Tadpoles 'could prevent skin cancer'

Good morning friends. Medicine is the best thing to use for any skin problem. But there is this other way that could prevent it.

Tadpoles could hold the key to developing skin cancer drugs, according to scientists. It has identified a compound which blocks the movement of the pigment cells that give the tadpoles their distinctive markings. It is the uncontrolled movement and growth of pigment cells that causes skin cancer in both humans and frogs. And by blocking their migration, the development and spread of cancerous tumours can potentially be prevented, the scientists have claimed.

The South African clawed frog tadpoles – Latin name Xenopus Laevis – have the same organs, molecules and physiology as humans. The close comparison means the same mechanisms are involved in causing cancer in both Xenopus tadpoles and humans. Until the 1960s, Xenopus Laevis frogs were used as the main human pregnancy test.

There would be a lot of testing to prove this test accurately. It shows that like tadpoles could lead to potential cancer drugs."

photo courtesy: sound waves

Single brain cell can hold memories

Good morning friends. We all know that brain is the most important part of our body. It is the brain who command us what to do. As it is very useful

Individual nerve cells in the front part of the brain can hold traces of memories on their own for as long as a minute and possibly longer.

This is the first time that a study has recognized the specific signal that establishes nonpermanent cellular memory, and revealed how the brain holds temporary information. The new finding has implications for addiction, attention disorders and stress-related memory loss. Permanent memories are known to be stored when the excitatory amino acid glutamate activates in channels on nerve cells in the brain to reorganize and strengthen the cells’ connections with one another.

This process takes minutes to hours to turn on and off and is too slow to buffer, or temporarily hold, rapidly incoming information.

It shows that rapid-fire inputs less than a second long initiate a cellular memory process in single cells lasting as long as minute, a process called metabotropic glutamate transmission.

It has been said that this transmission in the most highly evolved brain region holds moment-to-moment information.

These cellular findings have implications for how the human brain stores rapidly changing information, like the temporary memory a card shark uses when counting cards in a game of Black Jack and, as casinos have figured out. It is the memory that is most sensitive to the disruptive effects of alcohol and noisy distractions.

ref: The times of India

Cleaner air 'adds five months to life

Good morning friends. Many of you didn’t know about Schizophrenia. Some were not aware of what is this and how will it affect our life.

Schizophrenia blurs the line between inner and outer reality, by overstimulating a brain region involved in self-reflection and causing exaggerated focus on self.

The disturbed thoughts, perceptions and emotions that characterise the condition are caused by disconnections among the brain regions that control these different functions. Schizophrenia also involves an excess of connectivity between the so-called default brain regions, which are involved in self-reflection and become active when we are thinking about nothing in particular, or thinking about ourselves. "People normally suppress this default system when they perform challenging tasks. The patients with schizophrenia don't do this.

"We think this could help to explain the cognitive and psychological symptoms of schizophrenia." Research might lead to ways of predicting or monitoring individual patients' response to treatments for this mental illness, which occurs in about one percent of the population. Schizophrenia has a strong genetic component, and first-degree relatives of patients (who share half their genes) are 10 times more likely to develop the disease than the general population. The identities of these genes and how they affect the brain are largely unknown.

The researchers were especially interested in the default system, a network of brain regions whose activity is suppressed when people perform demanding mental tasks. The medial prefrontal cortex and the posterior cingulate cortex, regions are associated with self-reflection and autobiographical memories and which become connected into a synchronously active network when the mind is allowed to wander. I

n the schizophrenia patients, the default system was both hyperactive and hyper connected during rest, and it remained so as they performed the memory tasks. The patients were less able than healthy control subjects to suppress the activity of this network during the task. The less the suppression and the greater the connectivity, the worse they performed on the hard memory task, and the more severe their clinical symptoms.

Pollution could be turning you obese - 2

When activated, RXRs can migrate into the nuclei of cells and switch on genes that cause the growth of fat storage cells and regulate whole body metabolism -- compounds that affect a related receptor often associated with RXRs are now used to treat diabetes.

RXRs are normally activated by signalling molecules found throughout the body.

Taisen Iguchi and Yoshinao Katsu of the Graduate University for Advanced Studies in Japan described how RXRs and related receptors are also strongly activated by tributyltin and similar chemicals.

Tributyltin impairs reproduction in water fleas through its effects on a receptor similar to the RXR. In addition, tributyltin causes the growth of excess fatty tissue in newborn mice exposed to it in the womb.

The effects of tributyltin on RXR-like nuclear receptors might therefore be widespread throughout the animal kingdom.

The rise in obesity in humans over the past 40 years parallels the increased use of industrial chemicals over the same period. Iguchi and Katsu maintain that it is "plausible and provocative" to associate the obesity epidemic to chemical triggers present in the modern environment.

ref: thetimesofindia

Slick shape 'best for health'

Good morning friends. Here’s a good health tips for all of us.
Like it or not, slick shape is the best for health. A new study has found that the type of fat responsible for producing the pear shape showed off by celebrities like Beyonce and Jennifer Lopez can actually protect women from a number of serious diseases.

Researchers at Harvard Medical School have carried out the study and found that buttock and hip fat may help prevent Type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure - but women "with an apple shape" are more prone to diabetes and heart disease.

In fact, the researchers have based their findings on an analysis of laboratory rodents who were injected with hip and buttock fat taken from other mice - they found that the rodents easily lost weight and made better use of insulin.

"The surprising thing was that it wasn't where the fat was located; it's the kind of fat that was the most important variable. "I think it's an important result because not only does it say that not all fat is bad, but I think it points to a special aspect of fat where we need to do more research," lead researcher Ronald said.

However, having an apple shape may be detrimental to health for women. "The apple shape is definitely more dangerous. This is because tummy fat is packed around organs like the liver and the pancreas," said Jeff Halevy, certified fitness coach based in Manhattan.

In fact, being an "apple" isn't necessarily a health deterrent, he says, so long as there aren't any extra pounds on board. Angelina Jolie, Tyra Banks, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Drew Barrymore all have classic apple shapes, he explains, but they're thin so they cover it up.

ref: thetimesofindia

Pollution could be turning you obese - 1

Good morning friends. Many of us knows that pollution has been as any significant change in the physical, chemical or biological characteristics of the air, water and land that many negatively affect mankind, whether directly by being harmful to people or indirectly by causing natural resources to deteriorate. A pollutant might be triggering obesity by influencing gene activity, according to a new study.

For example tributyltin, a chemical is used in antifouling paints for boats, as a wood and textile preservative, and as a pesticide on high-value food crops, among many other applications.


Tributyltin affects sensitive receptors in animal cells, from water fleas to humans, at very low concentrations - a thousand times lower than pollutants that are known to interfere with sexual development of wildlife species.


Tributyltin and its relatives are highly toxic to snails, causing female snails to develop male sexual characteristics, and it bioaccumulates in fish and shellfish.


The harmful effects of the chemical on the liver and the nervous and immune systems in mammals are well known, but its powerful effects on the cellular components known as retinoid X receptors (RXRs) in a range of species are a recent discovery.

ref:thetimesofindia