Friday, March 1, 2013

'Gigantic jet' lightning over China reaches 55 miles high

'Gigantic jet' lightning isn't well understood, but could balance out the electrical charge of thunderstorms. One of the biggest ever observed was documented over China, scientists reported this week.

By Elizabeth Howell,?Our Amazing Planet / February 26, 2013

A 'gigantic jet' captured above a storm in North Carolina in 2009. One of the biggest of these 'gigantic jet' lightning bursts was recorded over China in 2010, scientists report this week.

Steven Cummer / LiveScience.com

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A rare glimpse of a "gigantic jet" ? a huge and mysterious burst of lightning that connects a thunderstorm with the upper atmosphere ? was made over China in 2010 and was recently described by scientists.

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The gigantic jet took place in eastern China on Aug. 12, 2010 ? the farthest a ground-based one has ever been observed from the equator, according to the research team.

Previous jets were mainly seen in tropical or subtropical regions, but this one took place around 35 degrees latitude, about the same as the southern part of Tennessee in the United States.

"This is the first report from mainland China," lead researcher Jing Yang, an atmospheric scientist with the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, told OurAmazingPlanet. The results were recently published in the Chinese Science Bulletin.

Researchers got a good look at the storm using a variety of tools, including Doppler radar data and weather pictures in the infrared band of radiation.

The gigantic jet peaked at about 55 miles (89 kilometers) above the ground, far above the cloudtops that were measured with Doppler radar at an altitude of 11 miles (17 km).?

Yang added that her team had possibly seen another gigantic jet in the same area during a different thunderstorm, but said they needed to recheck the data to confirm.

"It's not as clear as this one if it is a gigantic jet or not," she said.

It wasn't until the last century that electrical activity above thunderclouds was scientifically proven, although rumors based on undocumented observations circulated long before that time.

These electrical discharges can take several forms, such as sprites (orange-red flashes) and blue jets, which appear as blue cones.

The first confirmed gigantic jet was reported in 2001, after American researchers saw a blue jet reaching 44 miles (70 km) above the clouds at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. This was nearly double the 26-mile (42 km) limit for jets that was previously observed.

Two years later, researchers described shapes such as "tree jets" and "carrot jets" that they spotted during a 2002 thunderstorm over the South China Sea near the Philippines.

While scientists are still trying to understand how these gigantic jets work, they believe the jets balance out the electrical charge during thunderstorms by discharging the ionosphere ? a part of the upper atmosphere filled with charged particles.

Follow Elizabeth Howell @howellspace, or OurAmazingPlanet on Twitter @OAPlanet. We're also on Facebook?and Google+.

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Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/mDv51QQcEUA/Gigantic-jet-lightning-over-China-reaches-55-miles-high

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This encouraging result comes from a new theoretical study of Earth-like planets orbiting white dwarf stars. Researchers found that we could detect oxygen in the atmosphere of a white dwarf's planet much more easily than for an Earth-like planet orbiting a Sun-like star.Mon, 25 Feb 2013 13:16:16 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225131618.htmMoments of spirituality can induce liberal attitudes, researchers findhttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225131532.htm People become more politically liberal immediately after practising a spiritual exercise such as meditation, researchers have found.Mon, 25 Feb 2013 13:15:15 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225131532.htmNew maps depict potential worldwide coral bleaching by 2056http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225122045.htm New maps by scientists show how rising sea temperatures are likely to affect all coral reefs in the form of annual coral bleaching events under different emission scenarios. If carbon emissions stay on the current path most of the world's coral reefs (74 percent) are projected to experience coral bleaching conditions annually by 2045, results of the study show.Mon, 25 Feb 2013 12:20:20 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225122045.htmUltrasound reveals autism risk at birth, study findshttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225112510.htm Low-birth-weight babies with a particular brain abnormality are at greater risk for autism, according to a new study that could provide doctors a signpost for early detection of the still poorly understood disorder.Mon, 25 Feb 2013 11:25:25 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225112510.htmMarch of the pathogens: Parasite metabolism can foretell disease ranges under climate changehttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225112508.htm Researchers developed a model that can help determine the future range of nearly any disease-causing parasite under climate change, even if little is known about the organism. Their method calculates how the projected temperature change for an area would alter the creature's metabolism and life cycle.Mon, 25 Feb 2013 11:25:25 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225112508.htmMouse mothers induce parenting behaviors in fathers with ultra-sonic noiseshttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225102141.htm Researchers have demonstrated the existence of communicative signalling from female mice that induces male parental behavior.Mon, 25 Feb 2013 10:21:21 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225102141.htm'NanoVelcro' device to grab single cancer cells from blood: Improvement enables 'liquid biopsies' for metastatic melanomahttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225092252.htm Researchers have refined a method they previously developed for capturing and analyzing cancer cells that break away from patients' tumors and circulate in the blood. With the improvements to their device, which uses a Velcro-like nanoscale technology, they can now detect and isolate single cancer cells from patient blood samples for analysis.Mon, 25 Feb 2013 09:22:22 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130225092252.htmScientists develop a whole new way of harvesting energy from the sunhttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130224142917.htm A new method of harvesting the sun's energy is emerging. Though still in its infancy, the research promises to convert sunlight into energy using a process based on metals that are more robust than many of the semiconductors used in conventional methods.Sun, 24 Feb 2013 14:29:29 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130224142917.htmQuantum algorithm breakthrough: Performs a true calculation for the first timehttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130224142829.htm Scientists have demonstrated a quantum algorithm that performs a true calculation for the first time. Quantum algorithms could one day enable the design of new materials, pharmaceuticals or clean energy devices.Sun, 24 Feb 2013 14:28:28 ESThttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130224142829.htm

Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/rss/top_news/top_science.xml

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Fermi's motion produces a study in spirograph

Feb. 27, 2013 ? NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope orbits our planet every 95 minutes, building up increasingly deeper views of the universe with every circuit. Its wide-eyed Large Area Telescope (LAT) sweeps across the entire sky every three hours, capturing the highest-energy form of light -- gamma rays -- from sources across the universe. These range from supermassive black holes billions of light-years away to intriguing objects in our own galaxy, such as X-ray binaries, supernova remnants and pulsars.

Now a Fermi scientist has transformed LAT data of a famous pulsar into a mesmerizing movie that visually encapsulates the spacecraft's complex motion.

Pulsars are neutron stars, the crushed cores of massive suns that destroyed themselves when they ran out of fuel, collapsed and exploded. The blast simultaneously shattered the star and compressed its core into a body as small as a city yet more massive than the sun. The result is an object of incredible density, where a spoonful of matter weighs as much as a mountain on Earth. Equally incredible is a pulsar's rapid spin, with typical rotation periods ranging from once every few seconds up to hundreds of times a second. Fermi sees gamma rays from more than a hundred pulsars scattered across the sky.

One pulsar shines especially bright for Fermi. Called Vela, it spins 11 times a second and is the brightest persistent source of gamma rays the LAT sees. Although gamma-ray bursts and flares from distant black holes occasionally outshine the pulsar, they don't have Vela's staying power. Because pulsars emit beams of energy, scientists often compare them to lighthouses, a connection that in a broader sense works especially well for Vela, which is both a brilliant beacon and a familiar landmark in the gamma-ray sky.

Most telescopes focus on a very small region of the sky, but the LAT is a wide-field instrument that can detect gamma rays across a large portion of the sky at once. The LAT is, however, much more sensitive to gamma rays near the center of its field of view than at the edges. Scientists can use observations of a bright source like Vela to track how this sensitivity varies across the instrument's field of view.

With this in mind, LAT team member Eric Charles, a physicist at the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology and the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford University in California, used the famous pulsar to produce a novel movie. He tracked both Vela's position relative to the center of the LAT's field of view and the instrument's exposure of the pulsar during the first 51 months of Fermi's mission, from Aug. 4, 2008, to Nov. 15, 2012.

The movie renders Vela's position in a fisheye perspective, where the middle of the pattern corresponds to the central and most sensitive portion of the LAT's field of view. The edge of the pattern is 90 degrees away from the center and well beyond what scientists regard as the effective limit of the LAT's vision.

The pulsar traces out a loopy, hypnotic pattern reminiscent of art produced by the colored pens and spinning gears of a Spirograph, a children's toy that produces geometric patterns.

The pattern created in the Vela movie reflects numerous motions of the spacecraft. The first is Fermi's 95-minute orbit around Earth, but there's another, subtler motion related to it. The orbit itself also rotates, a phenomenon called precession. Similar to the wobble of an unsteady top, Fermi's orbital plane makes a slow circuit around Earth every 54 days.

In order to capture the entire sky every two orbits, scientists deliberately nod the LAT in a repeating pattern from one orbit to the next. It first looks north on one orbit, south on the next, and then north again. Every few weeks, the LAT deviates from this pattern to concentrate on particularly interesting targets, such as eruptions on the sun, brief but brilliant gamma-ray bursts associated with the birth of stellar-mass black holes, and outbursts from supermassive black holes in distant galaxies.

The Vela movie captures one other Fermi motion. The spacecraft rolls to keep the sun from shining on and warming up the LAT's radiators, which regulate its temperature by bleeding excess heat into space.

The braided loops and convoluted curves drawn by Vela hint at the complexity of removing these effects from the torrent of data Fermi returns, but that's a challenge LAT scientists long ago proved they could meet. Still going strong after more than four years on the job, Fermi continues its mission to map the high-energy sky, which is now something everyone can envision as a celestial Spriograph traced by a pulsar pen.

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/space_time/nasa/~3/Kd6-_fYbEqw/130227183532.htm

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John Kerry busts out his French-speaking skills


Secretary of State John Kerry busted out a bit of the language of Moli?re and G?rard Depardieu on Wednesday as he met in Paris with his French counterpart, Laurent Fabius. How?d he do?

Pas mal du tout, Monsieur Kerry. Not bad at all.

The Democratic former senator from Massachusetts learned French while attending a boarding school in Switzerland starting when he was 11. And he spent many childhood summers in the Atlantic coast region of Brittany with French relatives.

Those days are long gone ? but while Kerry seemed a bit rusty, his opening remarks at a joint press conference with the French foreign minister sounded pretty solid to this native speaker (he starts at 4:51 in the video above, and a transcript is at the bottom of this post). And he poured on the charm to please his audience.

?We?ve just finished one of those wonderful French lunches that have never ceased drawing Americans to Paris for centuries,? he said, seemingly reading from notes or prepared remarks. And he also joked about anti-French sentiment in the United States. ?And now I?ll speak in English because otherwise they won?t let me return home.?

Kerry?s gesture thrilled the French, who appreciate it when visiting dignitaries make an effort to speak their hosts? language. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius celebrated Franco-American cooperation on a range of foreign policy struggles like the bloodbath in Syria and Iran?s nuclear program -- and hailed Kerry as ?someone who is known to be a friend of France? (?quelqu?un qui est connu pour ?tre un ami de la France.?)

It was just a couple of weeks ago that the newly minted secretary of state, meeting with Canadian Foreign Minister John Baird, had declined a reporter?s request for ?a little bit of French, please, maybe?? (?un peu de Fran?ais s?il vous plait, peut-etre?? she asked).

?Not today ? I?ve got to refresh myself on that,? Kerry said, drawing chuckles from his audience.

The French question is a vexing one for Kerry. During the 2004 presidential campaign, The New York Times raised eyebrows by granting anonymity to a ?Bush adviser? who wanted to snipe from behind cover that the Democratic candidate ?looks French.? That cheap shot, apparently code for ?elitist,? caught fire in the media, stoked by perennial anti-French sentiment and still-fresh frustration that the government in Paris opposed the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. It was the era of renaming ?French fries? as ?Freedom Fries? in the congressional cafeteria (the French consider fries Belgian) and calling the ?French kiss? something more acceptable to American audiences, ?The Patriot Act.? (OK, that last one was, ahem, tongue-in-cheek.)

Times have changed. Somewhat. Throughout the 2012 campaign, Mitt Romney unhesitatingly spoke French to people he met on the trail (and he took crap for it. Even from Democrats.). Romney, who learned French when he lived in France as a Mormon missionary, does really well on his feet, has good sentence structure, and, likey Kerry, his mild accent doesn?t make him hard to understand.

Does any of this matter? Peut-?tre/Maybe. Diplomacy is often a language of symbolism and nuances, after all.

And an old story, handed down to by foreign language professors, may illustrate another usefulness.

The story goes that, in the early computer era, the CIA spent a fortune on a device that could translate intercepted messages. The chairman of the congressional committee that funded the project, on a tour, was invited to submit a phrase that would be translated from English, into French, then into German, then into Russian, then into Chinese, and back into English. The lawmaker thought a moment, then suggested ?out of sight, out of mind.?

The machine clacked and whirred and spat out a strip of paper. On it was the result: ?Invisible. Insane.?

Kerry's remarks in French:

"Merci beaucoup, Monsieur le Ministre. Vraiment, c?est chaleureux, et je vous remercie beaucoup pour votre accueil aujourd?hui. C?est un tr?s grand plaisir pour moi d??tre en companie du ministre des affaires ?trang?res, Fabius. Nous venons de conclure un de ces merveilleux d?jeuners fran?ais qui n?ont cess? d?attirer les Am?ricains ? Paris depuis des si?cles. Bien entendu, c?est un privil?ge de pouvoir partager tout repas avec Laurent. Il est un ami de confiance, un alli? fid?le et un partenaire appr?ci?, et je veux ? je le remercie pour tout ?a. La France, comme vous savez, est vraiment ? c?est le plus ancien des alli?s des Etats-Unis. On vous remercie pour ?a aussi. Et maintenant je parle en anglais parce qu?autrement on me laisse pas rentrer chez moi."

Translation:

"Thank you very much, Mister Minister. Really, that was [a] warm [welcome], and I thank you very much for your welcome today. It?s a great pleasure for me to be here with the minister of foreign affairs, Fabius. We just finished one of those wonderful French lunches that have never ceased drawing Americans to Paris for centuries. Of course, it?s a privilege to share any meal with Laurent. He is a trusted friend, a faithful ally, and a valued partner. and I want to thank him for all of that. France, as you know, is really - it's the oldest ally of the United States, so we would like to thank you for that, too. And now I'll speak in English, because otherwise they won?t let me return home.?

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/john-kerry-french-pas-mauvais-not-bad-190702655--politics.html

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Ready For Change? Use These Personal Development Tips! - Ziki

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Source: http://www.ziki.com/en/atbeglongbi+1326074/post/ready-for-change-use-these-personal-development-tips+14686966

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Penn State Upsets Michigan 84-78: No. 4 Wolverines Fall To Nittany Lions

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. -- Penn State coach Patrick Chambers kept saying all winter that his team was close to winning a Big Ten game even as the league losses piled up.

Momentum finally bounced the Nittany Lions' way on Wednesday night against one of their toughest foes of the season.

Jermaine Marshall scored 25 points and hit a key layup with 1:06 left to help Penn State roar back from a 15-point deficit and upset No. 4 Michigan 84-78 for its first Big Ten victory in more than a year.

No wonder fans rushed the court in delight after the final buzzer.

"I was looking around. I wanted to see our team," Chambers said about the frenzy inside the Jordan Center. "I wanted to embrace it and be in that moment, because those moments don't come very often."

Penn State (9-18, 1-14) had lost 18 straight regular-season Big Ten games dating to last season. The team's previous conference win came on Feb. 16, 2012, a 69-64 victory over Iowa.

It was Penn State's first win over a top 5 team since defeating No. 5 North Carolina 82-74 in the second round of the 2001 NCAA tournament, and the highest-ranked opponent that the Nittany Lions have beaten since moving to the Jordan Center in 1996.

Even Michigan coach John Beilein was impressed.

"I think what you saw tonight is why we all love college basketball," he said.

But this loss might hurt Michigan as it jockeys for seeding in the NCAA tournament. The Wolverines squandered a chance to pull into a second-place tie in the Big Ten with Michigan State and Wisconsin.

Tim Hardaway Jr. scored 19 points for the Wolverines (23-5, 10-5). Trey Burke had 18 points and six assists, but also committed six turnovers.

Michigan was uncharacteristically sloppy with 15 turnovers in the game, six more than its season average.

Penn State pounced on the mistakes.

D.J. Newbill added 17 points for the Nittany Lions, who hit a season-high 10 3-pointers. Marshall scored 19 in the second half, including four 3s that whipped the hometown fans into a frenzy. But it was his twisting drive to the bucket late left that really hurt Michigan.

The ball teetered on the rim for a couple of seconds before dropping in, causing the Penn State partisans to let out a collective sigh of relief with their team up 81-78.

"It was a chip play that we run. ... Coach put the ball in my hand and he had trust in me," Marshall said. "Fortuantely that layup rode around the rim and went down."

That was not the kind of luck that the Nittany Lions have been used to, ever since leading scorer and point guard Tim Frazier went down with a left Achilles injury four games into the season.

They had to adjust on the fly, with combo guard Newbill sliding over to the point, and Marshall needing to assume more ball-handling duties. Chambers, a never-say-die cheerleader, convinced his team to keep fighting through the adversity.

"Tonight, it's a relief. All the hard work, practices and shootarounds paid off for us," Newbill said.

Michigan's Glenn Robinson III misfired on a 3 with 17 seconds left. Sasa Borovnjak (nine points) had a memorable Senior Night, hitting two foul shots with 15 seconds left to seal the win.

Ross Travis provided the muscle up front with 15 points and 12 boards as Penn State made the clutch plays down the stretch.

"They beat us fair and square, and the last 10 minutes they really outplayed us," Beilein said.

Two foul shots by Marshall gave Penn State its first lead since the first half, 76-74, with 3:55 left. The Jordan Center rocked as if it were a Michigan-Penn State football game across the street at Beaver Stadium.

It was all Penn State from there.

Chambers watched as Michigan fumbled away opportunities, like when Burke had a steal from Newbill but lost control.

"The ball finally bounced our way," Chambers said. "Trey Burke strips D.J. at halfcourt and kicks it out of bounds ... that's usually what we do."

Midway through the second half, Michigan controlled the lane with dunks and cuts to the bucket. Long-range shooting gave the Wolverines breathing room after Nik Stauskus (12 points, eight rebounds) and Hardaway hit 3s on back-to-back possessions to help build the short-lived 15-point lead after Penn State had drawn within 49-45.

The first half was a sign of things to come. After struggling from long range much of the year, Penn State went 5 of 10 from behind the arc and forced 10 turnovers to stay within 39-36 at halftime.

All five of Michigan's losses have come on the road in the Big Ten ? none worse than Wednesday night's defeat. Michigan finished February with a 3-4 record, heading into a showdown Sunday with No. 9 Michigan State.

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/27/penn-state-michigan-upset-wolverines_n_2777924.html

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UCLA study could explain why some people get zits and others don't

UCLA study could explain why some people get zits and others don't [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 28-Feb-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Elaine Schmidt
eschmidt@mednet.ucla.edu
310-794-2272
University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences

2 strains of acne bacteria linked to pimples, another to healthy skin

The bacteria that cause acne live on everyone's skin, yet one in five people is lucky enough to develop only an occasional pimple over a lifetime. What's their secret?

In a boon for teenagers everywhere, a UCLA study conducted with researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute has discovered that acne bacteria contain "bad" strains associated with pimples and "good" strains that may protect the skin.

The findings, published in the Feb. 28 edition of the Journal of Investigative Dermatology, could lead to a myriad of new therapies to prevent and treat the disfiguring skin disorder.

"We learned that not all acne bacteria trigger pimples one strain may help keep skin healthy," said principal investigator Huiying Li, an assistant professor of molecular and medical pharmacology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. "We hope to apply our findings to develop new strategies that stop blemishes before they start, and enable dermatologists to customize treatment to each patient's unique cocktail of skin bacteria."

The scientists looked at a tiny microbe with a big name: Propionibacterium acnes, bacteria that thrive in the oily depths of our pores. When the bacteria aggravate the immune system, they cause the swollen, red bumps associated with acne.

Using over-the-counter pore-cleansing strips, LA BioMed and UCLA researchers lifted P. acnes bacteria from the noses of 49 pimply and 52 clear-skinned volunteers. After extracting the microbial DNA from the strips, Li's laboratory tracked a genetic marker to identify the bacterial strains in each volunteer's pores and recorded whether the person suffered from acne.

Next, Li's lab cultured the bacteria from the strips to isolate more than 1,000 strains. Washington University scientists sequenced the genomes of 66 of the P. acnes strains, enabling UCLA co-first author Shuta Tomida to zero in on genes unique to each strain.

"We were interested to learn that the bacterial strains looked very different when taken from diseased skin, compared to healthy skin," said co-author Dr. Noah Craft, a dermatologist and director of the Center for Immunotherapeutics Research at LA BioMed at HarborUCLA Medical Center. "Two unique strains of P. acnes appeared in one out of five volunteers with acne but rarely occurred in clear-skinned people."

The biggest discovery was still to come.

"We were extremely excited to uncover a third strain of P. acnes that's common in healthy skin yet rarely found when acne is present," said Li, who is also a member of UCLA's Crump Institute for Molecular Imaging. "We suspect that this strain contains a natural defense mechanism that enables it to recognize attackers and destroy them before they infect the bacterial cell."

Offering new hope to acne sufferers, the researchers believe that increasing the body's friendly strain of P. acnes through the use of a simple cream or lotion may help calm spotty complexions.

"This P. acnes strain may protect the skin, much like yogurt's live bacteria help defend the gut from harmful bugs," Li said. "Our next step will be to investigate whether a probiotic cream can block bad bacteria from invading the skin and prevent pimples before they start."

Additional studies will focus on exploring new drugs that kill bad strains of P. acnes while preserving the good ones; the use of viruses to kill acne-related bacteria; and a simple skin test to predict whether a person will develop aggressive acne in the future.

"Our research underscores the importance of strain-level analysis of the world of human microbes to define the role of bacteria in health and disease," said George Weinstock, associate director of the Genome Institute and professor of genetics at Washington University in St. Louis. "This type of analysis has a much higher resolution than prior studies that relied on bacterial cultures or only made distinctions between bacterial species."

Acne affects 80 percent of Americans at some point in their lives, yet scientists know little about what causes the disorder and have made limited progress in developing new strategies for treating it. Dermatologists' arsenal of anti-acne tools benzoyl peroxide, antibiotics and Accutane (isotretinoin) hasn't expanded in decades. Most severe cases of acne don't respond to antibiotics, and Accutane can produce serious side effects.

###

The research was supported by a grant (UH2AR057503) from the National Institutes of Health's Human Microbiome Project through the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.

Co-authors include co-first author Sorel Fitz-Gibbon, Bor-Han Chiu, Lin Nguyen, Christine Du, Dr. Minghsun Liu, David Elashoff, Dr. Jenny Kim, Anya Loncaric, Dr. Robert Modlin and Jeff F. Miller of UCLA; Erica Sodergren of Washington University; and Dr. Marie Erfe of LA BioMed.

UCLA: Elaine Schmidt, eschmidt@mednet.ucla.edu
310-794-2272

Washington University: Caroline Arbanas, arbanasc@wustl.edu
314-286-0109

LA BioMed: Laura Mecoy, lmecoy@labiomed.org
310-546-5860


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

?


AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


UCLA study could explain why some people get zits and others don't [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 28-Feb-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Elaine Schmidt
eschmidt@mednet.ucla.edu
310-794-2272
University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences

2 strains of acne bacteria linked to pimples, another to healthy skin

The bacteria that cause acne live on everyone's skin, yet one in five people is lucky enough to develop only an occasional pimple over a lifetime. What's their secret?

In a boon for teenagers everywhere, a UCLA study conducted with researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute has discovered that acne bacteria contain "bad" strains associated with pimples and "good" strains that may protect the skin.

The findings, published in the Feb. 28 edition of the Journal of Investigative Dermatology, could lead to a myriad of new therapies to prevent and treat the disfiguring skin disorder.

"We learned that not all acne bacteria trigger pimples one strain may help keep skin healthy," said principal investigator Huiying Li, an assistant professor of molecular and medical pharmacology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. "We hope to apply our findings to develop new strategies that stop blemishes before they start, and enable dermatologists to customize treatment to each patient's unique cocktail of skin bacteria."

The scientists looked at a tiny microbe with a big name: Propionibacterium acnes, bacteria that thrive in the oily depths of our pores. When the bacteria aggravate the immune system, they cause the swollen, red bumps associated with acne.

Using over-the-counter pore-cleansing strips, LA BioMed and UCLA researchers lifted P. acnes bacteria from the noses of 49 pimply and 52 clear-skinned volunteers. After extracting the microbial DNA from the strips, Li's laboratory tracked a genetic marker to identify the bacterial strains in each volunteer's pores and recorded whether the person suffered from acne.

Next, Li's lab cultured the bacteria from the strips to isolate more than 1,000 strains. Washington University scientists sequenced the genomes of 66 of the P. acnes strains, enabling UCLA co-first author Shuta Tomida to zero in on genes unique to each strain.

"We were interested to learn that the bacterial strains looked very different when taken from diseased skin, compared to healthy skin," said co-author Dr. Noah Craft, a dermatologist and director of the Center for Immunotherapeutics Research at LA BioMed at HarborUCLA Medical Center. "Two unique strains of P. acnes appeared in one out of five volunteers with acne but rarely occurred in clear-skinned people."

The biggest discovery was still to come.

"We were extremely excited to uncover a third strain of P. acnes that's common in healthy skin yet rarely found when acne is present," said Li, who is also a member of UCLA's Crump Institute for Molecular Imaging. "We suspect that this strain contains a natural defense mechanism that enables it to recognize attackers and destroy them before they infect the bacterial cell."

Offering new hope to acne sufferers, the researchers believe that increasing the body's friendly strain of P. acnes through the use of a simple cream or lotion may help calm spotty complexions.

"This P. acnes strain may protect the skin, much like yogurt's live bacteria help defend the gut from harmful bugs," Li said. "Our next step will be to investigate whether a probiotic cream can block bad bacteria from invading the skin and prevent pimples before they start."

Additional studies will focus on exploring new drugs that kill bad strains of P. acnes while preserving the good ones; the use of viruses to kill acne-related bacteria; and a simple skin test to predict whether a person will develop aggressive acne in the future.

"Our research underscores the importance of strain-level analysis of the world of human microbes to define the role of bacteria in health and disease," said George Weinstock, associate director of the Genome Institute and professor of genetics at Washington University in St. Louis. "This type of analysis has a much higher resolution than prior studies that relied on bacterial cultures or only made distinctions between bacterial species."

Acne affects 80 percent of Americans at some point in their lives, yet scientists know little about what causes the disorder and have made limited progress in developing new strategies for treating it. Dermatologists' arsenal of anti-acne tools benzoyl peroxide, antibiotics and Accutane (isotretinoin) hasn't expanded in decades. Most severe cases of acne don't respond to antibiotics, and Accutane can produce serious side effects.

###

The research was supported by a grant (UH2AR057503) from the National Institutes of Health's Human Microbiome Project through the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.

Co-authors include co-first author Sorel Fitz-Gibbon, Bor-Han Chiu, Lin Nguyen, Christine Du, Dr. Minghsun Liu, David Elashoff, Dr. Jenny Kim, Anya Loncaric, Dr. Robert Modlin and Jeff F. Miller of UCLA; Erica Sodergren of Washington University; and Dr. Marie Erfe of LA BioMed.

UCLA: Elaine Schmidt, eschmidt@mednet.ucla.edu
310-794-2272

Washington University: Caroline Arbanas, arbanasc@wustl.edu
314-286-0109

LA BioMed: Laura Mecoy, lmecoy@labiomed.org
310-546-5860


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

?


AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-02/uoc--usc022113.php

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