http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Proteins, which perform such vital roles in our bodies as building and maintaining tissues and regulating cellular processes, are a finicky lot. In order to work properly, they must be folded just so, yet many proteins readily collapse into useless tangles when exposed to temperatures just a few degrees above normal body temperature. http://www.physorg.com/news179672989.html Biology Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:10:52 EST news179672989 Scientists are building a clearer image of the machinery employed by bacteria to spread antibiotic resistance or cause diseases such as whooping cough, peptic stomach ulcers and legionnaires' disease. http://www.physorg.com/news178810154.html Biology Mon, 30 Nov 2009 13:29:45 EST news178810154 The community-associated strain of the deadly superbug MRSA -- an infection-causing bacteria resistant to most common antibiotics -- poses a far greater health threat than previously known and is making its way into hospitals, according to a study in the December issue of Emerging Infectious Diseases. http://www.physorg.com/news178264346.html Medicine & Health Tue, 24 Nov 2009 06:30:01 EST news178264346 Combination drug therapy has become a staple for treating many infections. For instance, doctors treat extensively drug resistant forms of tuberculosis with one drug that breaks down the pathogen's protective barriers and opens the door for another to deliver the deathblow. http://www.physorg.com/news177359451.html Chemistry Fri, 13 Nov 2009 18:31:58 EST news177359451 The perception that antibiotic resistance is primarily the undesirable consequence of antibiotic abuse or misuse is a view that is simplistic and inaccurate, according to a recent report by the American Academy of Microbiology. The reasons behind the spread of resistance are much more complex, including appropriate antibiotic use, lack of proper sanitation and hygiene, and even the environment. http://www.physorg.com/news174839239.html Biology Thu, 15 Oct 2009 15:27:47 EST news174839239 Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health have for the first time identified the genetic mechanisms involved in the formation and survival of L-form bacteria. Their findings are described in a study published October 6 in the journal PLoS ONE. http://www.physorg.com/news174651011.html Biology Tue, 13 Oct 2009 11:11:09 EST news174651011 (PhysOrg.com) -- The increasing antibiotic resistance of bacteria is a serious problem of our time. Hospital germs in particular have developed strains against which practically every current antibiotic is ineffective. In the battle against resistant microbes, a team at the University of Münster (Germany) is now pursuing a new approach involving photodynamic therapy, which is a technique that is already being used in the treatment of certain forms of cancer and macular degeneration. http://www.physorg.com/news173954300.html Nanotechnology Mon, 05 Oct 2009 09:38:51 EST news173954300 (PhysOrg.com) -- Antibiotic resistance has been a significant problem for hospitals and health-care facilities for more than a decade. But despite the need for new treatment options, there have been only two new classes of antibiotics developed in the last 40 years. http://www.physorg.com/news173281005.html Chemistry Sun, 27 Sep 2009 14:37:22 EST news173281005 Five genetic regions have been identified that are unique to the most virulent strain of Clostridium difficile (C. difficile), the hospital superbug. Researchers writing in BioMed Central's open access journal Genome Biology studied the genome of the bacterium, looking for genes relating to motility, antibiotic resistance and toxicity. http://www.physorg.com/news173078097.html Biology Fri, 25 Sep 2009 06:40:01 EST news173078097 Rice University biochemists are developing a system of "evolutionary forecasting" to better understand the mechanisms of antibiotic resistance. http://www.physorg.com/news172768709.html Medicine & Health Mon, 21 Sep 2009 16:40:07 EST news172768709 The world faces a compounding series of crises driven by human activity, which existing governments and institutions are increasingly powerless to cope with, a group of eminent environmental scientists and economists has warned. http://www.physorg.com/news171883610.html Space & Earth Fri, 11 Sep 2009 10:40:01 EST news171883610 (PhysOrg.com) -- A Texas Tech researcher said a recently patented chemical additive could break down the shield of certain types of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. http://www.physorg.com/news171814997.html Chemistry Thu, 10 Sep 2009 15:40:02 EST news171814997 Children in Ethiopia who received the antibiotic azithromycin as a method for controlling the contagious eye disease trachoma had a lower odds of death compared to children who did not receive the antibiotic, according to a study in the September 2 issue of JAMA. http://www.physorg.com/news171047671.html Medicine & Health Tue, 01 Sep 2009 18:15:12 EST news171047671 (PhysOrg.com) -- A small piece of foreign DNA recognizes when and where to slip into a bacterium's genetic code, allowing bacteria to genetically adapt to their environment -- and develop resistance to antibiotics, according to a new Cornell study in the Aug. 21 issue of the journal Cell. http://www.physorg.com/news170005193.html Biology Thu, 20 Aug 2009 16:50:02 EST news170005193 The emergence of new forms of tuberculosis could swell the proportion of drug-resistant cases globally, a new study has found. The finding raises concern that although TB incidence is falling in many regions, the emergence of antibiotic resistance could see virtually untreatable strains of the disease become widespread. http://www.physorg.com/news169136900.html Medicine & Health Mon, 10 Aug 2009 15:29:14 EST news169136900 Scientists studying Staphylococcus bacteria, including methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA), have discovered a potent staph toxin responsible for disease severity. They also found the gene for the toxin traveling with a genetic component of Staphylococcus that controls resistance to antibiotics. The study, now online in PLoS Pathogens, shows for the first time that genetic factors that affect Staphylococcus virulence and drug resistance can be transferred from one strain to another in one exchange event. http://www.physorg.com/news168266826.html Medicine & Health Fri, 31 Jul 2009 13:48:19 EST news168266826 (PhysOrg.com) -- Penny Beuning, an assistant professor of chemical biology and biotechnology at Northeastern, this month received a National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Early-Career Development grant to study how cells adapt to DNA-damaging agents. http://www.physorg.com/news166895987.html Chemistry Wed, 15 Jul 2009 17:00:47 EST news166895987 (PhysOrg.com) -- A Vanderbilt chemist and a biomedical engineer have teamed up to develop a respiratory virus detector that is sensitive enough to detect an infection at an early stage, takes only a few minutes to return a result and is simple enough to be performed in a pediatrician's office. http://www.physorg.com/news165489614.html Chemistry Mon, 29 Jun 2009 10:21:01 EST news165489614 Antibiotic prescribing for respiratory illnesses should be standardised across Europe to help reduce inappropriate prescribing and resistance, say experts in a study published on bmj.com today. http://www.physorg.com/news165005678.html Medicine & Health Wed, 24 Jun 2009 02:00:02 EST news165005678 An international team of scientists has discovered extensive similarities between a strain of bacteria commonly associated with plants and one increasingly linked to opportunistic infections in hospital patients. The findings suggest caution in the use of the plant-associated strain for a range of biotech applications. The genetic analysis was conducted in part at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, and will be published in the July 2009 issue of Nature Reviews Microbiology, now available online. http://www.physorg.com/news164379448.html Biology Tue, 16 Jun 2009 14:30:01 EST news164379448 Some disease-causing bacteria are becoming resistant to antibiotics because they have peculiar sex lives, say researchers publishing new results today in the journal Science. The new study helps scientists understand how bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics, which is a major challenge for those treating infectious diseases, say the authors from Imperial College London. http://www.physorg.com/news163949749.html Medicine & Health Thu, 11 Jun 2009 14:36:14 EST news163949749 Vancomycin resistant enterococci (VRE) have been found in sewage sludge, a by-product of waste-water treatment frequently used as a fertilizer. Researchers writing in the open access journal Acta Veterinaria Scandinavica point out the danger of antibiotic resistance genes passing into the human food chain. http://www.physorg.com/news162797574.html Biology Fri, 29 May 2009 06:34:49 EST news162797574 (PhysOrg.com) -- In an article due to be published in Science, teams from the Institut Pasteurand the University of Limoges, associated with the CNRS and Inserm, decipherfor the first time the molecular mechanism that enables bacteria to acquiremultiresistance to antibiotics, and that even allows them to adapt thisresistance to their environment. This discovery highlights the difficulties thatwill have to be tackled by public health strategies if they are to address theproblems created by multiresistance. http://www.physorg.com/news162484449.html Biology Mon, 25 May 2009 15:34:57 EST news162484449 Aerosol delivery of antibiotics via nanoparticles may provide a means to improve drug delivery and increase patient compliance, thus reducing the severity of individual illnesses, the spread of epidemics, and possibly even retarding antibiotic resistance. http://www.physorg.com/news161955592.html Nanotechnology Tue, 19 May 2009 12:40:18 EST news161955592 (PhysOrg.com) -- For bacteria in wastewater treatment plants, the stars align perfectly to create a hedonistic mating ground for antibiotic-resistant superbugs eventually discharged into streams and lakes. http://www.physorg.com/news161277933.html Medicine & Health Mon, 11 May 2009 16:26:04 EST news161277933 Heliobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection is considered one of the most important risk factors for stomach (or gastric) cancer with as much as 65% of all cases linked back to the bacteria, although exactly how this occurs is not fully clear. But now researchers in Denmark, Portugal and France, publishing in the journal Clinical Cancer Research, show that H. pylori infection contribution to cancer can be linked to at least three independent molecular pathways, which, when disturbed by infection, lead to mutations in the patients` gastric tissues. http://www.physorg.com/news160991589.html Medicine & Health Fri, 08 May 2009 08:54:22 EST news160991589 Inhibiting the "drug efflux pumps" in bacteria, which function as their defence mechanisms against antibiotics, can mask the effect of mutations that have led to resistance in the form of low-affinity drug binding to target molecules in the cell. This is shown by researchers at Uppsala University in a new study that can provide clues to how the development of resistance to antibiotics in bacteria can be delayed. http://www.physorg.com/news160752967.html Medicine & Health Tue, 05 May 2009 14:36:31 EST news160752967 Researchers at University College Cork have used bioengineering to produce a new generation of natural antibiotics that target harmful micro-organisms such as MRSA and the food-borne pathogen, Listeria monocytogenes. http://www.physorg.com/news157732966.html Biology Tue, 31 Mar 2009 15:43:18 EST news157732966 Before Alexander Fleming's discovery of penicillin in 1928, there were any number of unpleasant ways that bacteria could kill you. Countless women died from infection after childbirth, and a simple chest cold could turn into deadly pneumonia. http://www.physorg.com/news155494581.html Medicine & Health Thu, 05 Mar 2009 16:57:30 EST news155494581 A team of scientists, speaking today at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, called for new awareness of the potential for antibiotic-resistant illnesses from the marine environment, and pointed to the marine realm as a source for possible cures of those threats. http://www.physorg.com/news153760926.html Space & Earth Fri, 13 Feb 2009 15:22:28 EST news153760926