Pesticide to Parkinson's

a european study reveals a link between pesticides and Parkinson's disease (pd), claiming the greater the pesticide exposure, the higher the risk of developing the ailment. pd is an incurable, degenerative neurological condition where people have difficulty in moving their limbs and develop tremors and facial tics.

Deafening gas

a canadian study suggests that combined chronic exposure to noise and carbon monoxide in the workplace can induce hearing loss. Based on over 9,000 audiograms, the study by Adriana Lacerda of the cole d'orthophonie et d'audiologie, Universit de Montral, and her colleagues was presented at the annual meeting of the Acoustical Society of America in Vancouver on May 18, 2005.

Sweet vaccine

decades of trade embargo by the us did not chip away the biomedical edge of Cuba. This fact was crystal clear recently when the country's scientists announced that they have developed a synthetic vaccine for meningitis -- a disease that kills more than 600,000 children annually in developing countries.

Inhumane conclusion?

a recent us report may have wide-ranging impacts on international pesticide research and human health because it has given a clean chit to human testing of pesticides in the country.

Striking at the heart

exposure to elevated levels of fine particles from automobiles for just two hours raises the likelihood of heart attack according to a recent study in the journal Circulation.

End of innocence

children exposed to ddt (dichlorodiphenyl-trichloroethane) attain puberty at a much younger age, reveals a new study. The study shows that girls exposed to ddt develop breasts and start their menstruation cycle by the age of ten, both processes which generally start at the age of 12.

Bite of a tick

Lyme disease, which is transmitted through the bite of a tick, can now be cured by taking a single dose of an antibiotic (doxycycline), says a study. Lyme disease is directly linked with the destruction of forests due to which the tick gets a chance to jump from its natural host, the white-tailed deer, to humans. The drug tested on people living in Westchester County, New York, USA, with one of the highest rates of Lyme disease in the us, showed positive result.

Safe chemotherapy

A chemotherapy drug with few side effects has been developed by the University of Maryland's Greenebaum Cancer Center, in Baltimore, USA. The drug prevents further division of mutated cancerous cells. When the drug was tested for safety on 34 adult patients of leukemia, it was found that the drug did not have many side effects at lower concentrations. A high dose of 1,200 milligrammes, administered twice a day, could bring about neurological problems such as confusion, lack of balance and visual problems, but these effects disappeared 72 hours after the treatment was stopped.

Inducing cancer

Vitamin C, an essential nutrient found in fruits and vegetables, is a double-edged sword, providing benefits and also inducing the production of compounds associated with cancer, say researchers at the University of Pennsylvania, USA. Vitamin C, also known as ascorbic acid, when added to solutions of a degraded version of an important fatty acid found in blood triggered the production of DNA-damaging agents known to cause mutations associated with a variety of cancers, reports Reuters.

Miracle cure?

an anti-cancer drug which specifically targets the cancer cells and not the normal cells has entered the market. Unlike the conventional methods like chemotherapy which have their toll in the healthy cells also, the new smart drug zeros in only on the cancer cells.