Genetic variations linked to schizophrenia, bipolar disorder
New AIDS vaccine ready for trials
TORONTO: The Canadian University of Western Ontario has developed a new HIV/AIDS vaccine that is ready for human trials.
The vaccine called SAV001H has been developed by the university at London, about 160 km from here, in collaboration with Sumagen Canada, a subsidiary of the Korean pharmaceutical company.
In a statement Tuesday, Sumagen Canada said it has submitted an application to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to begin the first phase of trials of the vaccine on human beings.
Chil-Yong Kang, a professor at the university, said they have completed safety and immunogenicity studies of the vaccine on animals. Immunogenicity measures the ability of a drug or vaccine to provoke an immune response in the body.
Trials of the new vaccine on animals have reportedly resulted in good anti-body reactions with no adverse effects.
Numerous trials have been carried out by pharmaceutical companies to develop vaccines since the AIDS virus was recognized in 1983, but no commercialised vaccine has been developed so far.
Sumagen Canada has secured patents for the vaccine in over 70 countries, including the US, the European Union and Korea.
It said the phase one clinical trials of the vaccine will double check its safety on HIV positive volunteers. The phase two trials would assess the immunogenicity of the vaccine.
Sumagen Canada said it is ready for clinical trials in the US as soon the FDA approval is granted.
The University of Western Ontario and the city of London have been short-listed by the Canadian government to set up an $88 million HIV vaccine manufacturing facility, which will be partly funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Just last week Canadian scientists had announced a major breakthrough in AIDS treatment by saying that they have found where the HIV virus hides in the human body.
Currently, AIDS patients have to take a cocktail of up to five to six drugs to prolong their life up to 13 years.
There are over 33 million HIV patients worldwide, with 2.7 million more getting infected each year.
Humans can develop echolocation like dolphins and bats
WASHINGTON: In a new research, scientists have shown that human beings can develop echolocation, the system of acoustic signals used by dolphins and
bats to explore their surroundings.
The research was conducted by a team of researchers from the University of Alcala de Henares (UAH) in Spain.
"In certain circumstances, we humans could rival bats in our echolocation or biosonar capacity", said Juan Antonio Martínez, lead author of the study and a researcher at the Superior Polytechnic School of the UAH.
The team led by this scientist has started a series of tests, the first of their kind in the world, to make use of human beings' under-exploited echolocation skills.
In the first study, the team analyses the physical properties of various sounds, and proposes the most effective of these for use in echolocation.
"The almost ideal sound is the palate click, a click made by placing the tip of the tongue on the palate, just behind the teeth, and moving it quickly backwards, although it is often done downwards, which is wrong," Martinez explained.
According to the researcher, palate clicks "are very similar to the sounds made by dolphins, although on a different scale, as these animals have specially-adapted organs and can produce 200 clicks per second, while we can only produce three or four".
By using echolocation, "which is three-dimensional, and makes it possible to 'see' through materials that are opaque to visible radiation," it is possible to measure the distance of an object based on the time that elapses between the emission of a sound wave and an echo being received of this wave as it is reflected from the object.
In order to learn how to emit, receive and interpret sounds, the scientists are developing a method that uses a series of protocols.
This first step is for the individual to know how to make and identify his or her own sounds (they are different for each person), and later to know how to use them to distinguish between objects according to their geometrical properties.
The next level is to learn how to master the "palate clicks".
According to Martinez, his team is now working to help deaf and blind people to use this method in the future, because echoes are not only perceived by their ear, but also through vibrations in the tongue and bones.
A better understanding of the mental mechanisms used in echolocation could also help to design new medical imaging technologies or scanners, which make use of the great penetration capacity of clicks.
Researcher in search of 'happiness gene'
Washington: The pursuit of human happiness can be tripped by stress, financial trouble or chronic illness. Now, a researcher is trying to find the happiness gene, which may be partially responsible for a positive outlook.
Yoram Barak, a Tel Aviv University (TAU) researcher, is engaged in the "attempt to find the happiness gene, the genetic component of happiness", which may be 50 percent responsible for an optimistic outlook.
Initial research findings have made Barak optimistic about his ability to succeed. "If something is genetic, it should have a large concordance among twins," he said.
"And the twin studies we are looking at show that 50 percent of happiness is genetically determined." Barak is now working with Anat Achiron of the Sheba Medical Centre to identify the specific genes that are associated with happiness.
"We may be a long way off from being able to genetically engineer happiness," Barak said, "but we can start by thinking positively. Much of his work is based on positive psychology, which is the "fastest and largest growing area of psychology in the US - and in the world," he said.
For the 50 percent of happiness that is not genetic, Barak is working on a program of positive psychology workshops, with exercises he recently tested in a one-day workshop for 120 participants at the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Israel.
Early results indicate that the workshops improved the happiness level of participants by as much as 30 percent, said a TAU release.
Facebook tries to simplify privacy settings
NEW YORK : Facebook is overhauling its privacy controls over the next several weeks in an attempt to simplify its users' ability to control who sees the information they share on the site.
These privacy controls have grown increasingly complicated as the 5-year-old social networking service has expanded its user base and added new features.
The Palo Alto, California-based company said Wednesday that the new settings will give people greater control over what photos, updates and personal details they share with their friends, family and strangers on Facebook and, eventually, the wider Internet.
To make the settings easier, Facebook is consolidating its existing six privacy pages and more than 30 settings on to a single privacy page. It will also standardize the options for each setting so the choices are always the same, which hasn't always been the case.
Facebook's chief privacy officer, Chris Kelly, said in a conference call with reporters that the changes don't have anything to do with advertising or the information Facebook is going to make available to advertisers.
Rather, the site wants people ``to be able to share information with as many or as few people as they choose.''
The changes come as Facebook tries to become a broadly used destination, competing not just with other social networks like Twitter and MySpace but also more established hubs like Google and Yahoo.
To do this, Facebook needs its 200 million-plus users to share content and interact with more people than their close friends and families. To make this more palatable, the site will let users assign different privacy settings to each piece of information they make available on Facebook. This includes photos, contact information and work info, as well as status updates, links and photos.
The site is also getting rid of its regional networks. Facebook said those separate zones have led to too much confusion over which information can be widely seen or kept relatively private. In the past, someone who joined a New York network, for example, could inadvertently make personal information available to everyone else in that network, including complete strangers.
Facebook will continue to have social networks related to schools and work.
Genetic variations linked to schizophrenia, bipolar disorder
London, July 2: Two groundbreaking pieces of research have for the first time shown that genetic variations in the human body can increase the risk of developing conditions like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
The findings are based on the analysis of DNA samples from tens of thousands of people across the globe, conducted by a team of international researchers, including scientists at Aberdeen and Edinburgh universities.
David St Clair, the professor of mental health at Aberdeen University, described the findings as a major step forward in piecing together the genetic jigsaw of schizophrenia, a severe mental disorder that affects one in 100 people.
He, however, agreed that the use of the findings to develop potential new treatments for schizophrenia was still many years in the future.
"There has been a lot of controversy as to whether genes are even involved in psychiatric disorders. Some people think it is all just due to circumstances in their lives," the Scotsman quoted Prof St Clair as saying.
"But this is a landmark discovery in that it has been established beyond any doubt now that there are genes, and probably a lot of them, involved in these severe psychiatric disorders," he added.
According to the researcher, three common genetic variants can increase the risk of developing schizophrenia.
"These variants are present in a lot of the population, but not all of the people that have them go on to develop a mental illness," said Prof St Clair said.
"The individual variants on their own make us slightly more predisposed - between one and two per cent - to schizophrenia, but when combined with other genetic or environmental factors may substantially increase an individual's risk.
"Schizophrenia is one of the main causes of major mental illness. The drugs bill alone worldwide runs to $20 billion a year, not to mention the huge other costs such as hospital stays, lost employment opportunities and diminished quality of life.
"Our findings are a real scientific breakthrough since they tell us a lot more about the nature of the genetic risk of schizophrenia than we knew as little as a year ago," he added.
He continued: "However, this is not a breakthrough that is going to change clinical practice any time soon. It will still be many years before our findings can be translated into new drug treatments. Much more work is also still required for us to piece together the overall genetic architecture of schizophrenia."
Douglas Blackwood, the professor of psychiatric genetics at Edinburgh University, said: "The new discoveries of genes clearly take us forward in our understanding of what causes schizophrenia."
Blackwood added: "However, the project owes its success to the massive support received from a very large number of patients and their families who took part in the studies in several countries. We all now hope that these large-scale genetic studies will be the source of vital new clues about the nature of schizophrenia, opening up new possibilities for treating and defining the illness."
A research article on these findings has been published in the journal Nature. (ANI
