After a decade of painstaking research, federal and university scientists have reconstructed the 1918 influenza virus that killed 50 million people worldwide. Like the flu viruses now raising alarm bells in Asia, the 1918 virus was a bird flu that jumped directly to humans, the scientists reported. To shed light on how the virus evolved, the United States Department of Health and Human Services published the full genome of the 1918 influenza virus on the Internet in the GenBank database.

This is extremely foolish. The genome is essentially the design of a weapon of mass destruction. No responsible scientist would advocate publishing precise designs for an atomic bomb, and in two ways revealing the sequence for the flu virus is even more dangerous.

Consuming fish at least once a week was associated with a 10 percent per year slower rate of cognitive decline in elderly people, according to a new study posted online today from Archives of Neurology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. The study will be published in the December print edition of the journal.

Fish is a direct source of omega-3 fatty acids, which have been shown to be essential for neurocognitive development and normal brain functioning, according to background information in the article. Fish consumption has been associated with lower risk of dementia and stroke and recent studies have suggested that consumption of one omega-3 fatty acid in particular, docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), is important for memory performance in aged animals.

The Senate Thursday (2005-09-29) approved spending more than $3 billion on anti-viral medications, including one intended to fight avian flu.

It remained to be seen whether the House would also approve the funding. The measure approved by the Senate -- attached to a military funding bill -- authorizes spending $3.08 billion to increase federal stockpiles of anti-viral medications. The amendment calls for spending $125 million to increase domestic production of an avian flu vaccine, but does not specify how the money will be spent.

The Bush administration signed a contract in August with Sanofi-Pasteur to begin producing initial doses of a vaccine against H5N1, the virus causing avian flu.

Public health experts in the public and private sectors have warned about the danger of an avian flu pandemic. Humans have no natural immunity to the virus, so if it spreads, it could cause widespread illness and death.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta projects widespread human-to-human transmission could kill as many as 200,000 people in the United States.

Implicit-memory tests are stronger predictors than the common Mini Mental exam; Alzheimer's may hurt attention well before obvious memory loss.

Two recent studies may help clinicians and researchers better predict and understand dementia of the Alzheimer's type early in its history. Both studies appear in the September issue of Neuropsychology, which is published by the American Psychological Association (APA). Psychologists focus on early detection in part because current medications are useful only when given very early in the course of the disease.

In the first study, psychologists Pauline Spaan, PhD, and Jeroen Raaijmakers, PhD, from the University of Amsterdam in collaboration with neurologist Cees Jonker, MD, PhD, from the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam analyzed the data on 119 participants in the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam, a large, population-based study of older people. The researchers visited older people in their homes and gave them memory tests loaded on laptop computers. Two years later, they compared the test scores of people who went on to develop Alzheimer's with the scores of those who stayed healthy.

The researchers analyzed memory components that included episodic (what happened; what did you hear or read); semantic (vocabulary, facts); and implicit (learning without awareness of learning, "priming"). Three tests were very good at predicting who would develop Alzheimer's by two years later. Participants for whom "priming" information didn't aid memory or whose learning wasn't aided by semantic knowledge -- were significantly more likely to develop Alzheimer's.

Bodily Matters: The Anti-Vaccination Movement in England, 1853-1907 by Nadja Durbach

If, like me, you are young enough to have been immunised against diphtheria and polio in the mass public health campaigns of the postwar period, but old enough to have known victims of these childhood scourges, it may be hard to think of vaccination except within a narrative of progress. Almost paralysed with dread of the needles awaiting us, my sisters and I nonetheless understood ourselves to be lucky children, rescued by heroic doctors and a benevolent state from the implacable and unseen demons that had randomly crippled or killed so many of our parents' generation.

Today, this confident alliance of doctors, parents and public health officials is hard to find. Scary if unproven allegations of a link between infant vaccination and both bowel disorders and autism have helped fuel mass movements of parents critical of vaccination in both the US and UK. In Britain, uptake rates for the MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccine are falling, leaving scientists, doctors and public health officials scrambling to reassure parents not only of the safety of vaccines but, more challengingly, of their necessity in a Western world where �wild� cases of measles or rubella are now rare. The press, prone to approach medical matters either through the human interest story (�Did Leo Blair have the MMR?�) or as a �debate� between two equally plausible positions, has shown itself ill-suited to the task of reporting on scientific data, while on the web claims to expertise flourish unchecked. In cyberspace, organisations urging parents as rational human beings to inform themselves of the risks of vaccination before delivering up their children to the syringe jostle with harrowing pictures of infants struck down by vaccines and the delusional rantings of anti-semites and conspiracy theorists. (Check out www. christianparty. net, where Jonas Salk�s great work developing a polio vaccine is lambasted as a Jewish plot aimed at infecting �Christian children� with monkey-borne diseases.)

The main objectives of the project are (i) to develop versatile, inexpensive, and easy-to-use diagnostic tools for health, environmental and other applications based on the measurement of molecular interactions (ligand-receptor interactions) by integrated micro- and nano-cantilever sensors and (ii) to test the developed diagnostic tools in two specific health care applications, namely (1) the detection of tumour markers in clinical diagnosis and (2) the high-sensitivity detection of proteins, providing a verification of the project's achievements and initiating a generation of innovative products with significant market potential. The proposed project capitalizes on the mechanical properties of micro- and nano-mechanical structures (cantilevers) to measure molecular (ligand-receptor) interactions.

Vatican officials on Thursday decried what they called a "religion of health" in affluent societies and held out Roman Catholic Pope John Paul's stoic suffering as an antidote to the mentality that modern medicine must cure all.

"While millions of people in the world struggle to survive hunger and disease, lacking even minimal health care, in rich countries the concept of health as well-being figures in creating unrealistic expectations about the possibility of medicine to respond to all needs and desires," said Rev. Maurizio Faggioni, a theologian and morality expert on the Vatican's Pontifical Academy for Life.

Three years ago the federal government began passing out pills that may protect against some of the most dangerous effects of radiation. Fourteen states whose residents live near nuclear power plants haven't bothered to accept them.

Never mind that experts say the over-the-counter potassium iodide pills are the cheapest and easiest way to prevent radiation poisoning -- especially in children -- in case of a nuke accident. Last year, a report commissioned by Congress recommended that everyone under 40 near a nuclear power plant should have the pills on hand.

Despite the efforts of nuclear safety advocates and medical associations, the pills' existance remains fairly obscure. "You sit there scratching your head and say, 'Why aren't they giving it out?'" said Alan Morris, president of Anbex, the only potassium iodide pill manufacturer in the United States.

Dr. Keiji Fukuda is, by nature, composed. His voice is soft and measured. He rarely employs exclamations, never swears.

At 49, Fukuda, the top influenza epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, looks distinguished in a scruffy, academic way and reassuring. His face is unlined. His gray hair is close-cropped around his ears, making the top of his head rise like a pale dome above the timberline. He smiles often and gently. So when Keiji Fukuda admits to being as concerned as ''I have ever been,'' people who know him start really worrying.

In the past year, Fukuda has watched from his office in Atlanta as events overseas have seemed poised to spiral out of control. Between January and the end of October, 32 people have died from avian influenza in Vietnam and Thailand. Tens of millions of chickens have succumbed. Millions of others have been slaughtered. More nations have admitted to outbreaks among birds in more provinces than would have been conceivable even 18 months ago. All of this, Fukuda says, ''certainly increases the possibility'' of a much larger outbreak of avian flu among people.

Dr. Tim Uyeki, 45, one of the top epidemiologists who works with Fukuda at the C.D.C., is more excitable and blunt than his boss. ''You have the ingredients in Asia right now for a public health disaster,'' he says. Of long-term concern to him and Fukuda is that the region may be brewing a worldwide flu pandemic. ''It's a mess,'' Uyeki says. He is quiet. ''It would be nice,'' he continues, choosing his words with care, ''to be in the field, to be in Asia, to see firsthand what is going on.'' But he and the other C.D.C. scientists must be invited by other nations to help in disease investigations. Some countries prefer to do the work themselves. Others would like to keep the news of any outbreak off the world's radar screen, a difficult feat in the presence of a large international medical team.

Uyeki and Fukuda are 21st-century epidemiologists, and their job is not an easy one. They see themselves first and foremost as scientists. But in a globalized world where peripatetic germs hitch rides in the lungs or luggage of unwitting airline passengers, where sick chickens in Asia can threaten to topple third-world governments, where the role of politics and money can obscure the free flow of medical information, they cannot do their job -- preventing the spread of deadly flu viruses -- by being scientists only. They are medical monitors sitting at their desks, reading e-mail messages, Web sites, faxes and reports in order to track the varieties of flus in the United States and around the world. They are investigators who are prepared to jump on a plane to an outbreak site -- if invited -- and delicately interview the families of flu victims, trying to piece together how and why particular people fell ill and what the implications are for the rest of us. And less formally, they are diplomats, lobbyists, policy advocates, pressing for measures that governments would often prefer not to embrace.

Silicon Valley tycoons, Nobel laureates and Hollywood celebrities are backing a measure on California's Nov. 2 ballot to devote $3 billion to human embryonic stem cell experiments in what would be the biggest-ever state-supported scientific research program in the country.

The measure — designed to get around the Bush administration's restrictions on the funding of such research — would put California at the very forefront of the field. It would dwarf all current stem cell projects in the United States, whether privately or publicly financed.

Proposition 71 promises to be one of the most contentious election issues in California, pitting scientists, sympathetic patients who could benefit from stem cells and biotechnology interests against the Roman Catholic Church and conservatives opposed to the research because it involves destroying days-old embryos and cloning.

With the potential for targeted therapy, and therefore reduced side effects, nanomedicine holds the promise of significantly improving quality of life parameters. At the same time, the adoption of nanotechnology-based applications by large therapeutic and diagnostic companies is accelerating the development of nanomedicine.

The prospect of site-specific therapeutic action and by extension of fewer side effects means that nanomedical applications have an enhanced risk-benefit analysis ratio. This is motivating their growing popularity as a therapeutic option.

"Furthermore, with techniques for early diagnosis of diseases and, in some cases, their disposition, prophylactic (preventive) intervention could well become a reality with the advent of nanomedicine," notes Rajaram Sankaran, Analyst from Frost & Sullivan. "With such prophylactic interventions, it might be possible to postpone or even completely avoid diseases, in some instances."

Key to nanomedicine's rapid evolution has been the embrace of nanotechnology-based applications by pharmaceuticals, biopharmaceuticals and drug delivery companies. Prominent instances include the use of Elan Corporation's NanoCrystal technology by Wyeth and Merck and the deployment of Quantum Dot Corporation's Qdot(r) particles by Pfizer, GSK, Astra Zeneca and Genentech.

he moment the little boy was born, the hospital staff knew there was something unusual about him. His muscles looked nothing like the soft baby muscles of the other infants in the nursery. They were bulging and well defined, especially in his thighs and upper arms.

"Everybody noticed," said Dr. Markus Schuelke, a pediatric neurologist at Charité University Medical Center in Berlin.

The baby, it turned out in the first such documented case in a human, had a double dose of a genetic mutation that causes immense strength in mice and cattle. Drugs are under development that, investigators hope, will use the same principle to help people whose muscles are wasting from muscular dystrophy or other illnesses. Experts say the little boy, now 4½ and still very strong, offers human evidence for the theory behind such drugs.

The $3-billion measure puts California in the forefront of an ongoing national debate.

An initiative that would have state taxpayers underwrite $3 billion worth of research into using embryonic stem cells to develop cures for Alzheimer's and other debilitating diseases qualified for the Nov. 2 ballot Thursday, propelling California to the forefront of a national battle at the intersection of science and morality.

German scientists said Friday they had developed a "pioneering" method of extracting stem cells from the human body that could render obsolete the controversial practice of harvesting the cells from embryos.

Researchers at the Frauenhofer Institute and the University of Luebeck succeeded in extracting cells from human and rat glandular tissue that have similar properties to embryonic stem cells, the institute said in a statement. Researchers said they took cells from a 74-year-old person and a rat that were extremely stable, and easily multiplied them and conserved them by freezing.

A research team from Oregon Health & Science University and the Portland Veterans Affairs Medical Center is demonstrating some of the world's first clinical applications for nanometer-size particles in the brain.

The OHSU scientists have shown that an iron oxide nanoparticle as small as a virus can outline not only brain tumors under magnetic resonance imaging, but also other lesions in the brain that may otherwise have gone unnoticed, according to a study published in the journal Neuropathology and Applied Neurobiology.