London, June 2 (ANI): Engineers have constructed computer-designed proteins, which normally don't fight flu, but can be engineered to act as broad-spectrum antiviral agents against a variety of influenza virus strains, a study has suggested.
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Computer-designed proteins 'may help fight variety of flu viruses'
CHICAGO, June 2, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --
--TLE3 Biomarker Over-expressed in HER2-positive, Hormone Receptor-positive, and Triple-negative Breast Cancers --
-- EGFR status May Facilitate Therapeutic Decision-making in Head and Neck Cancer --
Caris Life Sciences announced today the utility of the company's Caris Target Now evidence-based molecular profiling service in the characterization of breast and head and neck cancers. These data were presented today at the 2012 annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO).
"By combining state-of-the-art genomic sequencing technology with a rigorous review of the clinical literature, Caris Target Now provides tumor-specific biomarker information, enabling physicians to make more informed, individualized treatment decisions for their patients," said Sandeep Reddy, MD, clinical professor of medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Loapracticing oncologist and clinical advisor to Caris Life Sciences. "The data presented today have potentially important predictive implications for patients with breast and head and neck cancers, as the molecular profiling information may point the way toward personalizing therapy based on tumor genetics."
Breast Cancer Data
In a poster presentation today, Gargi Basu, Ph.D., and colleagues at Caris Life Sciences, presented results from the first study providing a comprehensive review of transducin-like enhancer of split 3 (TLE3) expression in breast cancer subtypes. They described TLE3 as a transcriptional repressor that influences tumor growth and microtubule stability; its expression in epithelial tumor cells may reflect that these cells require the expression of TL3 to maintain their undifferentiated state. The expression of TLE3 is also associated with response to taxane therapy in patients with breast cancer.
Working with tumor cells collected from 978 breast cancer patients, the investigators employed two different technological platforms used in Caris Target Now -immunohistochemistry (IHC) and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) - to gather information on four biomarkers: TLE3 (M-201), ER(1D5), PR(PgR636), and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)/neu (Polyclonal). IHC analysis of the four biomarkers was conducted at the protein level, and FISH was used to determine amplification of HER2/neu. Samples were then sub-classified as hormone receptor (HR)-positive (i.e., estrogen receptor [ER]-positive and/or progesterone receptor [PR]- positive), HER2-positive (either at the protein level or amplified by FISH), or triple-negative (i.e., lacking in ER, PR, and HER2/neu).
Overall, 351 (36%) of the patients were HR-positive, 150 (15%) were HER2-positive, and 477 (49%) were triple-negative. TLE3 was expressed in 82% of the HR-positive patients, 73% of the HER2-positive patients, and 61% of the triple-negative patients. To further investigate TLE3 expression in the patient subtypes, Dr. Basu and colleagues performed a pairwise Fisher's Exact Test between the various pairs; this analysis revealed that for all pairs, the ratios of TLE3-expressing individuals were significantly different. The largest difference was observed between the HR-positives and the triple-negatives (82% vs. 61%, respectively; p=2.509e-10), suggesting that the HR-positives have a higher likelihood of responding to taxane therapy. The HER2-positives, at 73%, had a ratio that was significantly higher than the triple-negatives and significantly lower than the HR-positives.
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01-06-2012 10:51 Holly Valance - State Of Mind Official Music Video. ? & © 2003 London Records 90 Limited. Tecnical data before the upload: Original Video Format: MP4 (Codec H.264 - 7000Kbs Variable Bitrate - 2 Pass Encoding) Original Video Size: 179.638Kb; 1280x720 (16.9 WideScreen High Definition Upscaled - De-Interlaced) Frame Rate 25ps - Zoom 100% Original Audio Codec: MPEG-4 AAC 320Kbs Variable Bitrate NOTE: All the comments are not strictly related to this video will be removed.
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Holly Valance - State Of Mind Official Music Video © 2003 - Video
01-06-2012 21:36 If you enjoyed please leave a like and subscribe. Get this to 215 likes and I will upload the next Ep. right away! Follow me on twitter: Follow me on Twitch:
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02-06-2012 04:14 Sup! This clip took so long to make that I'll go inactive for a while now. I might do one or two more clips in the summer but I wont be that active. Song: JJ - Still If you want to support me upload my clip to your channel 🙂 Download Link:
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Caroline Wozniacki Upset By Kaia Kanepi At French Open (VIDEO)
You gotta hand it to the Americans. By god, they invented or at least morphed into profitability just about everything that's on my desk as I write this: my landline telephone; my iPad, which is open to my Facebook page; a DVD of the director's cut of "Edward Scissorhands"; even the plastic-lidded cup filled with a liquid that vaguely resembles coffee.
But now they've taken the cake. The new invention it's incumbent upon me to tell you about is far and away the greatest creation of that fiendishly innovative nation that has ever crossed a county, state or national border.
Armed with this smart weapon, Americans can not only "get their country moving again" which is something they do every four years until it stops in its tracks a couple of weeks later; they will also return to dominance around the world. Once everyone starts using this creation, the Russians will go back to playing roulette and the Chinese will have little choice but to while away their hours playing checkers.
If you haven't guessed by now, this invention is called Hecklevision. If you haven't heard of it, you will, for it will be coming to a cinema near you before you can say "Jackie Robinson."
Hecklevision apparently first saw the light of day or, in this case, the light of screen in Austin, Texas, at the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema. From there it spread like wildfire across to the Hollywood Cinema in Portland, Oregon.
You see, Americans love to heckle. Had they been around in Jesus' time, I'm sure one of them would have shouted, "Hey, dude, come down from your mount and stop sermonizing!" And that would have spelled the end not only of the Vatican and its golden hoards, but also of the lucrative Swarovski crystal crucifix business, before either got off the ground.
Now Americans have finally turned heckling into a commercial activity, just like they did with pizza, tacos, a drink marketed as coffee and imperialism all things originally invented in other countries.
Hecklevision is simple. People in a cinema who have mobile phones create text messages and send them to the screen in real time.
For instance, if Dorothy in "The Wizard of Oz" says to her dog Toto, "I've a feeling we're not in Kansas," you can shoot off a rib-tickler to the screen like: "That's what Sarah Palin said when she arrived in Moscow."
But the potential of this new technology goes far beyond anything the American mind has ever stumbled on before. This being the case, I am calling on the Gateses, the Jobses and the Zuckerbergs among my readers to throw in some of their hard-earned cash to take this heckling technology from the big screen and into the world of television news.
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Hush ye not! Here's a heckle of an idea to get rich — and save the world
Howland Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Receives Laboratory Accreditation Status from the American Association of Neuromuscular & Electrodiagnostic MedicineHowland, Ohio (PRWEB) June 01, 2012 Howland Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation has received Laboratory Accreditation status from the American Association of Neuromuscular & Electrodiagnostic Medicine (AANEM). The AANEM established ...
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Howland Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Gets Accreditation
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. & CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--
Foundation Medicine, Inc., a molecular information company that brings comprehensive cancer genomic analysis to routine clinical care, today announced results from two studies using next-generation sequencing (NGS) to provide actionable information about genomic tumor alterations in individual patients cancers across all solid tumor types. The studies, being presented this week in an oral and poster session at the 2012 Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), provide new evidence of the important role and clinical impact of NGS in cancer treatment.
These data follow Foundation Medicines recent launch of FoundationOne, the first pan-cancer, fully informative genomic profile for all solid tumors.
These studies, along with other results previously presented and published, provide unequivocal evidence of the significant clinical value of NGS-based comprehensive genomic analysis, said Michael J. Pellini, president and chief executive officer, Foundation Medicine. One test, using a very small amount of tissue, can enable physicians to tailor treatment to a patients molecular subtype. With our pan-cancer genomic profile now commercially available, physicians will have a critical decision-making tool to assist them in making the most appropriate therapeutic choices for their patients with cancer.
The first study, Discovery of Recurrent KIF5B-RET Fusions and Other Targetable Alterations from Clinical NSCLC Specimens (Abstract # 7510), was completed in collaboration with researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and assayed cancer-relevant genes in 24 cases of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Highlights of the analysis include:
Many non-small cell lung cancers have oncogenic alterations that may be sensitive to a targeted therapeutic approach, which can lead to better outcomes for individual patients, said Marzia Capelletti, Ph.D., Research Fellow in Medicine, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. The challenge for physicians is to comprehensively understand the patients cancer by characterizing the genomic profile and develop a rational treatment strategy. The results of this study clearly demonstrate that there is a need to have a reliable tool to identify the particular molecular drivers of a tumor to help select appropriate therapies for individual patients.
An additional study, Next-Generation Sequencing Reliably Identifies Actionable Genomic Changes in Common and Rare Solid Tumors: The FMI Experience with the Initial 50 Consecutive Patients (Abstract #10590), utilized NGS to identify actionable genomic alterations across a variety of solid tumors in the first 304 clinical specimens (poster updated with clinical experience through May 1, 2012) analyzed by Foundation Medicines CLIA-approved laboratory. Alterations were defined as actionable if linked to an approved therapy in the tumor under study or another solid tumor; a known or suspected contraindication to a given therapy; or a clinical trial linked to the alteration. Lung, breast, colorectal, ovarian and pancreatic cancers were the most common solid tumors identified among 16 primary tumor types. In the analysis:
The complex nature of cancer and the transformation of cancer care, prompted by advanced understanding of genomic subtypes and emergence of targeted therapies, make the detection of alterations to guide therapeutic decision-making more critical than ever, said Gary Palmer, M.D., J.D., M.P.H., senior vice president of medical affairs and commercial development, Foundation Medicine, and lead author of the study. This NGS assay makes it possible for clinicians to make the best possible therapeutic choices, minimize the use of ineffective therapies and enhance enrollment in clinical trials appropriate for the individual patient.
Foundation Medicines first commercial offering, FoundationOne, is a fully informative genomic profile that allows any oncologist to use the same technology that informed the studies presented here as a clinical decision making tool in their own practice. FoundationOne uses routine, formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tumor samples. Test results are provided in a straightforward report that matches detected patients genomic alterations with potential treatment options and clinical trials.
About FoundationOne
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Alan Milburn is wrong to suggest that clever government spin will overcome the huge financial barriers facing low-and middle-income students who want to apply to medical school ( Medical profession must open doors to poor students, says social mobility tsar , 30 May). Successive governments have steadily increased the cost of the intensive, five- to six-year medical degree by raising tuition ...
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After the Liberty lost its opener, 78-73 to the Connecticut Sun in the Garden, coach John Whisenant said he liked his team. Judging by the way they have played, one must ask if the players like him.
The Liberty (0-4) is one of just three winless teams in the WNBA and the prospects for a first win are grim.
They play at the Indiana Fever (3-0), one of three undefeated teams, Saturday night (7 p.m, not on television). The teams then do it again Sunday night at the Prudential Center.
The Liberty have never opened a season 0-5. Worse, they have shown no signs of improving. After dropping the opener by five, the Liberty lost a rematch with the Sun in Connecticut by 15 (92-77). Then came an 18-point loss to the Minnesota Lynx, the defending WNBA champs. And the most recent loss was a 26-point blowout in Atlanta, 100-74, to the Dream.
No doubt the Liberty have played a brutally tough schedule. But this franchise, still searching for its first league title, has played tough schedules before.
This is Whisenants second season with the Liberty. The franchise believed one of the greatest players in womens basketball history Carol Blazejowski had taken the team as far as it could go. She was the GM from Day 1.
The Liberty went 19-15 last season and was eliminated in the first round of the playoffs. The early part of the season was focused on learning Whisenants new systems. This season he incorporated some of former Knicks coach Mike DAntonis offense. But the Liberty is averaging just 71.5 points per game, third worst in the league. and they are dead last in point differantial (-16), allowing 87.5 points.
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INDIANAPOLIS (AP) Tamika Catchings scored 16 points to help the Indiana Fever defeat the New York Liberty 91-68 on Saturday night.
Roneeka Hodges scored 15 points, Jeanette Pohlen added 12 and Katie Douglas had 11 for Indiana (4-0). The Fever made 13 of 26 3-pointers while New York made 5 of 17. The Fever made 22 of 27 free throws and committed just 12 turnovers.
Indiana's reserves outscored New York's 52-18.
Plenette Pierson scored 24 points on 10-for-13 shooting for the Liberty (0-5). Cappie Pondexter, New York's leading scorer, finished with 13 points on 4-for-15 shooting. Pierson and Pondexter were the only Liberty players to score in double figures.
New York's past four losses have all been by double digits, by a combined 82 points. The teams play again Sunday at New York.
Indiana, which entered the game as the No. 2 scoring team in the league, shot 47 percent from the field.
The Fever shot just 6-for-19 from the field in the first quarter but made enough free throws to tie the score at 20 by the end of the period.
Indiana heated up in the second quarter making 10 of its 16 shots to take a 49-36 halftime lead. Catchings scored 14 points in the first half and Hodges scored eight off the bench in the second quarter. The Fever made 6 of 13 3-pointers in the first half.
New York cut Indiana's lead to nine points early in the third quarter before the Fever took control. A 3-pointer by Shavonte Zellous pushed Indiana's lead to 60-45 and forced the Liberty to call a timeout.
Catchings disagreed with a foul call, then made contact with an official and was issued a technical foul. New York made all three free throws to cut Indiana's lead to 12.
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In the wake of Mayor Bloomberg?s proposes big soda ban, I have some suggestions for paternalistic nudges for economists who advocate such paternalism. One idea is when they go to a restaurant, by default they should be seated at the table that places them in the most proximity to people near the median income level. ...
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The new dive center, to open this summer, will be bigger than any other on the archipelago.
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In Transit Blog: In the Galápagos Islands, A Bigger Center for Divers
GEORGE TOWN, Cayman Islands A turtle farm in the Cayman Islands says it is freeing a roughly 60-year-old turtle to celebrate British Queen Elizabeth's 60 years on the throne.
Officials with the Cayman Turtle Farm say that the creature known as "Sir Thomas Turtleton" weighs more than 600 pounds (272 kilograms) and has been used to breed for more than 30 years.
The plan is to release it on Saturday in North Sound, the largest protected bay on Grand Cayman Island. Then scientists will track it by satellite.
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Cayman Islands to release turtle in honor of Britain's Queen Elizabeth
If youre looking for a new job, as more Americans are these days, there couldnt be a surer bet than the health-care sector. Of the 665,000 jobs the economy added in 2012, 158,000 of them have been in health care. Even when the economy was shedding huge numbers of jobs in 2008 and 2009, the sector was still growing:
The health-care sector keeps getting bigger largely because our health-care needs keep growing: Americans are getting older. At the same time, study after study finds there arent enough doctors to care for them. This all should make a field such as nursing a pretty certain slam dunk, right?
Wrong: David Glenn, a nursing student at University of Maryland who blogs at Notes on Nursing, flags a new study showing that nearly a third of recent nursing graduates are having trouble finding jobs.
The National Student Nurses Association surveyed 3,733 nursing students in September 2011, about four months after their graduation. Among them, 36 percent said they were not yet employed. It wasnt for lack of effort: 26 percent reported difficulty getting a job in their preferred specialty, while 55 percent couldnt find employment in a preferred geographic area.
A lot of this could have to do with older nurses staying, during a tough economy, longer than had been expected. A separate survey, this one of nurses employers, found that the majority of institutions that hire nurses have a pretty low vacancy rate, less than 5 percent. The vacancy rate for bedside nurses continues to be lower than typical and is a clear indication that nurses are binding themselves to the workforce with many delaying retirement, the report from Nursing Solutions, Inc. found.
A lot of it also has to do with geography. As mentioned earlier, more than half of the unemployed nursing school graduates said they couldnt find a job in the geographic region they preferred. In health reform, theres a lot of talk about impending doctor and nurse shortages. But some would argue our problem is less of a shortage and more of a poor distribution of resources: Health-care professionals end up concentrated in metropolitan areas, with few to serve those in rural communities.
That seems to be true for nurses. About 83 percent live in large metropolitan areas, according to the Health Resources and Service Administration. Graduates may encounter more demand looking in more rural areas, such as Nevada, which has 604 nurses for every 100,000 people (one of the countrys lowest rates). The nursing jobs may be available, but not necessarily where theyre desired by recent nursing graduates.
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The health-care sector is booming. So why are nurses having trouble finding jobs?
INDIANAPOLIS A dispute over the new health care law's tax hike on medical device-makers became a proxy last week for the larger philosophical differences between Indiana's two U.S. Senate hopefuls.
It started when the Republican candidate, state Treasurer Richard Mourdock, said at a stop in Churubusco, Ind., that the tax increase is a "terrible thing that threatens jobs" and linked it to the Democratic candidate, U.S. Rep. Joe Donnelly.
Donnelly's camp then responded by accusing Mourdock of distorting the three-term congressman's record. He supported the health care law, but opposed the medical device tax hike and has worked to repeal that portion.
If you're grading the truthfulness of their arguments, both Mourdock and Donnelly get partial credit.
Had Donnelly and some of his conservative Democratic colleagues such as former U.S. Rep. Brad Ellsworth, who was hammered over this issue in his failed 2010 U.S. Senate campaign, not voted for the health care law in the first place, the medical device tax would not exist.
The 2.3 percent excise tax on sales above $5 million for medical device-makers was expected to raise about $30 billion over a decade an important step toward footing the law's price tag for a major Medicaid expansion and more.
However, Donnelly's been a vocal critic of the tax, which would put the pinch on areas like Warsaw, Ind., that are known as industry hubs. He cites it as the top example of how the health care law needs "fixing."
And he's done something about it. Donnelly co-sponsored a measure approved by the House Ways and Means Committee on Thursday that would repeal the tax.
Thus, Indiana Democratic Party spokesman Ben Ray hit Mourdock on Friday over his criticism of Donnelly.
"This attack is dishonest, and it's exactly what's wrong with Richard Mourdock's 'my way or the highway' mentality. Joe Donnelly is working with both Republicans and Democrats to repeal the medical device tax, something that wouldn't be possible if he played by Mourdock's rules," Ray said.
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Medical device tax becomes proxy for philosophical dispute between U.S. Senate candidates
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Deputy Editorial Page Editor
First, a word about what this weeks column is not about.
Its not about whether Obamacare is the best prescription to cure the drawbacks and disparities in Americas health-care system.
Its not about policy buzzwords like individual mandates, risk pools or severability.
Its about just one question: Can the government order its citizens to act against their religious faith?
You probably thought that question had been answered more than 200 years ago. The Founding Fathers hammered out the First Amendment to the Constitution ensuring the free exercise of religion without government meddling.
The White House thinks otherwise.
PRESIDENT OBAMAS health-care initiative includes a mandate directed at religiously affiliated employers and their health providers. They must offer insurance coverage for contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs such as the morning-after pill.
In the words of John Garvey, president of the Catholic University of America: Its like compelling Jehovahs Witnesses to salute the flag, or Quakers to fight, or Jews to eat pork.
Of course such a mandate runs utterly contrary to the Catholic Churchs unwavering respect for human life. Its an unshakable pillar of Catholic faith and a component of its formidable care network 56 Catholic health-care systems nationwide, whose hospitals employ more than 750,000 workers. One in six U.S. patients regardless of faith are treated in Catholic hospitals.
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