Saliva Science Crime scene investigators could soon use saliva left behind at crime scenes to determine the ages of those involved at the scene Thinking of pulling off the perfect crime? Here’s one more thing you now need to take into account (thanks for nothing, science): your saliva. Yes, it’s no longer enough to keep track of every single hair, every last skin cell, and and absolutely everything you touch at the scene of your nefarious scheme. Researchers at UCLA have figured out how to determine age to within five years from nothing more than a saliva sample. The method relies on a process...

Researchers may have struck a solution to reverse the signs of Type 2 diabetes, the most common form of diabetes, according to a recent experiment. Individuals living with Type 2 diabetes have issues regulating the amount of blood sugar in their bloodstreams that would otherwise be picked up and stored within the body’s cells as energy. Insulin helps escort sugar into cells, but for people living with diabetes, the body doesn’t respond appropriately to insulin and needs more of it to regulate sugar in the bloodstream. The findings were drawn from a group of 11 participants (nine men...

Duct tape – is there no end to its usefulness? Apparently not. Now we learn that using duct tape in hospitals could be a tool in the fight against infectious disease. Call it a handyman’s quarantine. An infection-prevention team at Trinity Medical Center in the Quad Cities along the Illinois and Iowa border, wanted to create safe zones in which healthcare workers could talk to patients with infectious diseases. So they used 3-foot squares of red duct tape to indicate where precisely that zone was located. As explained in a news release from the Assn. for Professional in Infection Control and...

Study Shows Toddlers With Autism Have Abnormal Synchronization in Brain’s Communication Area June 22, 2011 — A brain that is out of sync may be an early clue of autism, researchers suggest. Toddlers with autism are more likely to have abnormal synchronization between certain brain areas than other kids the same age, even those with language delays, according to a new study. ”There seems to be impaired or reduced synchronization between the right and left hemispheres, specifically the areas involved in language and communication,” says researcher Ilan Dinstein, PhD, a postdoctoral...

Children living in wealthy households have far superior vocabularies and problem-solving skills than their poorer peers by the age of five, according to research prepared for Scottish ministers. The ground-breaking study, which assessed the abilities of 14,000 youngsters, found a gap in academic ability between children from different socio-economic backgrounds has already opened up by the time they are three years old. At the age of five, youngsters with wealthier parents educated to degree level are on average 18 months ahead of their less well-off peers with their vocabulary. They are also...

Life-saver: Stem cells are separated from a blood sample Healthy adults will be able to boost their chances of surviving cancer and diseases such as Alzheimer’s by freezing stem cells taken from their blood for the first time. A British company has been granted a licence to extract the cells, so that anyone can now pay to store them in the hope that they will one day help to cure fatal conditions. Until now, it has only been possible to bank stem cells taken from umbilical cord blood and embryos left over from fertility treatment. Read more…

Discovery: Scientists have found that the retinas of people born deaf, or who lost their hearing early in life, develop differently – and this means that they have better eyesight By Daily Mail Reporter Deaf people have better eyesight than those who can hear, research shows. Scientists discovered that the retinas of people born deaf, or who lost their hearing early in life, developed differently from those in people who can hear. This gave them greater peripheral vision, allowing them to see more and thus increase their awareness of their surroundings and any potential hazards. Read more…

The brains of people with autism are chemically different to healthy ones, according to researchers. A study, published in the journal Nature, showed the unique characters of the frontal and temporal lobes had disappeared. Different genes should be active in each region, but autistic brains had the same pattern of gene expression. The National Autistic Society said the results could be important for future treatments. Autism spectrum disorders, including Asperger’s syndrome, are common and affect more than 500,000 people in the UK. Read more…

Magazine Evaluates Sunscreens on How Well They Protect From UVA and UVB Rays May 24, 2011 — Nine of 22 sunscreens tested by Consumer Reports Health earned a ”recommended” or “Best Buy” rating in the organization’s latest evaluation. All nine got excellent marks for protection from UVB rays (which cause sunburn) even after water immersion. All provided very good protection against UVA rays, which penetrate deeper and are linked with aging and tanning. The results, issued today, are published in the July 2011 Consumer Reports. The report follows another sunscreen...

Mood lighting: Janice and her husband Carl use candles at night as she says electromagnetic fields give her chest pains She cannot watch television, listen to the radio or boil the kettle to make a cup of tea. So severe is Janice Tunnicliffe’s sensitivity to electricity that even her neighbours have had to stop using wireless internet. The mother-of-two spends her evenings playing board games by candlelight, avoiding switching on lights or using fridges, freezers, computers and mobile phones. Mrs Tunnicliffe, 55, claims a course of chemotherapy during treatment for cancer left her with a rare...