Eating licorice in pregnancy may affect a child's IQ and behavior

Expectant mothers who eat excessive quantities of licorice during pregnancy could adversely affect their child's intelligence and behavior, a study has shown. more  

A simple way for middle aged and older adults to assess how stiff their arteries are: reach for their toes

How far you can reach beyond your toes from a sitting position – normally used to define the flexibility of a person’s body – may be an indicator of how stiff your arteries are. more

Ethnic background may be associated with diabetes risk

Fat and muscle mass, as potentially determined by a person's ethnic background, may contribute to diabetes risk, according to a new study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM). more  

Future diabetes treatment may use resveratrol to target the brain

Resveratrol, a molecule found in red grapes, has been shown to improve diabetes when delivered orally to rodents. Until now, however, little has been known about how these beneficial changes are mediated in the body. A new study accepted for publication in Endocrinology, a journal of The Endocrine Society, shows that the brain plays a key role in mediating resveratrol's anti-diabetic actions, potentially paving the way for future orally-delivered diabetes medications that target the brain. more

Diabetes drug metformin shows promise as a breast cancer treatment  

Low doses of the commonly used diabetes drug metformin may be an effective treatment for breast cancer, primarily because the drug appears to target breast cancer stem cells, Harvard Medical School researchers reported online September 14 in Cancer Research. Cancer stem cells, also called tumor-initiating cells, are thought to be relatively rare cells that can give rise to new tumors and are resistant to standard cancer treatments. more

Hormone therapy linked to risk of death from lung cancer  

Women who use combination hormone therapy to treat menopausal symptoms may be at an increased risk of dying from lung cancer. An analysis of data from the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) study has found that, although the use of estrogen-plus-progestin therapy did not increase lung cancer incidence, it did increase the number of deaths from the disease, primarily from non-small cell lung cancer. The results appeared online September 18 in The Lancet. more

Recently discovered virus linked to aggressive prostate tumors

A previously unknown virus was discovered in tumors from men with prostate cancer in 2006, but at the time it was not clear whether the virus played a role in the disease. That question remains unanswered, but a new report shows that the virus, called xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV), is present in malignant prostate cells and is more commonly found in men with aggressive tumors. more

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