The Institute for Systems Biology (ISB) has analyzed the first whole genome sequences of a human family of four. The findings of a project funded through a partnership between ISB and the University of Luxembourg was published online today by Science on its Science Express website. It demonstrates the benefit of sequencing entire families, including lowering error rates, identifying rare genetic variants and identifying disease-linked genes.

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Patients who undergo gastric bypass surgery experience changes in their urine composition that increase their risk of developing kidney stones, research from UT Southwestern Medical Center investigators suggests.

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Parents of young boys may want to encourage moderation when it comes to their kids' video game habits. According to new findings in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, owning a video-game system may hamper academic development in some children.

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Computers should not play dice. That, to paraphrase Einstein, is the feeling of a University of Washington computer scientist with a simple manifesto: If you enter the same computer command, you should get back the same result. Unfortunately, that is far from the case with many of today's machines. Beneath their smooth exteriors, modern computers behave in wildly unpredictable ways, said Luis Ceze, a UW assistant professor of computer science and engineering.

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High school and college students who understand the geological age of the Earth (4.5 billion years) are much more likely to understand and accept human evolution, according to a University of Minnesota study published in the March issue of the journal Evolution.

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Distant galaxy clusters mysteriously stream at a million miles per hour along a path roughly centered on the southern constellations Centaurus and Hydra. A new study led by Alexander Kashlinsky at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., tracks this collective motion -- dubbed the "dark flow" -- to twice the distance originally reported.

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A study on the past extinction of large mammals in India by the Wildlife Conservation Society, Duke University, and other groups has found that country's protected area system and human cultural tolerance for some species are key to conserving the subcontinent's tigers, elephants, and other large mammals.

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Current drugs used to treat heart failure and arrhythmias (irregular heartbeat) have limited effectiveness and have side effects. New basic science findings from a University of Iowa study suggest a way that treatments could potentially be refined so that they work better and target only key heart-related mechanisms.

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The gift of "seeing ourselves as others see us" is particularly beneficial when we judge how we've made a first impression — in a job interview, during a sales pitch or on a first date.

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New research provides exciting insight into the molecular mechanisms associated with addiction and relapse. The study, published by Cell Press in the March 11 issue of the journal Neuron, uncovers a crucial mechanism that facilitates motivation for alcohol after extended abstinence and opens new avenues for potential therapeutic intervention.

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An analysis of more than 70,000 galaxies by University of California, Berkeley, University of Zurich and Princeton University physicists demonstrates that the universe – at least up to a distance of 3.5 billion light years from Earth – plays by the rules set out 95 years ago by Albert Einstein in his General Theory of Relativity.

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A puzzle that has baffled scientists for centuries – why some birds appear to be male on one side of the body and female on the other – has been solved by researchers.

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Hearing scientist Daniel Polley, Ph.D., an investigator at Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary's Eaton-Peabody Laboratories of Auditory Physiology, has gained new insight into why a relatively short-term hearing deprivation during childhood may lead to persistent hearing deficits, long after hearing is restored to normal. The research, featured on the cover on the March 11 issue of the journal Neuron, reveals that, much like the visual cortex, development of the auditory cortex is quite vulnerable if it does not receive appropriate stimulation at just the right time.

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Researchers from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands have succeeded in making a significant leap forward in the production of biochemicals and biofuels from waste wood. They discovered that the bacterium Cupriavidus basilensis breaks down harmful by-products which are produced when sugars are released from wood. They also managed to incorporate the degradation process in bacteria which are in common industrial use. This breakthrough does away with the need to resort to costly and environmentally unfriendly methods for removing by-products, thereby boosting the appeal of waste wood as a sustainable resource. The research results were published on 2 March in the US journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA (PNAS).

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A 10-year effort by a University of Rhode Island scientist to develop transgenic rainbow trout with enhanced muscle growth has yielded fish with what have been described as six-pack abs and muscular shoulders that could provide a boost to the commercial aquaculture industry.

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At age 55, men can expect another 15 years of sexual activity, but women that age should expect less than 11 years, according to a study by University of Chicago researchers published early online March 10 by the British Medical Journal. Men in good or excellent health at 55 can add 5 to 7 years to that number. Equally healthy women gain slightly less, 3 to 6 years.

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University of Minnesota researcher George Weiblen and colleagues have found a faster way to study the spread and diet of insect pests.

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Sonic hedgehog, a gene that plays a crucial rule in the positioning and growth of limbs, fingers and toes, has been confirmed in an unexpected place in the embryos of developing mice — the layer of cells that creates the skin.

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Immunizing children and adolescents with inactivated influenza vaccine resulted in reduced rates of influenza in their community compared to a similar community in which children did not receive the vaccine, suggesting that vaccinating children may help prevent transmission of the virus and offer protection for unimmunized community residents, according to a study in the March 10 issue of JAMA.

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Removal of the ovaries (bilateral oophorectomy) while performing a hysterectomy is common practice to prevent the subsequent development of ovarian cancer. This prophylactic procedure is performed in 55% of all U.S. women having a hysterectomy, or approximately 300,000 times each year. An article in the March/April issue of The Journal of Minimally Invasive Gynecology suggests that this procedure may do more harm than good.

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