‘Designer estrogen’ to protect the brain
US researchers have designed a form of estrogen that can protect the brain against degeneration without increasing a woman’s risk for breast or uterine cancer, according to a study released on Monday, reports AFP from Chicago.
The researchers suggest this “designer estrogen” could be used to treat brain deterioration in a variety of conditions including Alzheimer’s, multiple sclerosis, Lou Gehrig’s disease, spinal cord injury and even natural aging.
The experimental estrogen has only been tested on mice so far, but in those studies it halted the progress of the disease in mice infected with the animal version of the autoimmune disease MS. The animals also recovered their ability to walk again.
NY Arabic school faces protests
One of New York City’s newest public schools is named after a Lebanese poet who promoted peace and published his most famous work while living in the city, but there has been little peace for the Khalil Gibran International Academy, reports AP from New York.
The school announced in February as New York City’s first school to offer instruction in Arabic and on Arab culture already has had to move once and has its second principal, both because of protests. Critics have attacked the school as a potential radical Islam training ground. Supporters have been taken aback by the controversy.
“In fact it is a regular public school, the only difference is they’re going to use Arabic as a medium,” said Shamsi Ali, imam at the Islamic Cultural Center in Manhattan.
Sons of fat mothers could be less fertile
Beware, overweight mothers-to-be! A new research has revealed that sons born to obese women may be less fertile, reports PTI from London. The study carried out by a team of researchers from Aarhus University in Denmark has found that overweight women may have sons who are born with sperm of poorer quality.
“It’s possible that higher levels of the hormone estrogen, associated with being overweight, might harm the development of male foetus reproductive organs,” said one member of the researchers.
AIDS victims ‘buried alive’ by relatives
Some AIDS victims are being buried alive in Papua New Guinea by relatives who cannot look after them and fear of being infected themselves, a health worker said on Monday, AFP reports from Port Moresby. Margaret Marabe, who spent five months carrying out an AIDS awareness campaign in the remote Southern Highlands of the South Pacific nation, said she had seen five people buried while still breathing.
One was calling out “Mama, Mama” as the soil was shovelled over his head, said Marabe, who works for the NGO Igat Hope. A recent United Nations report said Papua New Guinea was facing an AIDS catastrophe, accounting for 90 per cent of HIV infections in the Oceania region