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Mandated increases in the production of maize-derived ethanol will lead to land-use changes that boost carbon dioxide emissions enough to make the fuel a worse environmental option than burning gasoline, according to an analysis published in the March issue of BioScience. The new analysis refines the conclusion of a controversial estimate that was published by Timothy Searchinger and colleagues in 2008.

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) afflicts a large number of younger minority adults receiving medical care in settings that serve the uninsured and under-insured (settings collectively known as the health care safety net). Poor, minority adults with moderate to severe CKD are also two to four times more likely to progress to kidney failure than non-Hispanic whites. These are the findings from a study published online in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.

This week our activists, Junichi and Toru, spent two very long and intense days in court, defending the honourable actions they took to expose the corruption within Japan's whaling industry. As the prosecution fumbled its desperate attempt to cast the 'Tokyo Two' as criminals, it became obvious that whaling really is on trial in Aomori.

Today, T2 co-defendants Junichi and Toru finished their testimony to the Aomori District Court. When questioned, they demonstrated their commitment to openness and transparency - a commitment the whaling company Kyodo Senpaku, the prosecution, and the Fisheries Agency of Japan do not share. Step by step, the T2 outlined the process of uncovering the whale meat embezzlement scandal. During their investigation, which took place in 2008, informants' statements were confirmed, shipments tracked, on-the-street interviews were conducted with underground whale meat vendors, and crew lists and shipment records were cross-checked. All of this meticulous leg work led to a box, the physical confirmation of embezzlement. The contents were unesu, or "whale bacon," which confirmed an open-secret of embezzlement taking place on the Nisshin Maru ship. Junichi explained the roles on the investigation team. He described sending a box through courier to help track the shipments. Toru recalled fact-checking on tips from informants. You can read about this in the evidence from Greenpeace. This afternoon, in an emotional moment, Toru recounted the events surrounding his arrest. In numbers: 75 police officers were sent to arrest the T2. Eight men searched Toru's home. He spent 26 days in custody - 23 without charges and under interrogation without lawyers. He lost six kilos in the first four days of a nine-day hunger strike in protest of the disregard by police of the Greenpeace explanation of the investigation. Toru was told by one policeman that it usually takes only two officers to arrest a person for something like taking a box. The police's reaction during the T2 arrest versus their reaction to the embezzlement evidence was disproportionate, to say the least. When asked why he didn't take the box to the police, he told the court that from his experience in the motorcycle trading business that police would not move on a tip - especially one that involved government and DIET (parliament) members, or even so-called "research whaling." It would be necessary to mobilize media and public pressure to secure a proper investigation. One officer told Toru that if it weren't for his occupation as a policeman, he would tell Toru he had done a great job. The prosecution didn't have much to say, and probably only spent 20 minutes in total cross-examination of the T2. Their questions didn't lead to much either, and the lead prosecutor once even posed the befuddling argument: Well, if crew members, Kyodo Senpaku, and the Fisheries Agency of Japan all know about it and it is not a secret then it cannot be embezzlement.I suppose the prosecutor must not consider very significant the idea that individuals are personally profiting off of a taxpayer sponsored "research program," or that this meat is not recorded in the Kyodo Senpaku Company record. Read the Press Release from Monday's court proceedings, and a recount of whistle blower testimony with nearly 30 years working for Kyodo Senpaku, whaling company.This phase of the trial is over tomorrow, but the next phase is in May, so there is still time to sign the whale trial pledge!

Aided by ultrasound guidance, treating tumors with extreme heat or moderate heat may provide a possible therapeutic option, according to early research presented at the second AACR Dead Sea International Conference on Advances in Cancer Research.

Breast cancer continues to rise in Iraq, and scientists have established the Iraqi National Cancer Research Program to better understand the underlying molecular and environmental causes in an effort to curb the incidence of cancer.

Scientists may have uncovered a mechanism for resistance to paclitaxel in ovarian cancer, microRNA-31, suggesting a possible therapeutic target for overcoming chemotherapy resistance.

Seaweed extract may eventually emerge as a lymphoma treatment, according to laboratory research presented at the second AACR Dead Sea International Conference on Advances in Cancer Research.

Only half of all patients at high risk of heart disease are given correct targets for lowering their cholesterol levels according to a study of 25,250 patients published on Thursday March 11 in the European Heart Journal. The study investigated how primary care doctors assessed their patients' risk factors and other health problems when deciding on cholesterol-lowering targets, and although the research focused on German doctors and their patients, the authors believe that it reflects a similar picture in the rest of Europe.

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.

An independent panel convened this week by the National Institutes of Health confronted a troubling fact that pregnant women currently have limited access to clinicians and facilities able and willing to offer a trial of labor after previous cesarean delivery because of so-called VBAC bans. The panel affirmed that a trial of labor is a reasonable option for many women with a prior cesarean delivery. But many women are not offered this option.

A thyroid-hormone-like substance that works specifically on the liver reduces blood cholesterol with no serious side effects. This according to a clinical trial conducted by researchers from the Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet, amongst other centers, published today in the top-ranking scientific periodical the New England Journal of Medicine.

The Board of Directors of the American Association of Anatomists (AAA) has approved a set of guidelines to govern programs accepting the donation of bodies for education and biomedical research. The guidelines cover the minimum requirements that should be met by any Willed Body Program.

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.

Researchers at the University of Utah and other institutions have sequenced for the first time the entire genome of a family, enabling them to accurately estimate the average rate at which parents pass genetic mutations to their offspring and also identify precise locations where parental chromosomes exchange information that creates new combinations of genetic traits in their children.

People whose "bad" cholesterol and risk of future heart disease stay too high despite cholesterol-lowering statin therapy can safely lower it by adding a drug that mimics the action of thyroid hormone.

Complete Genomics Inc., a third-generation human genome sequencing company, today announced that the Institute for Systems Biology employed Complete Genomics' human genome sequencing service to sequence a family quartet to determine the depth of genetic information possible in analyzing a full family's sequence, and to verify the gene responsible for Miller syndrome, a rare craniofacial disorder. Results from this collaboration were published online today in Science Express.

A Perspective piece in the New England Journal of Medicine calls for change in the way researchers and pharmaceutical companies collect and report adverse symptom information in clinical trials submitted to the Food and Drug Administration, and how the FDA represents this information on drug labels.

It's time to re-think how patients are selected for cardiac catheterization, say doctors at Duke University Medical Center, after reporting in a new study that the invasive procedure found no significant coronary artery disease in nearly 60 percent of chest pain patients with no prior heart disease.

Baylor College of Medicine's Dr. James Lupski came to the end of a personal quest earlier this year when the Baylor Human Genome Sequencing Center sequenced his complete genome and identified the gene involved in his own form of Charcot-Marie-Tooth syndrome, which affects the function of nerves in the body's limbs, hands and feet. At the same time, the finding opened a new door showing that genome information has clinical importance.