Archive by date | August 2012

Epigenetic drug may lower cholesterol build-up

Epigenetic drug may lower cholesterol build-up

With a market worth more than US$20.1 billion, drug companies have long competed in a race to develop cholesterol medicines that work better than statins. Today, researchers report on a little-known alternative – an epigenetic therapy that fights plaque-hardened arteries in a novel manner.  Read more

Armstrong left mark on science

Neil Armstrong in the lunar lander after his historic moon walk.

The death of Neil Armstrong over the weekend triggered a wave of commemorations, from Barack Obama and Mitt Romney to countless tweeters who said they were inspired by the first man to walk on the moon. Armstrong and his fellow Apollo astronauts also made a big impact on science — by helping to steer a generation of young students toward scientific research. That was one of the conclusions to come out of a survey that Nature conducted in the summer of 2009, on the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing. Nature asked 800 scientists who had published in the journal about the legacy of the Apollo program. Half of the researchers who responded said that the Apollo missions had inspired them to become scientists.  Read more

Arctic sea ice declines to record low

Arctic sea ice declines to record low

With a few weeks in the melt season yet to go, Arctic sea ice has broken the record for minimum summer extent. Satellites registered 4.1 million square kilometres of sea ice on 26 August, edging out the record of 4.17 million square kilometres set on 18 September, 2007, according to scientists at NASA and the National Snow & Ice Date Center in Boulder, Colorado.  Read more

Court upholds federal funding of embryonic stem cell research

A senior US appeals court ruled today that the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) is legally able to fund human embryonic stem cell research. The decision means that the plaintiffs in the case, two adult stem cell researchers who are trying to stop the funding, have few options left. Their lawyers said today that they are considering asking the final arbiter, the US Supreme Court, to hear their appeal. But that court accepts only about 1% of the cases it is asked to hear.  Read more

Another Alzheimer’s antibody drug fails large trials

Another Alzheimer’s drug bites the dust. Today, Eli Lilly and Company announced that the biologic drug solanezumab did not meet its pre-specified endpoints to slow cognitive and functional decline in Alzheimer’s patients who participated in two phase 3 clinical trials. However, a secondary analysis found some hints that the drug slowed cognitive decline in patients with milder forms of the neurodegenerative condition.  Read more

Curiosity gets rolling on Mars

Curiosity gets rolling on Mars

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has made tracks, literally. The $2.5 billion probe, which researchers hope will answer questions about whether Mars could have supported life, sent back this picture showing its first movement from the Red Planet yesterday. After taking 16 minutes to perform what NASA calls “combined forward, turn and reverse segments” the laser-armed rover ended up 6 metres from where it landed. You can see a video simulation of its test drive here. The rover’s first proper drive in a few days will see it head for a spot some 400 metres east.  Read more

Chemical culture ‘needs a safety upgrade’

A number of devastating and sometimes deadly accidents in laboratories have focused the attention of chemists on dangerous practices. But the problem is rooted in the cultures of many academic institutions, which must be changed from the bottom up, a major conference in Philadelphia heard this week.  Read more