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Study links milk-producing protein to aggressive breast cancer

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HONG KONG (Reuters) – The discovery that a protein which triggers milk production in women may also be responsible for making breast cancers aggressive could open up new opportunities for treatment of the most common and deadliest form of cancer among women.


Found in all breast cells, the protein ELF5 tries to activate milk production even in breast cancer cells, which does not work and then makes the cancer more aggressive, according to scientists in Australia and Britain.






“The discovery opens up new avenues for therapy and for designing new markers that can predict response to therapy,” said lead author Professor Chris Ormandy from the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney.


In 2008, Ormandy‘s work linked ELF5 to milk production.


The latest research by Ormandy and his team, published in the journal PLOS Biology on Friday, went a step further to find the link between ELF5 and breast cancer.


“Cancer cells can’t respond properly (to ELF5), so they … acquire some characteristics … that make the disease more aggressive and more refractory (resistant) to treatment with existing therapies,” Ormandy said by telephone.


Ormandy and his team grew human breast cancer tissues, genetically manipulated to contain high amounts of ELF5, in petri dishes and saw how the protein proliferated aggressively.


FINDINGS MAY HELP TARGETED THERAPY


Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer and the top cause of cancer death among women, accounting for 23 percent of total cancer cases and 14 percent of cancer deaths in women.


To decide on treatment, doctors normally need to find out if the cancer has receptors for the hormones estrogen and progesterone, which, in the case of breast cancer patients, promote growth in their tumors.


Two-thirds of breast cancers are usually positive for estrogen receptors, which then require anti-hormonal therapies that lower estrogen levels in the patient or block estrogen from supporting the growth of the cancer.


For the remaining one-third of patients, their cancers do not have receptors, which means they won’t benefit from hormonal therapies. Such patients are usually given other treatments, such as chemotherapy.


Ormandy’s team found that cancers with these receptors had low levels of ELF5, while those without receptors had significantly higher levels of the protein.


“What we have shown in this paper is high ELF5 tumors are dependent on ELF5 for their proliferation and if we block ELF5 in high ELF5 tumors, we will block proliferation and that will treat the tumor,” Ormandy said.


“If we can develop a drug that targets ELF5, it will be very useful for that group of women,” he said.


(Reporting by Tan Ee Lyn; Editing by Paul Tait)


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In Bangladesh, the Garment Factories Keep Burning

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On Nov. 24, a fire broke out in the Tazreen Fashions plant outside Dhaka, Bangladesh. It was the worst industrial accident in Bangladesh’s history, resulting in 111 deaths and provoking widespread calls for improved safety measures in the country’s garment industry.


In the four weeks since the Tazreen fire, 17 additional conflagrations have broken out in Bangladeshi textile and garment factories, based on reports in the local press that were compiled by the Dhaka office of Solidarity Center, an organization affiliated with the AFL-CIO. In one case, a worker died as panic-stricken employees jammed a stairwell to escape their workplace. A separate case involved no fire, but workers rushed out of a factory after an electric short circuit made a loud noise.






Abdus Salam Murshedy, president of the Exporters Association of Bangladesh and a member of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers & Exporters Association, says the fires were triggered by short circuits, faulty wiring, or sudden power surges. “Some workers got injured when they started running out of their factories in a panic. We are trying to boost confidence among the workers so they don’t panic in case of a fire.”


Murshedy is coordinating an effort to improve safety standards in garment factories in the industrial belt of Ashulia, on the outskirts of Dhaka. “We won’t be able to do our business any more without improving compliance standards,” he says.  The government of Bangladesh did not respond to requests for comment.


If the Tazreen fire effectively pushes the government and the factory owners to make Bangladesh’s garment factories safe—much as the Triangle Shirtwaist fire did in the U.S. a century ago—“It would be a sea change that we’ve been looking for for a long time,” says Celeste Drake, trade policy specialist for the AFL-CIO. The use of child labor in Bangladesh has diminished considerably, thanks in part to outside pressure, she says, noting it may take action by the U.S. government to convince Bangladeshis to change further. In particular, she says, “the president has the power to remove tariff benefits from a country,” which would make U.S.-bound exports from Bangladesh more expensive.


For Cathy Feingold, director of the AFL-CIO’s international department, and Scott Nova, executive director of the Worker Rights Consortium, big U.S. and European retailers and apparel companies must be persuaded to press Bangladesh to do more. “The brands need to take responsibility for their supply chains,” says Feingold. Nova says he figures it would cost the big brand companies less than 10¢ per garment to ensure safe factories in Bangladesh. Instead, “as long as the companies press for low prices from their suppliers, the government of Bangladesh cannot be active in improving safety,” he says. With subcontractors in Bangladesh operating on razor-thin margins, they face an incentive to cut corners.


The best motivation for Bangladeshis to improve worker safety may come not from corporations or the West, however, but from neighboring Burma. As that country emerges as a potential center for textile and apparel manufacturing, Burmese trade unions are viewing Bangladesh as a case study in how an emerging-market economy should not handle issues of safety and workers’ rights, says Tim Ryan, Asia department director for Solidarity Center. “They look at Bangladesh and say, ‘we don’t want to go down that route,” he says, suggesting that a prospering, worker-friendly state on its border might add to pressure for Bangladesh to improve workplace safety and overall conditions for its own garment workers.



Devnath a special correspondent for Bloomberg News in Dhaka.


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10 Things to Do on Dec. 26

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Christmas has ended and New Year’s Eve is still a few days away. What’s a person to do during this holiday lull?


1. Complain About Your Christmas Gifts






[More from Mashable: ‘We Are Young’ Performed on Vintage Computer Parts]




2. Use Your New Label Maker


Image courtesy of Imgur


3. Find Weird Crap Around Your Parents’ House





4. Attempt to Learn How a Kindle Works





5. Recreate Old Family Photos


Image courtesy of Reddit, 31Max


Image courtesy of Imgur, ConnorUllmann


6. Try to Figure Out What Boxing Day Is






Educate yourself.


7. Put Away the Christmas Throw-Up


Image courtesy of Reddit, xbaahx


8. Return the Stuff You Don’t Want


Image courtesy of Imgur


9. Reuse the Christmas Tree Tinsel and Other Holiday Decorations


Image via Borntobenervous.com


Image courtesy of Flickr, stuartpilbrow


10. Take a Nap


1. Sluggish Pug


Image courtesy of Flickr, chriswaits


Click here to view this gallery.


Thumbnail image courtesy of Flickr, formatc1


This story originally published on Mashable here.


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SPOILER ALERT: Twist awaits US fans of ‘Downton’

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NEW YORK (AP) — British fans of “Downton Abbey” are feeling blue after Tuesday’s conclusion of Season 3, even as the U.S. audience eagerly anticipates this third cycle on PBS’ “Masterpiece” beginning Jan. 6.


(ANY “ABBEY” DEVOTEES WHO PREFER NOT TO LEARN WHAT AWAITS THEM ARE URGED TO STOP READING RIGHT NOW.)






___


One of the stars of this wildly popular British costume drama is leaving the series after its third season. Dan Stevens had opted not to continue beyond his initial commitment, the British network ITV confirmed Wednesday.


His character, Matthew Crawley, has been written out with what ITV called an “untimely and tragic death” in the season finale. That episode will air in the U.S. in February.


Michelle Dockery will be returning in Season 4 as Matthew’s soon-to-be widow, Lady Mary.


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S.Africa’s Mandela ‘not yet fully recovered’: spokesman

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JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – Former South African President Nelson Mandela is doing well after being discharged from hospital, although he is still not fully recovered, a government spokesman said on Thursday.


“He is not yet fully recovered, but he has sufficiently moved forward so that he can be discharged,” Mac Maharaj told local broadcaster eNCA.






“He is sufficiently well to be home.”


The 94-year-old anti-apartheid leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate was discharged from the hospital on Wednesday, ending a nearly three-week stay during which he was treated for a lung infection and had surgery to remove gallstones.


Mandela, who has been in frail health for several years, is now receiving care at his suburban Johannesburg home.


Mandela has a history of lung problems dating back to when he contracted tuberculosis while in jail as a political prisoner. He spent 27 years in prison, including 18 years on the windswept Robben Island off Cape Town.


The former president was admitted to a Pretoria hospital on December 8 and this was his longest stay in a hospital since he was released from prison in 1990.


Current President Jacob Zuma visited Mandela on Christmas Day and said the former South African leader was doing much better, making progress and in good spirits.


Mandela was also admitted to a hospital in February because of abdominal pain but released the following day after a keyhole examination showed there was nothing seriously wrong with him.


He has spent most of his time since then in another home in Qunu, his ancestral village in the impoverished Eastern Cape province.


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Brent holds near $111 on US fiscal uncertainty; Japan supports

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SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Brent crude held near $ 111 per barrel on Thursday as jittery investors stayed on the sidelines with a deadline to avert a U.S. fiscal crisis approaching, while hopes the new Japanese government’s policies will spur demand supported prices.


U.S. President Barack Obama and Republican lawmakers resumed talks on Wednesday over the so-called fiscal cliff – tax hikes and spending cuts slated to take effect next week that could push the economy back into recession.






“There is no easy way to resolve the U.S. fiscal cliff, but there should be a compromise at some point and that’s what the market is looking for,” said Tetsu Emori, a commodity fund manager at Astmax in Tokyo.


Front-month Brent futures slipped 16 cents to $ 110.91 per barrel at 0501 GMT, giving up some of the previous session’s 2 percent gain.


Brent may face some resistance between $ 112 and $ 113 before falling towards $ 102.7 over the next three months, according to Wang Tao, Reuters market analyst for commodities and energy technicals.


U.S. crude dropped from a nine-week high reached on Wednesday, shedding 6 cents to $ 90.92.


Oil futures rose in early Asian trade, taking a cue from Japanese stocks, which were at an 18-month high after the country’s new prime minister said beating deflation in the world’s No. 3 oil consumer and taming a strong yen were his top priorities.


“There are hopes that the aggressive fiscal policies will help Japan get out of deflation and, as it is an importer of commodities, that’s a positive for oil markets,” Emori said.


The government will pursue bold monetary policy, flexible fiscal policy and a growth strategy to encourage private investment, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Wednesday .


CLIFFHANGER


The White House and Republicans are still far apart, as hopes for legislation to prevent the U.S. economy from tumbling off the fiscal cliff switch to the Senate.


Democrats control a majority in that chamber but still need some support from Republicans across the aisle for a likely attempt to raise taxes on the wealthy.


Obama will try to revive budget crisis talks – which stalled last week – when he returns to Washington on Thursday after cutting short his Christmas holiday in Hawaii.


“While markets have vacillated between optimism and pessimism over the prospects for a compromise, we expect a deal only at the last minute, with lots of decisions delayed into the New Year and austerity of roughly 2 percent of GDP,” Bank of America-Merril Lynch analysts said in their weekly report.


Worries about supplies from the Middle East rose once more after security forces in the United Arab Emirates arrested a cell of UAE and Saudi Arabian citizens which they said was planning to carry out militant attacks in both countries and other states.


The region holds some of the world’s largest oil fields and as a result any unrest in the area triggers supply concerns.


Oil futures may rise in the first quarter of 2013 with the global economy showing early signs of a pick-up, and on expectations that the fiscal crisis will be resolved.


Encouraging economic data from China, aggressive action by the European Central Bank to help its economies, and quantitative easing by the U.S. Federal Reserve together brighten the outlook for oil in the near-term.


U.S. crude could rise to $ 100 per barrel and Brent may test $ 120 by the end of March, said Emori.


Also supporting prices are expectations that U.S. crude stockpiles may have decreased last week as refiners kept inventory low for year-end tax purposes.


Crude stocks may have dropped by 1.9 million barrels in the week ended Dec 21, a Reuters poll showed on Wednesday.


Inventory data from the American Petroleum Institute will be released on Thursday, while numbers from the Energy Information Administration will be out on Friday, a day later than usual, because of the Christmas holiday.


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Afghan bomber attacks near major US base

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KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A vehicle driven by a suicide bomber exploded at the gate of a major U.S. military base in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, killing the attacker and three Afghans, Afghan police said. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.


Police Gen. Abdul Qayum Baqizai said a local guard who questioned the vehicle driver at the gate of Camp Chapman was killed along with two civilians and the assailant. The camp is located adjacent to the airport of the capital of Khost province, which borders Pakistan. Chapman and nearby Camp Salerno had been frequently targeted by militants in the past, but violent incidents have decreased considerably in recent months.






Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in an email that the bomber targeted Afghan police manning the gate and Afghans working for the Americans entering the base. He claimed high casualties were inflicted.


NATO operates with more than 100,000 troops in the country, including some 66,000 American forces. It is handing most combat operations over to the Afghans in preparation for a pullout from Afghanistan in 2014. Militant groups, including the Taliban, rarely face NATO troops head-on and rely mainly on roadside bombs and suicide attacks.


NATO forces and foreign civilians have also been increasingly attacked by rogue Afghan military and police, eroding trust between the allies.


On Tuesday, the Interior Ministry said a policewoman who killed an American contractor in Kabul a day earlier was a native Iranian who came to Afghanistan and displayed “unstable behavior” but had no known links to militants.


The policewoman, identified as Sgt. Nargas, shot 49-year-old Joseph Griffin, of Mansfield, Georgia, on Monday, in the first such shooting by a woman in the spate of insider attacks. Nargas walked into a heavily-guarded compound in the heart of Kabul, confronted Griffin and shot him once with her pistol.


The U.S-based security firm DynCorp International said on its website that Griffin was a U.S. military veteran who earlier worked with law enforcement agencies in the United States. In Kabul, he was under contract to the NATO military command to advise the Afghan police force.


The ministry spokesman, Sediq Sediqi, told a news conference that Nargas, who uses one name like many in the country, was born in Tehran, where she married an Afghan. She moved to the country 10 years ago, after her husband obtained fake documents enabling her to live and work there.


A mother of four in her early 30s, she joined the police five years ago, held various positions and had a clean record, he said. Sediqi produced an Iranian passport that he said was found at her home.


No militant group has claimed responsibility for the killing.


The chief investigator of the case, Police Gen. Mohammad Zahir, said that during interrogation, the policewoman said she had plans to kill either the Kabul governor, city police chief or Zahir himself, but when she realized that penetrating the last security cordons to reach them would be too difficult, she saw “a foreigner” and turned her weapon on him.


There have been 60 insider attacks this year against foreign military and civilian personnel, compared to 21 in 2011. This surge presents another looming security issue as NATO prepares to pull out almost all of its forces by 2014, putting the war against the Taliban and other militant groups largely in the hands of the Afghans.


More than 50 Afghan members of the government’s security forces also have died this year in attacks by their own colleagues. The Taliban claims such incidents reflect a growing popular opposition to the foreign military presence and the Kabul government.


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Huawei shows off 6.1-inch Android phablet ahead of CES [video]

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Title Post: Huawei shows off 6.1-inch Android phablet ahead of CES [video]
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Britain’s royal family attends Christmas services

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LONDON (AP) — Britain‘s royal family is attending Christmas Day church services — with a few notable absences.


Wearing a turquoise coat and matching hat, Queen Elizabeth II arrived at St. Mary Magdelene Church on her sprawling Sandringham estate in Norfolk. She was accompanied in a Bentley by granddaughters Beatrice and Eugenie.






Her husband, Prince Philip, walked from the house to the church with other members of the royal family.


Three familiar faces were missing from the family outing. Prince William is spending the holiday with his pregnant wife Kate and his in-laws in the southern England village of Bucklebury. Prince Harry is serving with British troops in Afghanistan.


Later Tuesday, the queen will deliver her traditional, pre-recorded Christmas message, which for the first time will be broadcast in 3D.


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Early Childhood Obesity Rates Might Be Slowing Nation-Wide

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About one in three children in the U.S. are now overweight, and since the 1980s the number of children who are obese has more than tripled. But a new study of 26.7 million young children from low-income families shows that in this group of kids, the tidal wave of obesity might finally be receding.Being obese as a child not only increases the risk of early-life health problems, such as joint problems, pre-diabetes and social stigmatization, but it also dramatically increases the likelihood of being obese later in life, which can lead to chronic diseases, including cancer, type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Children as young as 2 years of age can be obese–and even extremely obese. Early childhood obesity rates, which bring higher health care costs throughout a kid’s life, have been especially high among lower-income families.”This is the first national study to show that the prevalence of obesity and extreme obesity among young U.S. children may have begun to decline,” the researchers noted in a brief report published online December 25 in JAMA, The Journal of the American Medical Association. (Reports earlier this year suggested that childhood obesity rates were dropping in several U.S. cities.)The study examined rates of obesity (body mass index calculated by age and gender to be in the 95th percentile or higher–for example, a BMI above 20 for a 2-year-old male–compared with reference growth charts) and extreme obesity (BMI of more than 120 percent above that of the 95th percentile of the reference populations) in children ages 2 to 4 in 30 states and the District of Columbia. The researchers, led by Liping Pan, of the Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity and Obesity at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, combed through 12 years of data (1998 to 2010) from the Pediatric Nutritional Surveillance System, which includes information on roughly half of all children on the U.S. who are eligible for federal health care and nutrition assistance.A subtle but important shift in early childhood obesity rates in this low-income population seems to have begun in 2003. Obesity rates increased from 13.05 percent in 1998 to 15.21 percent in 2003. Soon, however, obesity rates began decreasing, reaching 14.94 percent by 2010. Extreme obesity followed a similar pattern, increasing from 1.75 percent to 2.22 percent from 1998 to 2003, but declining to 2.07 percent by 2010.Although these changes might seem small, the number of children involved makes for huge health implications. For example, each drop of just one tenth of a percentage point represents some 26,700 children in the study population alone who are no longer obese or extremely obese. And if these trends are occurring in the rest of the population, the long-term health and cost implications are massive.Public health agencies and the Obama Administration have made battling childhood obesity a priority, although these findings suggest that early childhood obesity rates, at least, were already beginning to decline nearly a decade ago. Some popular prevention strategies include encouraging healthier eating (by reducing intake of highly processed and high-sugar foods and increasing fruit and vegetable consumption) and increased physical activity (both at school and at home).The newly revealed trends “indicate modest recent progress of obesity prevention among young children,” the authors noted. “These finding may have important health implications because of the lifelong health risks of obesity and extreme obesity in early childhood.”


Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs.Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
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