than the typical victorious narrative. Using fossil and archaeological evidence, Shea takes down the idea that we became “modern” late in human evolution, with that sense of modernity (or progress) often tied to causes like “a cognitive revolution” or “an explosion of culture.” In other words, he wants to contradict the popular image just below: We have known for years that this image is entirely wrong. The sequence of being hunched over as a shuffling apeman in the middle to an erect man at the end is also wrong. Shea adds one more important element that helps to completely dismantle this popular image. Shea’s article, Refuting a Myth about Human Evolution, is this month’s feature article in American Scientist. This view is wrong.
100 Time-Saving Search Engines for Serious Scholars
While burying yourself in the stacks at the library is one way to get some serious research done, with today’s technology you can do quite a bit of useful searching before you ever set foot inside a library. Undergraduates and grad students alike will appreciate the usefulness of these search engines that allow them to find books, journal articles and even primary source material for whatever kind of research they’re working on and that return only serious, academic results so time isn’t wasted on unprofessional resources. Note: Visit our updated list for the latest in academic search engines. General Start off your research with one of these more general academic search engines. Intute: Use this website’s search tools to find the best and most reliable sites to start your research. Meta Search Want to search it all at once? Dogpile: Search Google, Yahoo, Bing and more at once with this great search engine. Databases and Archives Books and Journals Science Math and Technology Social Science
Evolution
Here then is the beta version of my strip about evolution. This is a chapter of the book Science Stories which will be out from Myriad Editions next spring. I'm sure there'll be mistakes here, so do feel free to point them out, so that I can make the necessary changes. Thank you. Note Oct 2013.
Lasers Reveal a Maya Civilization So Dense It Blew Experts’ Minds
They were hidden there, all this time, under the cover of tree canopies in the jungles of northern Guatemala: tens of thousands of structures built by the Maya over a millennium ago. Not far from the sites tourists already know, like the towering temples of the ancient city of Tikal, laser technology has uncovered about 60,000 homes, palaces, tombs and even highways in the humid lowlands. The findings suggested an ancient society of such density and interconnectedness that even the most experienced archaeologists were surprised. “Everywhere that we looked, there was more settlement than we expected,” said Thomas Garrison, a National Geographic explorer and an archaeologist at Ithaca College. Researchers found the structures by shooting lasers down from planes to pierce the thick foliage and paint a 3-D picture of the ground below. The method has been used elsewhere, including around the Angkor Wat temple in Cambodia. But it is not only about protecting cultural treasures, Ms. Ms. Dr.
Poll: Just 39% believe in evolution
From NBC's Mark MurrayToday it's not only Abraham Lincoln's birthday; it's also Charles Darwin's. And a brand-new Gallup poll tied to Darwin's birthday finds that just 39% of Americans believe in evolution. As expected, Gallup notes, education plays a big role here: 74% of those with post-graduate degrees believe in evolution. Ditto religion: 55% who don't attend church believe in evolution, versus 24% of weekly churchgoers who believe in it. And vote here on who you think had a a bigger impact on the world, Lincoln or Darwin?
