Apr 2013
The Microbes You Share
19/04/13 16:23 Filed in: GenomeWeb Daily Scan
Rob Knight at the University of Colorado and his colleagues examined the fecal, oral, and skin microbiota of 60 families with and without children or dogs, and reported that cohabitating partners shared many microbes, especially Prevotella and Veillonella. People also had similar microbial communities as their dogs. S. Pelech points out that animal companions can also provide us the opportunity to become immunized against many pathogens, and describes how cat owners may have been more resistant to infection by the SARS coronavirus. Read More...
BRAIN Game
02/04/13 16:21 Filed in: GenomeWeb Daily Scan
US President Barack Obama announced his $100 million initiative called the Brain Research Through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies or BRAIN Project. The project will involve a number of agencies, including the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, and a so-called "dream team" of researchers led by Rockefeller University's Cori Bargmann and William Newsome from Stanford University will be developing a specific plan and goals for the project. S. Pelech acknowledges that a commitment to increase spending for neuroscience-based research is sorely needed, but it would appear from preliminary descriptions of the research program that very little of the new funding will actually be applied to the study of neurological diseases in humans. Read More...