2012 Nobel Prize Lecture -- Medicine
Salil Lachke, assistant professor of biological sciences at the University of Delaware, discusses the work done by John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka who were awarded the 2012 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. Visit http://www.udel.edu for more info.From:UnivDelawareViews:1 0ratingsTime:19:56More inEducation
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2012 Nobel Prize Lecture -- Medicine - Video
October 30, 2012 in Features, Health WSUs nutrition and exercise physiology program guides real people on exercise and diet through rigorousclasses
Rachel Hutchins, center, participates in WSUs free fitnessclass. (Full-size photo)(All photos)
Washington State Universitys Health and Fitness Clinic, on the third floor of the Innovate Washington Building, 665 N. Riverpoint Blvd. on the Riverfront Campus in Spokane,offers:
Free group exerciseclasses.
Free individual counseling, including nutrition and fitness assessments andrecommendations.
A group weight-loss program in which participants learn about healthy eating and exercise and track their progress. The $50 fee coversmaterials.
Email nep.clinic@wsu.edu or call (509) 368-6710 to sign up or for moreinformation.
It takes more than muscle tone and stretchy pants to teach an exerciseclass.
The instructors leading a class last week at WSU Spokane on the Riverpoint Campus were being observed by their own instructors as they led participants through tai chi and step routines. The students earned approval for their cueing warning participants what moves were coming next, while offering adapted exercises based on participants aches andpains.
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Exercises in health - Tue, 30 Oct 2012 PST
PHOENIX, Oct. 30, 2012 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- Holistic pain managementseeks to find treatment options to manage and treat pain in a way that works with the physiology of the body rather than against it. One very basic example of this is through identifying vitamin and nutrient deficiencies. Vitamin D is a vitamin that has large implications for treating chronic pain. In this article we will explore the role of vitamin D and how it can be used for holistic pain management.
Vitamin D has been implicated in many research papers for painrelief, yet it is still very under utilized by doctors in the pain management field. The likely reason for this, is the lack of knowledge about this vitamin's effectiveness to treat pain. Keep in mind that vitamin D does not treat pain like your typical pain medication. Taking vitamin D will not cause immediate pain relief. It only works for pain relief when there is a deficiency or inadequacy present in the body. But these deficiencies or inadequacies are quite common. In these cases it will take several months for it to have its pain relieving effects, as it works on an underlying physiological processes. Working on and improving the underlying human physiology is the exact approach holistic pain management takes. Let's look at how vitamin D deficiency causes pain.
Holistic Pain Management: physiological role of vitamin D
Vitamin D is well known for its role in maintaining serum calcium and bone health. When vitamin D deficiencies are present bone tissue forms in a weak gelatin like substance rather than its hard counterpart. This leads to fluid absorption in the bone which pushes against the bone causing pain. In severe case this is referred to as osteomalacia. Vitamin D deficiency does cause osteomalacia but the more common problem is a subclinical or undetectable osteomalcia process where the there is mild fluid retention. This process can effect any of the bones throughout the body (legs, spine, ribs, arms, etc) and can come about from even slight inadequacies of vitamin D. Vitamin D deficiency is linked with conditions such asFibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, generalized musculoskeletal pain, and Myositis.
Holistic Pain Management: Vitamin D for specific pain conditions
While musculoskeletal and fibromyalgia like conditions seem to be the most plausible conditions effected by vitamin D status, It may be important in other conditions as well. There are vitamin D receptors on virtually every tissue in the body not just bone and muscle. It makes sense then that vitamin D would play a role in these other tissues and organ functions as well.
Neuropathy: A study of 51 patients with chronic neuropathy had 50% reduction in pain levels after supplementation with vitamin D for only 3 months.
Rheumatoid Arthritis and other inflammatory conditions: Several animal studies have demonstrated the ability of vitamin D to decrease inflammatory markers such as CRP. As a result it is likely helpful in many inflammatory conditions.
Mood and Pain levels: There is substantial evidence that supports the link between depression and chronic pain. How this is associated with vitamin D has not been full realized. There have been a few studies showing the relationship of vitamin D on neurotransmitters. A placebo controlled trial in patients with clinical depression found that those who took vitamin D self reported enhancements in their mood.
Holistic Pain Management: How much to take
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Holistic Pain Management and the Role of Vitamin D
ScienceDaily (Oct. 30, 2012) New research shows a simple reason why even the most intelligent, complex brains can be taken by a swindler's story -- one that upon a second look offers clues it was false.
When the brain fires up the network of neurons that allows us to empathize, it suppresses the network used for analysis, a pivotal study led by a Case Western Reserve University researcher shows.
How could a CEO be so blind to the public relations fiasco his cost-cutting decision has made?
When the analytic network is engaged, our ability to appreciate the human cost of our action is repressed.
At rest, our brains cycle between the social and analytical networks. But when presented with a task, healthy adults engage the appropriate neural pathway, the researchers found.
The study shows for the first time that we have a built-in neural constraint on our ability to be both empathetic and analytic at the same time
The work suggests that established theories about two competing networks within the brain must be revised. More, it provides insights into the operation of a healthy mind versus those of the mentally ill or developmentally disabled.
"This is the cognitive structure we've evolved," said Anthony Jack, an assistant professor of cognitive science at Case Western Reserve and lead author of the new study. "Empathetic and analytic thinking are, at least to some extent, mutually exclusive in the brain."
The research is published in the current online issue of NeuroImage.
A number of earlier studies showed that two large scale brain networks are in tension in the brain, one which is known as the default mode network and a second known as the task positive network. But other researchers have suggested that different mechanisms drive this tension:
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Empathy represses analytic thought, and vice versa: Brain physiology limits simultaneous use of both networks
Nov. 1, 2012, 3 a.m.
'Josef, what is the best time of day to exercise?" is one of the top 20 most frequently asked questions I get at parties. The answer to this question is on two levels: practicality and physiology. Practicality is about what you can do - do today, do tomorrow and continue doing. Physiology is about what works best for your body. They don't always agree.
Research has shown that exercising first thing in the morning may aid weight loss and that the body is best primed for physical activity in the late afternoon. But, as the excellent fitness coach Alwyn Cosgrove likes to say, "psychology trumps physiology", and I will change that to, "practicality trumps physiology''.
The most important thing is picking a time of day when you can actually get your workouts done because if you can't get them done, any talk about optimising them becomes irrelevant because they're not getting done. With that in mind, let's start with the practical and then move on to the physiological.
Just pick a time you know you can work out and if that isn't practical , then try another time. If the second attempted time doesn't work, try something else.
However, once you've changed your mind three times you have to start looking in the mirror.
Adapting to reality is a good thing, but there is a fine line between adapting to reality and just making excuses so that you don't do anything.
You may need to become a morning person if you find your evenings being thwarted by a lack of energy, family duties, or work spilling over.
If your plate is full, then you need to do something to expand the size of the plate - which is to say increase your capacity and energy levels.
If the energy you do have is already spoken for, then you won't have any left over at the end of the day. This means you will need to bite the bullet and do it before everything else.
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Working at your workouts
IT WAS the work of Australian Institute of Sport head of physiology Professor Christopher Gore that determined the chances of Lance Armstrong being clean in the 2009 and 2010 Tour de France races.
Professor Gore examined blood samples taken from Armstrong between October 2008 and April this year for the US Anti-Doping Agency - 29 samples taken by the World Anti-Doping Agency and a further nine taken by USADA.
According to the USADA report on Armstrong, a cluster of five Armstrong samples taken during the 2009 Tour and his two samples during the 2010 event contained an unusually low percentage of reticulocytes, or immature red blood cells that are created naturally by the body. When an athlete adds additional red blood cells to his circulation by transfusing his own stored blood, the body's production of reticulocytes is suppressed.
''When Prof Gore compared the suppressed reticulocyte percentage in Armstrong's 2009 and 2010 Tour de France samples to the reticulocyte percentage in his other samples, Prof Gore concluded that the approximate likelihood of Armstrong's seven suppressed reticulocyte values during the 2009 and 2010 Tours de France occurring naturally was less than one in a million," the report said.
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Professor Gore was unavailable for comment yesterday, but AIS director Matt Favier had nothing but praise for his work.
"Professor Gore has worked at the Australian Institute of Sport for more than 20 years and is the head of the department of physiology. Professor Gore earned his PhD in 1989 and has published over 130 papers,'' Favier said. ''He has two professorships and is well positioned as an internationally recognised expert.
"Given his expertise and impeccable credentials, Professor Gore has provided an evidence-based opinion on perturbation in various factors found in the blood of athletes in several anti-doping cases.
"Professor Gore was also a key researcher in work prior to the Sydney Olympic Games that provided the basis for the current process that identifies abnormal levels of markers in an athlete's bloodstream. Moreover, the basic model of the so called 'athlete blood passport' now used by WADA and USADA is built on the foundation of that 1999-2000 research project, which was funded by the IOC.''
Australia has several links to Armstrong. He made his racing comeback in January 2009 at the Tour Down Under in Adelaide, and then last year, he raced professionally for the final time in the same event.
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AIS professor triggered red alert on Armstrong blood cells
British researcher John Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka of Japan have won this year's Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology. They won for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed into stem cells.
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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Steve Inskeep.
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was announced today in Stockholm, Sweden. Two men share that prize.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN: The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2012 jointly to John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent.
INSKEEP: Pluripotent - that is a word we have rarely used on MORNING EDITION, but we'll use it this morning. These men will split a prize worth about one million U.S. dollars. And we're going to try to explain what pluripotency means. NPR health correspondent Rob Stein is here.
Rob, good morning.
ROB STEIN, BYLINE: Good morning.
INSKEEP: OK. What is it? What did they do?
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Nobel Season Kicks Off With Medicine Prize
Public release date: 8-Oct-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Leslie Capo lcapo@lsuhsc.edu 504-568-4806 Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center
New Orleans, LA Dr. Patricia Molina, Professor and Chair of Physiology at LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans, has been awarded a $2.7 million grant by the National Institutes of Health to develop a behavioral approach to reduce alcohol use and disorders in people living with HIV/AIDS. Alcohol use disorders are frequent in this population and are strongly associated with both decreased compliance in taking as well as the effectiveness of prescribed medicines. Alcohol is also linked to increased susceptibility to infection and viral replication.
A team of scientists led by Dr. Molina will work with LSUHSC physicians at the LSU HIV Outpatient Clinic as well as the LSUHSC School of Public Health. They will enroll 250 people living with HIV/AIDS in a clinical study that will compare intervention with a Holistic Health Recovery Program adapted for Alcohol Use Disorders with a control group in achieving or maintaining viral load suppression, reducing alcohol use and HIV risk behaviors, and improving anti-retroviral therapy adherence. It is hoped that this intervention and its future implementation will improve clinical outcomes by enhancing patients' awareness of the biomedical and psychosocial consequences of alcohol use in HIV/AIDS, and by enhancing the knowledge, motivation, and skills necessary to modify behaviors that promote HIV disease progression.
"This is the first study of this sort and it is important because the Louisiana HIV+ population appears to have a high level of alcohol use disorders compared nationally, and Louisiana also has a very high number of new HIV cases diagnosed per year," notes Patricia Molina, MD, PhD, the Richard Ashman Professor of Physiology and Head of the Department of Physiology at LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans and the grant's principal investigator.
Louisiana remains disproportionally affected by the HIV epidemic, with 18,602 people living with HIV/AIDS in 2011, 54% of whom had been diagnosed with AIDS, the 5th highest estimated state AIDS case rate. Among U.S. metropolitan areas, New Orleans ranks 9th in estimated HIV case rates (37 per 100,000) and 9th in AIDS case rates (23 per 100,000.)
LSU Health Sciences Center Comprehensive Alcohol Research Center researchers have demonstrated that chronic alcohol use elevates viral set point, increases lung viral levels during bacterial infection, promotes intestinal CD4+ and CD8+ T lymphocyte population changes that favor disease transmission, negatively affect bone metabolism, nitrogen balance, and skeletal muscle wasting, ultimately leading to accelerated disease progression to end-stage disease.
Efficacy of the intervention will lead to improved adherence to and effectiveness of ART, improved quality of life, and decreased risky behaviors that promote HIV transmission.
"Successfully decreasing the prevalence of alcohol use disorders in this vulnerable population has the potential to significantly and positively impact the HIV epidemic by decreasing the deleterious biomedical consequences of HIV infection, improving adherence to and effectiveness of anti-retroviral therapy, improving quality of life, and decreasing risky behaviors that promote HIV transmission," concludes Dr. Molina. The grant was awarded to LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health, and it is a five-year grant.
###
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$2.7M LSUHSC grant to reduce alcohol use & improve HIV outcomes
The Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine was announced on Monday. The award this year went to Sir John B. Gurdon and Dr. Shinya Yamanaka. The two men were awarded the Nobel Prize jointly, for their individual work in cloning and stem cell research.
Monday's recognition marked the awarding of the first Nobel Prize for 2012. The rest of the Nobel Prize recipients will be announced throughout the next two weeks.
Here is some of the key information regarding Gurdon and Yamanaka's work and Monday's Nobel Prize announcement.
* Yamanaka and Gurdon did not work together or present shared research, even though they both concentrate their studies on a similar area of research.
* Gurdon is actually being honored for work he did back in 1962. According to a New York Times report, he was the first person to clone an animal, a frog, opening the door to further research into stem cells and cloning.
* Gurdon was able to produce live tadpoles from the adult cells of a frog, by removing the nucleus of a frog's egg and putting the adult cells in its place.
* This "reprogramming" by Gurdon laid the groundwork for Yamanaka's work four decades later. Yamanaka's work, which dates back only six years, to 2006, focused on the mechanisms behind Gurdon's results.
* According to the Los Angeles Times, Yamanaka was sharply criticized at first for his own work, in which he sought to discover how cells are able to reprogram themselves the way that Gurdon's work first suggested that they could.
* Ultimately, Yamanaka was able to isolate just four cells that were needed in order to be able to reprogram other cells back to an embryonic state, allowing them to be manipulated into developing into any particular kind of cell that was needed. These cells have now been dubbed "induced pluripotent stem cells," or iPS cells, according to reports by CNN and other media outlets.
* Scientists are reproducing Yamanaka's technique in their own labs to be able to replicate disease cells, like those of Alzheimer's or Parkinson's, in order to study them and even to test the effects of potential new treatments.
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Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine Goes to Stem Cell Researchers
(CNN) -
The 2012 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine was awarded Monday to Sir John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka for work that revolutionized the understanding of how cells and organisms develop.
The Nobel Assembly's announcement at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, is the first for what will be a series of prizes announced this week. The Norwegian Nobel committee will announce the most anticipated of the annual honors -- the Nobel Peace Prize -- on Friday in Oslo, Norway.
Gurdon, 79, of Dippenhall, England, and Yamanaka, 50, of Osaka, Japan, share the prize jointly for their discovery that "mature, specialised cells can be reprogrammed to become immature cells capable of developing into all tissues of the body," according to the Nobel Assembly, which consists of 50 professors at the Karolinska Institute.
Gurdon discovered in 1962 that the cells are reversible in an experiment with an egg cell of a frog. Yamanaka discovered more than 40 years later how mature cells in mice could be reprogrammed to become immature stem cells "that are able to develop into all types of cells in the body," the assembly said in a statement.
"These groundbreaking discoveries have completely changed our view of the development and cellular specialisation. We now understand that the mature cell does not have to be confined forever to its specialised state," the Nobel Assembly said.
"Textbooks have been rewritten and new research fields have been established. By reprogramming human cells, scientists have created new opportunities to study diseases and develop methods for diagnosis and therapy.
Separated by more than 40 years, the work of Gurdon and Yamanaka led to a practical medical use for stem cell research that sidesteps the main argument by anti-abortion opponents.
Now embryonic-like stem cells can be created in the laboratory from adult cells of the same organism, rather than using aborted fetuses or embryos, explained Visar Belegu, a stem cell researcher at the Hugo W. Moser Research Institute, part of the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore.
Gurdon pioneered cloning through cell reproduction in a tadpole in 1962. In 2006, Yamanaka figured out how to reprogram mature cells so that they revert to their primitive state as "induced pluripotent stem cells," or iPS cells, capable of developing into any part of the body, Belegu said.
Excerpt from:
Nobel Prize season opens with medicine award
(CNN) -
The 2012 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine was awarded Monday to Sir John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka for work that revolutionized the understanding of how cells and organisms develop.
The Nobel Assembly's announcement at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, is the first for what will be a series of prizes announced this week. The Norwegian Nobel committee will announce the most anticipated of the annual honors -- the Nobel Peace Prize -- on Friday in Oslo, Norway.
Gurdon, 79, of Dippenhall, England, and Yamanaka, 50, of Osaka, Japan, share the prize jointly for their discovery that "mature, specialised cells can be reprogrammed to become immature cells capable of developing into all tissues of the body," according to the Nobel Assembly, which consists of 50 professors at the Karolinska Institute.
Gurdon discovered in 1962 that the cells are reversible in an experiment with an egg cell of a frog. Yamanaka discovered more than 40 years later how mature cells in mice could be reprogrammed to become immature stem cells "that are able to develop into all types of cells in the body," the assembly said in a statement.
"These groundbreaking discoveries have completely changed our view of the development and cellular specialisation. We now understand that the mature cell does not have to be confined forever to its specialised state," the Nobel Assembly said.
"Textbooks have been rewritten and new research fields have been established. By reprogramming human cells, scientists have created new opportunities to study diseases and develop methods for diagnosis and therapy.
Separated by more than 40 years, the work of Gurdon and Yamanaka led to a practical medical use for stem cell research that sidesteps the main argument by anti-abortion opponents.
Now embryonic-like stem cells can be created in the laboratory from adult cells of the same organism, rather than using aborted fetuses or embryos, explained Visar Belegu, a stem cell researcher at the Hugo W. Moser Research Institute, part of the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore.
Gurdon pioneered cloning through cell reproduction in a tadpole in 1962. In 2006, Yamanaka figured out how to reprogram mature cells so that they revert to their primitive state as "induced pluripotent stem cells," or iPS cells, capable of developing into any part of the body, Belegu said.
ScienceDaily (Oct. 8, 2012) The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet has decided to award The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2012 jointly to John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent.
The Nobel Prize recognizes two scientists who discovered that mature, specialised cells can be reprogrammed to become immature cells capable of developing into all tissues of the body. Their findings have revolutionised our understanding of how cells and organisms develop.
John B. Gurdon discovered in 1962 that the specialisation of cells is reversible. In a classic experiment, he replaced the immature cell nucleus in an egg cell of a frog with the nucleus from a mature intestinal cell. This modified egg cell developed into a normal tadpole. The DNA of the mature cell still had all the information needed to develop all cells in the frog.
Shinya Yamanaka discovered more than 40 years later, in 2006, how intact mature cells in mice could be reprogrammed to become immature stem cells. Surprisingly, by introducing only a few genes, he could reprogram mature cells to become pluripotent stem cells, i.e. immature cells that are able to develop into all types of cells in the body.
These groundbreaking discoveries have completely changed our view of the development and cellular specialisation. We now understand that the mature cell does not have to be confined forever to its specialised state. Textbooks have been rewritten and new research fields have been established. By reprogramming human cells, scientists have created new opportunities to study diseases and develop methods for diagnosis and therapy.
Life -- a journey towards increasing specialisation
All of us developed from fertilized egg cells. During the first days after conception, the embryo consists of immature cells, each of which is capable of developing into all the cell types that form the adult organism. Such cells are called pluripotent stem cells. With further development of the embryo, these cells give rise to nerve cells, muscle cells, liver cells and all other cell types -- each of them specialised to carry out a specific task in the adult body. This journey from immature to specialised cell was previously considered to be unidirectional. It was thought that the cell changes in such a way during maturation that it would no longer be possible for it to return to an immature, pluripotent stage.
Frogs jump backwards in development
John B. Gurdon challenged the dogma that the specialised cell is irreversibly committed to its fate. He hypothesised that its genome might still contain all the information needed to drive its development into all the different cell types of an organism. In 1962, he tested this hypothesis by replacing the cell nucleus of a frog's egg cell with a nucleus from a mature, specialised cell derived from the intestine of a tadpole. The egg developed into a fully functional, cloned tadpole and subsequent repeats of the experiment yielded adult frogs. The nucleus of the mature cell had not lost its capacity to drive development to a fully functional organism.
Gurdon's landmark discovery was initially met with scepticism but became accepted when it had been confirmed by other scientists. It initiated intense research and the technique was further developed, leading eventually to the cloning of mammals. Gurdon's research taught us that the nucleus of a mature, specialized cell can be returned to an immature, pluripotent state. But his experiment involved the removal of cell nuclei with pipettes followed by their introduction into other cells. Would it ever be possible to turn an intact cell back into a pluripotent stem cell?
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Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2012 awarded for discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become ...
Shinya Yamanaka
Shinya Yamanaka, MD, PhD, is the fifth UCSF scientist to win the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
Yamanaka is a busy man. He is a senior investigator and the L.K. Whittier Foundation Investigator in Stem Cell Biology at the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, a professor of anatomy at UCSF, director of the Center for iPS Cell Research and Application (CiRA) and a principal investigator at the Institute for Integrated Cell-Material Sciences (iCeMS), both at Kyoto University, Japan.
Other UCSF Nobel Prize winners include:
Elizabeth Blackburn
Elizabeth H. Blackburn, PhD, received the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. She shared the award with Carol W. Greider of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Jack W. Szostak of Harvard Medical School. The scientists discovered an enzyme that plays a key role in normal cell function, as well as in cell aging and most cancers. The enzyme is called telomerase and it produces tiny units of DNA that seal off the ends of chromosomes, which contain the bodys genes. These DNA units named telomeres protect the integrity of the genes and maintain chromosomal stability and accurate cell division. They also determine the number of times a cell divides and thus determine the lifespan of cells.
The scientists research sparked a whole field of inquiry into the possibility that telomerase could be reactivated to treat such age-related diseases as blindness, cardiovascular disease and neurodegenerative diseases, and deactivated to treat cancer, in which it generally is overactive. Read more.
Stanley Prusiner
Stanley B. Prusiner, MD, received the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of a novel disease-causing agent a protein he named prion (PREE-on). The prion causes rare neurodegenerative diseases, such as Creutzfeldt Jakob disease in humans, and mad cow disease in cattle. The discovery has informed research into the role of misprocessed proteins in more common brain diseases, including Alzheimers disease and Parkinsons disease.
J. Michael Bishop
The rest is here:
UCSF Nobel Prize Winners
(CNN) -
The 2012 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine was awarded Monday to Sir John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka for work that revolutionized the understanding of how cells and organisms develop.
The Nobel Assembly's announcement at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm is the first for what will be a series of prizes announced this week. The Norwegian Nobel committee will announce the most anticipated of the annual honors -- the Nobel Peace Prize -- on Friday in Oslo.
Gurdon, 79, of Dippenhall, England, and Yamanaka, 50, of Osaka, Japan, share the prize jointly "for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent" -- the ability of a cell to differentiate into another cell type, according to the Nobel committee.
Gurdon discovered in 1962 that the cells are reversible in an experiment with an egg cell of a frog. Yamanaka discovered 40 years later that mature cells in mice could be reprogrammed as immature cells, the committee said.
"These groundbreaking discoveries have completely changed our view of the development and cellular specialisation. We now understand that the mature cell does not have to be confined forever to its specialised state," the Nobel Assembly said in a statement following the announcement.
"Textbooks have been rewritten and new research fields have been established. By reprogramming human cells, scientists have created new opportunities to study diseases and develop methods for diagnosis and therapy.
The prizes created in 1895 by Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel honor work in physics, chemistry, literature and peace. Economics was added as a category in 1968, and the first prize awarded for economic sciences was in 1969.
The monetary award that accompanies the Nobel Prize was lowered by the foundation this year by 20% from 10 million Swedish kronor ($1.5 million) to 8 million kronor ($1.2 million) because of turbulence that hit the financial markets.
On Tuesday, the committee will announce its award for achievement in physics. The next day, the winner of the Nobel Prize in chemistry will be announced.
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Prize for medicine first to be announced
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The Press Release from the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institute
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2012 goes jointly to John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent
Summary
The Nobel Prize recognizes two scientists who discovered that mature, specialised cells can be reprogrammed to become immature cells capable of developing into all tissues of the body. Their findings have revolutionised our understanding of how cells and organisms develop.
John B. Gurdon discovered in 1962 that the specialisation of cells is reversible. In a classic experiment, he replaced the immature cell nucleus in an egg cell of a frog with the nucleus from a mature intestinal cell. This modified egg cell developed into a normal tadpole. The DNA of the mature cell still had all the information needed to develop all cells in the frog.
Shinya Yamanaka discovered more than 40 years later, in 2006, how intact mature cells in mice could be reprogrammed to become immature stem cells. Surprisingly, by introducing only a few genes, he could reprogram mature cells to become pluripotent stem cells, i.e. immature cells that are able to develop into all types of cells in the body.
October 4, 2012
A fragment of a child's skull discovered at Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, shows the oldest known evidence of anemia caused by a nutritional deficiency. Credit: Dominguez-Rodrigo M, Pickering TR, Diez-Martin F, Mabulla A, Musiba C, et al. (2012)
Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com Your Universe Online
New evidence indicates that early humans were meat eaters, based on a 1.5-million-year-old skull unearthed in Tanzania by Spanish researchers. The skull, that of a child, shows signs of anemia, suggesting a regular diet of meat in early hominids. The finding sheds new light on the evolution of human physiology and brain development.
The skull was found in the Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania and showed signs of nutritional deficiencies commonly caused by a lack of meat in the diet. This finding suggests early man needed meat to thrive, and leads researchers, led by Manuel Domnguez-Rodrigo from Complutense University, Madrid, to believe our ancestors began eating meat much earlier in history than previously believed.
Previous studies have shown that early hominids ate meat, but whether it was a regular part of their diet or only occasionally consumed was not known. Dominguez-Rodrigo and his team suggest the bone lesions present in this skull fragment provide support for the idea that early humans needed to maintain a meat-diet or anemia would set in. The bone lesions observed in the child skull fragment shows signs of vitamin-B deficiency.
Nutritional deficiencies, such as anemia, are most common during weaning, when the diet of children change drastically. The authors suggest that the child possibly died at a time when he/she was beginning to eat solid foods lacking meat. And, if the child was breastfed, it is possible the mother may have been nutritionally deficient as well.
Both cases imply that early humans were hunters, and had a physiology adapted to regular meat consumption at least 1.5 million years ago, the authors noted.
Meat eating has always been considered one of the things that made us human, with the protein contributing to the growth of our brains, said Charles Musiba, PhD, associate professor of anthropology at the University of Colorado Denver, who helped make the discovery.
Musiba said evidence in the childs skull fragment shows deficiency in vitamin B12 and B9, indicating meat was cut off during the weaning process. He was not getting the proper nutrients and probably died of malnutrition, he said.
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Skull Fragment Shows Earliest Evidence Of Human Meat Consumption
STOCKHOLM, October 2, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --
You can watch the live stream of the 2012 Nobel Prize announcements as the news breaks onNobelprize.org, the official website of the Nobel Prize, with live coverage from official press conferences and exclusive interviews with experts, including alerts on social media such as Twitter and Facebook.
The 2012 Nobel Prize announcements within Physiology or Medicine, Physics, Chemistry, Literature, Peace and the Prize in Economic Sciences will be live streamed on Nobelprize.org. The first announcement, for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, is scheduled on Monday, 8 October 11:30 a.m. CET at the earliest (see the full timetable of announcements). http://bit.ly/SkccIy Exclusive content such as interviews with members of Nobel Committees explaining this year's awarded achievements will also be streamed live.
Background information about the 2012 Nobel Laureates, their Nobel Prize-awarded work and official press releases from the Nobel Prize-awarding institutions will be immediately posted.
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In addition to the live stream on Nobelprize.org, you can follow the news in several ways:
SocialMedia. Keep up with the latest news and join the conversation about the 2012 Nobel Prizes on the Nobelprize.org Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/Nobelprize.org, or Twitter: @nobelprize_org, http://twitter.com/Nobelprize_org (#NobelPrize).
Smartphone App. Download the official Nobel Prize mobile application available on Android Apps on Google Play. http://bit.ly/QCq3qz
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2012 Nobel Prize Announcements Live Stream
HAMDEN, Conn., Sept. 25, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Anthony M. Payne has been appointed to the founding faculty of the Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine at Quinnipiac University.
In his new position, Payne will be responsible for teaching physiology, histology and gross anatomy at Connecticut's newest medical school, which is expected to open on Quinnipiac's North Haven Campus. Before coming to Quinnipiac, Payne was a lecturer in the Anatomy and Cell Biology Department at the University of Florida.
"This is a tremendous opportunity," Payne said. "It's rare to have one's educational pursuits be valued so highly."
Payne earned a doctorate in physiology from Wake Forest University. He also holds a master's degree in exercise physiology from the University of Florida and a bachelor's degree in exercise science from Winthrop University. He is a member of the American Physiological Society and the American Association of Anatomists.
"I am delighted that Anthony has joined the School of Medicine," said Dr. Bruce Koeppen, founding dean of the school. "He brings the school expertise in physiology, anatomy and histology, all of which are core disciplines in our curriculum."
The Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine is scheduled to open in the Fall of 2013, pending preliminary accreditation by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education .
The medical school, which will train primary care physicians, is aiming to become a national model of interprofessional health professions education and improve the way health care is delivered. Medical students at Quinnipiac will be part of a learning environment where they will interact with students from Quinnipiac's School of Health Sciences and School of Nursing to learn to become effective members of a primary health care team.
Quinnipiac is a private, coeducational, nonsectarian institution located 90 minutes north of New York City and two hours from Boston. The university enrolls 6,200 full-time undergraduate and 2,300 graduate students in 58 undergraduate and more than 20 graduate programs of study in its School of Business and Engineering, School of Communications, School of Education, School of Health Sciences, School of Law, Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine, School of Nursing and College of Arts and Sciences.
SOURCE Quinnipiac University
Research by an East Carolina University scientist could lead to a product that helps preserve heart tissue during a heart attack.
Dr. Jitka Virag, an assistant professor of physiology at the Brody School of Medicine, and collaborators are working with a protein called ephrinA1. They have found that an injection of the protein into a rodent heart at the onset of a myocardial infarction, commonly referred to as a heart attack, reduces the death of heart tissue by as much as 50 percent. Their work was published last year in the Journal of Physiology.
If it works in the acute and chronic models and ultimately reduces the progression of heart failure and mortality, I think the potential for therapeutic use is great, Virag said.
She recently received a $75,000 grant from the N.C. Biotechnology Center to further her research. She hopes that will clarify how the protein works to protect heart tissue and whether it can be developed into a viable therapy for people who have had heart attacks.
Technically, a myocardial infarction is caused when the blood supply to the heart is blocked, usually by a break-up of plaque inside the artery. At worst, death occurs, but in almost all cases, tissue dies, and the heart loses part of its capacity to pump blood. If caught early, damage can be minimized. However, therapies available to limit the progression to heart failure are geared toward relieving the symptoms, not repairing the injury.
Ephrins are a type of protein known as receptor tyrosine kinase ligands that regulate certain cellular processes. In particular, the ephrinA1 ligand is angiogenic, meaning it can create blood vessels. Due to that property and others, Virag hypothesized that ephrinA1 would help reduce tissue damage. It did, but not because of its angiogenic properties.
Thus, Virag and her team are now working to determine why ephrinA1 works.
ECU is pursuing a patent on the discovery and eventually could work with a biotechnology firm or pharmaceutical company to commercialize it.
Although preliminary data from ongoing experiments is quite promising, there are many questions that remain unanswered, and so this is an exciting time for this work, Virag said.
ECU students recently took their underwater archaeology training above ground as they examined maritime artifacts on the site of the Chicamacomico Life-Saving Station Historic Site & Museum.
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ECU notes: Protein may save tissue
New Delhi, Sept. 30: Fish in Indias coastal waters and elsewhere in the worlds oceans might become smaller and lighter in the coming decades, a study of the effects of climate change on fish physiology has suggested.
The computer simulation study of the impact of warmer and less-oxygenated oceans on some 600 species of marine fish has predicted that their average body weight in 2050 would be 14 to 24 per cent less compared with 2001.
The Canadian and US scientists involved in the research have found that most of the species they studied could experience a five to 39 per cent drop in their maximum body weight. The findings were published today in the journal Nature Climate Change.
These results may have implications for the marine ecosystem and for food security, William Cheung, marine ecologist at the University of British Columbia in Canada and lead author of the study, told The Telegraph.
But a senior Indian scientist said the fishing zones for at least two fish species in Indian coastal waters had expanded over the past two decades and there was no evidence of size depletion driven by climate change.
The simulations by Cheung and his colleagues predict the largest decrease in the average maximum body weight of fish in the Indian Ocean (24 per cent), followed by the Atlantic Ocean (20 per cent) and the Pacific Ocean (14 per cent).
According to the projections, the maximum body weights of some fish species found along Indias west and east coasts could fall by more than 20 per cent.
The projected reductions in fish size and weight are accentuated closer to the coasts rather than in deep-sea zones.
This is because changes in the oceans properties that influence fish physiology will be greater in shallow areas than in the deep sea, Cheung said.
The study is part of efforts to predict how warmer temperatures brought about by greenhouse gas emissions would effect the marine ecosystem. Last year, scientists at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland had independently shown that warmer temperatures are likely to reduce the maximum size of the haddock off the Scottish North Sea coast.
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Warming sparks smaller-fish fears