The study found that patients with at least five CTCs detected straight after surgery have a four-fold increase in the risk of recurrence and a three-fold increase in risk of death.

German researchers from nine university hospitals conducted the study which confirmed that CTCs carry important information about survival rates. Additionally, the researchers have postulated that the CTCs could be a target for treatment, with new technology opening up the possibility of more in depth studies in this area.

Identifying the number of CTCs was previously very difficult, with most experiments lacking the technological resources to carry out such an experiment. But recent advances mean that it is possible to find them using a semi-automated detection device, which eradicates the reliance on bone marrow samples.

Dr Bernadette Jäger, a scientist on the study said: “Looking for CTCs in blood samples is much less invasive than taking bone marrow.

“Although there is no direct advantage to the patient knowing her CTC status, this is already a step forward, and in the future we believe that the presence of CTCs could be used as a marker for monitoring the efficacy of treatment.”

By combining the method with routine blood collection, it also means that the condition can be monitored throughout the disease. The researchers have already started to follow up on their results by  evaluating CTC counts of patients straight after chemotherapy and at two and five year intervals.

As well as tracking the CTC counts they will also be looking into adding a secondary drug called lapatinib to standard treatment in patients with HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer and HER2-positive CTCs.

Dr Jäger added: “HER2 status can change as the disease advances.

“If there is no relapsed tumour in the primary cancer site it is difficult to perform a new histopathological examination. Being able to detect this change in CTCs would be much less invasive than having to take a biopsy of a metastasis which is often anatomically inaccessible.”

Researchers at A*STAR’s Institute of Medical Biology (IMB), in collaboration with doctors and scientists in Jordan, Turkey, Switzerland and USA, identified the genetic cause of the birth defect, which is a rare genetic disorder known for causing abnormal facial features and defects in the heart, bone, blood and reproductive cells.

Until now, the exact cause of the disease was unknown, but the collaborative research effort was able to uncover that the genetic mistake is a mutation in a single gene called IRX5. This is the first time such a mutation has ever been discovered in man, which makes the findings quite groundbreaking in the field.

IRX5 is a gene that is present not only in humans but also in mice, fish, frogs, flies and even worms. Carine Bonnard, a final-year PhD student at IMB and the first author of the paper, said: “Because Hamamy syndrome causes a wide range of symptoms, not just in newborn babies but also in the adult, this implies that IRX5 is critical for development in the womb as well as for the function of many organs in our adult body.”

She continued to explain that finding a causative gene for people with this condition will be a catalyst for research efforts in the future, with other conditions attached to the Irx gene family also open for exploration, such as bone homeostasis, or gamete formation for instance.

Dr Bruno Reversade, senior principal investigator at IMB said: “We believe that this discovery could open up new therapeutic solutions to common diseases like osteoporosis, heart disease, anaemia which affect millions of people worldwide.

“The findings also provide a framework for understanding fascinating evolutionary questions, such as why humans of different ethnicities have distinct facial features and how these are embedded in our genome.”

Henry Ford Hospital researchers made the discovery by taking data from 328 sepsis patients with no previous history of protein in the urine. They found the urine dipstick test predicted the presence of renal failure in 55 per cent of these patients, which is the first time the method has been used to test for renal failure in sepsis patients.

Results of the study were presented  at the National Kidney Foundation’s annual meeting in Washington, US, and Javier Neyra, M.D., a third-year resident at Henry Ford and the study’s lead author said that the main benefits of the test are that it is widely available and inexpensive.

He added: “The dipstick test excess protein, or proteinria, resulted in fewer false positives and a greater threshold for detecting more severe renal failure compared to other biomarkers. Ultimately, he says, the test may provide timely and early diagnosis of renal failure before substantial damage has already been done.”

The math problem dates back to Sanskrit scrolls, but has only just been exposed by nanotechnology researchers. According to the ancient text we have been missing a version of the famous "packing problem," and its new guise could have big implications on the medical industry as well as computer science and construction industries.

The mathematical equation is called the ‘filing problem’, and it seeks out the best way of filling an object with a particular shape. Contrary to the traditional ‘packing problem’, the discs can overlap. It also differs from the ‘covering problem’, in that the disks can't extend beyond the triangle's boundaries.

Sharon Glotzer, U-M professor of chemical engineering said: "Besides introducing the problem, we also provided a solution in two dimensions.” This is what makes it applicable to treating tumours using fewer shots with radiation beams or speeding up the manufacturing of silicon chips for microprocessors.

Carolyn Phillips explains that the key to finding a solution in any dimension is to find the shape’s skeleton. Ms Phillips is a postdoctoral fellow at Argonne National Laboratory, and said:"Every shape you want to fill has a backbone that goes through the centre of the shape, like a spine.”

The researchers have had their paper published in Physical Review Letters, where they report the rules for how to find the ideal size and spacing of the discs that fill a shape.  They hope that this research will help them create an algorithm that can take the desired shape and the number of discs, or the shape and percentage of the area to be filled, and spit out the best pattern to fill it.

The algorithm is likely to be most suited to nanotechnology, but in biology and medicine, researchers often need models for complex shapes, such as those of proteins.

Miss Phillips said:"You don't want to model every single one of the thousands of atoms that make up this protein.
“You want a minimal model that gives the shape, allowing the proteins to interact in a lock-and-key way, as they do in nature."

The so-called 'stem cell shielding' could protect the body from the damaging effects of chemotherapy. In what Cancer Research UK have called "a completely new approach", the treatment can reduce the susceptibility of bone marrow to the effects of chemo.

Chemotherapy treatment has been said to have several major barriers to healthy and effective use. For instance, the treatment can prompt fewer white blood cells to be produced, which in turn increases the risk of infection, and fewer red blood cells, which leads to shortness of breath and tiredness.

Researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, in Seattle, said these side effects can often result in chemo no longer being used on patients. The researchers therefore conducted experiments to protect bone marrow in three patients with glioblastoma.

Dr Jennifer Adair, one of the researchers involved said: "This therapy is analogous to firing at both tumour cells and bone marrow cells, but giving the bone marrow cells protective shields while the tumour cells are unshielded."

They conducted the experiment by removing bone marrow and isolating the stem cells from the patients. They then infected the cells with a virus that contained a gene which protects the cells against a chemotherapy drug. The cells were then put back into the patient.

Lead author of the report, Prof Hans-Peter Kiem, said: "We found that patients were able to tolerate the chemotherapy better, and without negative side effects, after transplantation of the gene-modified stem cells than patients in previous studies who received the same type of chemotherapy without a transplant of gene-modified stem cells."

The three patients tested in the study were said to have lived around a year longer, with one patient still alive 34 months after treatment.

This hypothesis is becoming of increasing interest to scientists who believe preventing communication signals could be the key to stopping the disease growing. Most recently, scientists from St George’s University of London found that these communication signals might contain pieces of RNA, or snippets of genetic information that instruct cells to form.

Their discovery raises the possibility that treatments could be developed that interfere with these signals. The scientists have postulated that they could use chemotherapy to intercept the instructions and modify their message, which would prevent cancer cells from growing.

Previously, it was thought that the development of new blood vessels (angiogenesis) is sparked by cytokines. However, the latest research suggests that this is not entirely accurate, speculating that tumours may also send out little packets of RNA which, like cytokines, instruct blood vessels to form and feed the tumour.

Dr Wai Liu, lead researcher of the paper published in British Journal of Cancer, said: “This study tells us a bit more about how cancer forms and provides a further avenue to explore.

“Although these are early findings and more research is needed, they add to the growing interest in training the body’s own immune system to fight cancer and will hopefully help to for the foundation for future medications that exploit this.”

In terms of medications, the team also looked into the effects of two frequently prescribed cancer drugs on angiogenesis in human lung cells. They cultivating RNA messages sent by untreated cancer cells, as well as those messages sent by cancer cells treated with either cyclophosphamide or oxaliplatin.

The results showed that in lung cells treated with oxaliplatin, the RNA and cytokine messages produced by the tumours were no longer capable of influencing vessels to grow. On the other hand, those treated with cyclophosphamide were still able to instruct vessels to feed the tumour via these chemical messages.

Over 200 cases of measles have been reported in the region, according to the Health Protection Agency. They recently announced that there are 210 confirmed cases, of which 39 needed hospital treatment.

The illness seems to be mostly affecting children, with 50 per cent of the cases reported being infants under the age of five. There is now a large call for people to immunise as soon as possible, as measles is very infectious and can spread rapidly amongst children and adults who are not protected with the MMR vaccine.

Dr Roberto Vivancos, a Health Protection Agency consultant, said: "It's obvious from these statistics that people who are not fully vaccinated are not just at risk themselves, but they pose an infection risk to others, such as defenceless babies and toddlers who are too young to be vaccinated.

"It should not be treated lightly, but it is an avoidable illness and we strongly advise parents to ensure that their children are vaccinated."

If eating is motivated by pleasure, rather than hunger, researchers found that endogenous rewarding chemical signals are activated which can lead to overeating. This could ultimately affect BMI and be a factor in the continuing rise of obesity.

The research was conducted by researchers at the University of Naples SUN in Italy, and has been published in The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM).

Palmiero Monteleone, lead author of the study, said: "'Hedonic hunger' refers to the desire to eat for pleasure, and to enjoy the taste, rather than to restore the body's energy needs.

"For example, desiring and eating a piece of cake even after a satiating meal is consumption driven by pleasure and not by energy deprivation. The physiological process underlying hedonic eating is not fully understood, but it is likely that endogenous substances regulating reward mechanisms like the hormone ghrelin and chemical compounds such as 2-arachidonoylglycerol (2-AG) are involved."

In reaching their conclusion, the researchers assessed eight satiated healthy adults aged 21 years. They fed them on their personal favourite food first, followed by a less palatable food of equal caloric and nutrient value.

By measuring 2-AG and ghrelin levels, they found an increase in their levels during hedonic eating, with their favourite foods, but not with non-hedonic eating. This indicates that an activation of the chemical reward system could override the body's signal that enough has been eaten to restore energy.

Mr Monteleone concluded: "Understanding the physiological mechanisms underlying this eating behaviour may shed some light on the obesity epidemic. Further research should confirm and extend our results to patients with obesity or with other eating disorders in order to better understand the phenomenon of hedonic eating."

Gloves are no longer considered as laboratory commodity products and are now thought of as tools used to perform the science safely and effectively. There are three primary considerations one should observe when selecting the right laboratory gloves, starting with health and safety.

It is important that the lab gloves being used should meet various health and safety legislation. Before purchasing, check they are certified in accordance with the EU Directive 89/686/EEC, as a PPE Category III product. Much of this research should be done with the research in mind. Consider the level of risk personnel may be exposed to, and according to this select a glove with the appropriate level of certification and performance with respect to test standards relevant to the risk.

Other health and safety aspects include chemical splash hazards and microorganism hazards. Both of these can cause damage to the glove in use and as a consequence cause damage to the skin. There are standard signs in the industry that specify which glove is appropriate for these experiments, such as published EN374-3:2003 test data for chemical hazards and test standard EN374-2:2003 for microorganism hazards.

The second consideration for selecting the right glove is the application specific requirements. Different applications require different protection and functionality, and these considerations go beyond simply considering health and safety requirements.

Contamination is an important consideration, with latex gloves typically associated with protein contamination for example. Functionality is the next requirement, such as the physical attributes of the glove that allow it to be used to perform procedures safely and effectively, such as dexterity and tactile sensitivity, grip, comfort and tear resistance. 

Finally, there are personal considerations. Every person is different and this translates to how we perform in the lab. Choosing a glove that suits you is one of the most important aspects, because if you don’t feel comfortable in your work, your performance is likely to be impacted.

The results are based on data collected in the Copenhagen City Heart study presented at the EuroPRevent2012 meeting, which finds that between one and two-and-a-half hours of jogging per week at a slow to average pace delivers optimum benefits for longevity.

Peter Schnohr, chief cardiologist of the Copenhagen City Heart Study, said: "The results of our research allow us to definitively answer the question of whether jogging is good for your health.

"We can say with certainty that regular jogging increases longevity. The good news is that you don't actually need to do that much to reap the benefits."

The Copenhagen City Heart study started in 1976 and is a prospective cardiovascular population study of around 20,000 men and women aged between 20 to 93 years. The researchers set out with a remit of increasing knowledge about prevention of cardiovascular disease and stroke.