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AtheroGenics, Inc. (NASDAQ: AGIX), a pharmaceutical cast focused on the treatment of confirmed inflammatory diseases, announced that The Lancet, a peer-reviewed medical diary, will publish an article entitled, “Effects of succinobucol (AGI-1067) after an acute coronary syndrome: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled bane,” in this week’s May 24, 2008 issue. The article describes the results from AtheroGenics’ 6,144-patient ARISE outcome trial of its unfamiliar diabetes tranquillizer candidate, AGI-1067.

“The ARISE trial has provided us with corroboration that succinobucol may be a promising new therapy, based on clinical endeavour in a number of prespecified diabetes and cardiovascular endpoints,” stated Dr. Jean-Claude Tardif, Co-Worthy Investigator of the ASCEND study, director of the Montreal Heart Institute Examine Centre and professor of medicine at the Montreal Heart Institute and the Université de Montréal. “Although ARISE missed its primary endpoint of reducing a composite of cardiovascular endpoints, we suppose the study data clearly indicate that succinobucol should be other investigated to confirm its ability to improve glucose control in patients with diabetes and to reduce cardiovascular events in patients with heart disease.”

Interested parties will be able to access this week’s edition of The Lancet by visiting their website at http://www.thelancet.com/. Once you access the website, click on “This Week’s Issue,” and then click on “articles.”

In AtheroGenics

AtheroGenics is focused on the discovery, development and commercialization of novel drugs notwithstanding the treatment of hardened frenzied diseases, including diabetes and coronary heart disease (atherosclerosis). The Company’s lead antioxidant and anti-inflammatory drug candidate, AGI-1067, is being studied in a Usher in III clinical fling known as ANDES (AGI-1067 as a Novel Anti-Diabetic Substitute Evaluation Study), for the treatment of diabetes. In joining, the Associates has other clinical and preclinical anti-inflammatory compounds, including AGI-1096, an oral agent for the control of organ transplant rejection. For more information about AtheroGenics, please visit http://www.atherogenics.com.

Disclosure Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

Statements contained in this impel release that relate to events or developments that we think or anticipate on take place in the prospective are deemed to be flippant-looking statements, and can be identified by words such as “believes,” “intends,” “expects” and equivalent expressions. AtheroGenics cautions investors not to place undue reliance on the send-looking statements contained in this release. These statements are subject to unchanging factors, risks and uncertainties that may provoke actual results, events and performances to differ materially from those referred to in such statements. Recompense example, additional message relating to the safeness, efficacy or tolerability of AGI-1067, may be discovered upon more distant analysis of hard times data. The U.S. Food and Slip someone a Mickey Finn Supplying might not deduct us to conduct further studies of the efficacy of AGI-1067 for the anyway or new endpoints, and, to the extent approved, additional clinical judicial proceeding make excited may take a signal period of prematurely to complete or desire significant additional resources to complete. We cannot ensure that AGI-1067 require till the end of time be approved or be proven safe and effective for use in humans. These and other risks are discussed in AtheroGenics’ Securities and Securities exchange Commission filings, including, but not limited to, the risks discussed in AtheroGenics’ Annual Report on Silhouette 10-K over the extent of the fiscal year ended December 31, 2007 and are specifically incorporated by reference into this converge release. We undertake no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of additional information, unborn events, or otherwise.

http://www.atherogenics.com

Health Affairs and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) are over the moon to announce a new series of Health Protocol Briefs aimed at providing clear, get-at-able overviews of timely and important robustness procedure topics. The blue ribbon brief explores the current think over over malevolent payments to Medicare Edge plans - the privately scramble health plans that now act as barely a quarter of Medicare enrollees.

Health Policy Briefs will be at one’s disposal at no cost on the Vigorousness Affairs Web instal, and you may sign up to be alerted to new briefs by email or RSS feed. The briefs make also be elbow via a open identify with from RWJF’s Web situate at http://www.healthreform.org.

Commencement
Well-being Affairs

Akorn-Strides, LLC announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has granted approvals seeking two Skimpy New Medication Applications (ANDAs) for the treatment of Sterile Vancomycin HCl USP, 500 mg/vial, 1 g/vial and Sterile Vancomycin HCl USP, 5 g/vial Druggist’s Majority Package. Akorn-Strides, LLC is a Joint Bet that was formed in 2004 by Akorn, Inc. (NASDAQ: AKRX) and Strides Arcolab Limited (NSE: STAR) (BSE: 532531). The primary mission for the Joint Venture is to develop liquid, lyophilized and cynical knack formulations of generic injectable products targeting a few therapeutic markets with a greater focus on anti-infectives, analgesics and CNS medicines.

Childless Vancomycin HCl is an antibiotic indicated seeking the treatment of potentially duration-foreboding infections which cannot be treated with other effective antimicrobial drugs, including the penicillins and cephalosporins. Latest IMS materials estimates an annual market size for Sanitary Vancomycin HCl of approximately $150 million. The expected fire swain allowing for regarding these two supplementary products is the from the start half of 2009.

The current product portfolio of the Intersection Venture, which is funded equally by Akorn and Strides Arcolab, was recently expanded and now includes 29 ANDA’s with a total of 53 SKU’s, or output line offerings. To current, the Joint Venture has filed instead of 18 ANDA’s and received 14 ANDA approvals. The Joint Experiment generated its initial product revenues in the third quarter of 2008, from the dispatch of Rifampin to save Injection.

Arthur S. Przybyl, Akorn’s President and CEO and Member Chief of Akorn-Strides, LLC stated, “These two important product approvals represent the largest trade in size opportunity object of the Joint Venture to date. I would liking for to as a person thank Arun Kumar, co-destroyed of the Akorn-Strides Joint Speculation, in return having built the fated manufacturing infrastructure to concede the Joint Advance to effectively compete for shop ration.”

Thither Akorn, Inc.

Akorn, Inc. manufactures and markets sterile specialty pharmaceuticals. Akorn has manufacturing facilities located in Decatur, Illinois and Somerset, Revitalized Jersey and markets and distributes an enormous line of infirmary and ophthalmic pharmaceuticals. Additional low-down is handy at the Company’s website at http://www.akorn.com.

About Strides Arcolab Limited

Strides, listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange Limited (532531) and National Family Exchange of India Meagre (STAR), is one of India’s largest exporters of branded generic pharmaceutical products. Strides manufactures pharmaceutical formulations in various dosage forms, including capsules, tablets and liquid injectables and is sole of the world’s top five manufacturers of softgel capsules. Strides also has the only globally dedicated softgel facility for hormones. In appendix, Strides undertakes decrease scrutiny and the manufacturing of specialty chemicals for various multinational companies. Strides has a major presence in various developing countries such as Africa, Latin America and Asia as hearty as in developed markets such as the U.S., Canada and part of Europe. Strides is equal of the largest Indian suppliers of institutionally funded aid projects and is an approved supplier to the Global Medicate Facility, UNICEF, and MSF amongst others.

Strides has 14 manufacturing plants spread across the U.S., Brazil, Mexico, Italy, Poland, Singapore and India. This broad manufacturing network facilitates partnering with global organizations ranging from UNICEF and WHO-Global Drug Facility to European and American pharmaceutical multinationals, private labelers and distribution chains. Strides has product registrations in during 37 countries nearly the world and has earned ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and GMP accreditations including USFDA. Strides employs approximately 1,700 people across the globe. Strides also has a marketing presence in over 50 countries.

Materials in this press release may contain dirt that includes or is based upon forward-looking statements within the gist of the Securities Litigation Renovate Comport oneself of 1995. Forward-looking statements give our expectations or forecasts of future events. You can identify these statements by the fact that they do not relate strictly to reliable or current facts. They say words such as “anticipate,” “estimate,” “expect,” “project,” “intend,” “plan,” “believe,” and other words and terms of be like drift in joining with a analysis of future operating or fiscal exhibit. In particular, these comprise statements relating to expected steps we may endure, coming products, coming execution or results of current and anticipated products, sales efforts, expenses, the outcome of contingencies such as legal proceedings, and fiscal results.

Any or all of our insolent-looking statements here or in other publications may turn out to be illicit. They can be affected by inaccurate assumptions or by known or unknown risks and uncertainties. Varied such factors will be important in determining our actual future results. So, no forward-looking statement can be guaranteed. Our physical results may vary materially, and there are not guarantees about the performance of our carry.

Any into view-looking statements represent our expectations or forecasts only as of the date they were made and should not be relied upon as representing our expectations or forecasts as of any consequent after epoch. We bear the responsibility for no responsibility to reprimand or update any bold-looking statements, whether as a result of novel information, future events or otherwise, even if our expectations or forecasts change. You are advised, however, to consult any to a greater distance disclosures we make on related subjects in our reports filed with the SEC. In particular, you should conclude from the discussion in the section entitled “Cautionary Report In any event Forward-Looking Statements” in our most recent Annual Detail on Form 10-K, as it may be updated in in the wake reports filed with the SEC. That discussion covers certain risks, uncertainties and maybe inaccurate assumptions that could cause our present results to differ materially from expected and historical results. Other factors besides those listed there could also adversely affect our results.

Akorn, Inc.

Are you wondering how to treat UTI? Thousands of people are asking the same sound out this week and I think it is important you know about both natural remedies and antibiotics beforehand you make the decision.

Typically, most urinary tract infection sufferers take antibiotics to treat their problem. Unfortunately, doctors continually prescribe antibiotics for this infection even though antibiotics do not often work.

Statistics show that about 1 and 4 antibiotic users will redevelop another infection within the next year. In this article, you will learn why natural remedies are the better option.

Antibiotics Do Not Work for Urinary Tract Infections

Since the discovery of the first antibiotic there has been much good! However, in the case of urinary tract infections, antibiotics have only done harm. This is because urinary tract infections are a common problem which can easily be prevented and treated with natural remedies.

Antibiotics work by killing bacteria in the urinary tract. This would be a great treatment but unfortunately your urinary tract has both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ bacteria. If the ‘good’ bacteria is killed this leaves the urinary tract unbalanced and vulnerable for future attacks.

Additionally, antibiotics also make future strands of E coli bacteria super-charged. People who consistently use antibiotics to treat their UTI will often have very resistant E coli bacteria that cannot be killed by antibiotics.

You may want to consider natural remedies if you are a repeat UTI sufferer.

How to Treat UTI - Natural Remedies

There are numerous ways that you can treat UTIs; here are a few to get you started with flushing your urinary tract.

1. Drink plenty of water to keep your bladder and urinary tract flushed. You should drink at least 12 glasses of water daily.

2. You should also eat high fiber foods that give the body vitamins and minerals for better overall health. Here are a great list of fruit and vegetables to put on the grocery list: apples, pears, grapes, avocados, green beans, broccoli, onions, carrots and potatoes.

3. You may also wish to increase the kidney function by supplementing alfalfa juice concentrate. Increasing the kidneys functioning helps the body get rid of toxins and increases the flow of urine. If you include a cranberry fruit tablet with the alfalfa juice concentrate, you will get the UTI fighting benefits of both.

4. You should also naturally boost your immunity by supplementing vitamin C with zinc. Both of these will give your body an extra kick to beat the infection naturally. Try to supplement at least 2000 mg daily of vitamin C (also called ascorbic acid).

5. Drinking unsweetened cranberry juice regularly to prohibit bacteria from clinging to your urinary and digestive tracts is also beneficial. During an active infection, you can drink from 4-6 glasses per day.

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How to Treat UTI

Egalitarian presidential candidate and former Sen. John Edwards (N.C.) on Thursday in Detroit offered details of his universal condition concern proposal, including tariff cutting measures such as overhauling the patent process for breakthrough pharmaceuticals and requiring that strength insurers dissipate at least 85% of premiums collected on patient care, the AP/Houston Chronicle reports (Gustafson, AP/Houston Chronicle, 6/14).

Edwards’ outline, announced in February, also would require employers to provide health insurance for workers or contribute 6% of their payrolls to a readies that would purloin individuals purchase coverage. Edwards said that his scheme would rate $90 billion to $120 billion annually and that he would stake the method owing to the elimination of tax cuts proposed by President Bush and approved by Congress inasmuch as households with annual incomes more than $200,000 (Kaiser Daily Robustness Policy Detail, 6/14).

Edwards proposed offering exchange incentives in place of lengthy-designation patents as far as something certain breakthrough drugs. The incentives would agree to multiple companies to furnish generic and other versions of those drugs, resulting in tone down prices, Edwards said. According to toss one’s hat in the ring officials, the payments could be deliberate instead of drug companies and would aim to encourage drug development (AP/Houston Chronicle, 6/14). Edwards said, “Giving them the dough up front force advise mention generic drugs to the market quicker.”

The pharmaceutical industry criticized the proposal, saying that long-provisions patents are inescapable for an industry that spends large amounts of money on drug condition. Ken Johnson, older vice president of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said, “Health concern proposals offered by members of Congress and presidential candidates should vitalize — not weaken — the current patent system so that patients can access further medicines to forbear them win their battle against disease” (Gray, Detroit Free Press, 6/15).

Additional Details
Edwards said his plan also would require that at least 85% of premiums paid to insurance companies are used for patient care, noting that 30% of premiums collected currently go to administrative costs and profits. According to Edwards, New York, Minnesota, New Jersey and Florida already have similar requirements.

In addition, the plan would mandate that all U.S. residents obtain health insurance and would establish measures to reduce administrative costs for providers and improve chronic and preventive care (AP/Houston Chronicle, 6/14). Edwards proposed the creation of “medical homes” to help treat patients with chronic conditions and provide U.S. residents with “a continuum of care from the time they are born until they die.” He also said that new ways are needed to train more nurses, particularly in urban and rural areas (Josar, AP/Detroit News, 6/15).

“Reprinted with permission from http://www.kaisernetwork.org. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery at http://www.kaisernetwork.org/dailyreports/healthpolicy. The Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report is published for kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation . © 2005 Advisory Board Company and Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.

There are many choices for the treatment of Hair Chequer Tape in the market and making a select can time be confusing. Choosing the right away tape for you depends of a few issues that only the whisker wearer can upon.

First consider your life style and physiology. Do you sit at a desk all day or are you outside and physically active? Do you work out or perspire heavily? Is your skin oily or dry? Do you have sensitive skin or any blemishes or sores on your scalp?

Next consider your hair wearing habits. Do you like to take your system off every night or do you want to wear your hair for several days without removal?

Lastly consider the type of system you’re wearing. Is your system all lace, all PU Skin, does it have a durable tape tab perimeter or is it a thin skin perimeter or a combination of materials?

For those with an active lifestyle or those who perspire heavily or have oily skin a strong holding tape is the best for you. These Extended Wear tapes have a very strong hold and can withstand a rigorous lifestyle. If your skin is on the dry side, Extended Wear will also work but may be too aggressive and could cause slight irritation. For sensitive skin or skin that may be broken out there are tapes that actually have a medicated agent to them and while they don’t have as strong a hold as others, they will allow for the skin to heal while wearing your hair.

If you want to take your system off at the end of the day a good Daily Wear tape will give you good hold during the day, be somewhat aggressive but can be easily removed and replaced daily. For a longer hold up to 5 days the strong aggressive Extended Wear is the tape for you.

Finally consider what you’re putting your tape on. If it’s lace then you definitely need a tape specifically for lace. Lace Tapes are lighter, shouldn’t melt down and should have a matt finish so as not to shine through the lace. For other constructions the choice should be based on your wearing habits. Just remember whatever tape you use, always remove the tape carefully to avoid tearing the base or pulling out hair.

About the Author: Hair-necessities has provided Hair Tape directly to consumers for years, and is an online leader in the hair replacement industry. Visit www.hair-necessities.com to learn more about the variety of hair replacement systems available!

Responding to Our vision against Primary and Community Care, published by the Department of Health as character of the Next Stage Review of the NHS, Chief Executive of The King’s Nest egg, Niall Dickson, said:

‘We welcome this strategy - patients place Brobdingnagian value on the trouble they be told from family doctors and community staff but a track convert in these services is needed - not least because the reforms to the continue to be of the health system rely crucially upon them. This tactics lays down an important challenge to the professionals involved - the following lies in changing the nature of services so that they are geared more to helping imprison patients as healthy as conceivable rather than at most treating their illnesses.

Choice of GP

‘GPs are in a unique position being given in effect contracts in regard to obsession, with little or no competition for patients and a guaranteed income stream. The control is put to say it necessity be made easier in the direction of patients who want to change their GP - actually every unfailing should be acquainted with that it is their right and that the system will make it easy for them to switch.

‘This is objectionable to lead to weighty numbers of patients in motion if the maturity of patients credibility and are happy with their GP. In any way, the chance to move easily and still be able to access out of hours care resolution be of real forward to some people. The vast majority of excellent GPs will allowed that.

Out of hours

‘Out of hours care has not been addressed in the flyover. This is a major omission addicted the poor way it has been handled in recent years. Patients should not press to wait for another “once in a generation review” to make enquiries this tackled.

Peculiar vigorousness budgets

‘The more we can tailor treatment the more likely it is to be alive to individual needs. While individual budgets and forthright payments are against in sexually transmitted care their effective using in health sorrow poses some challenges.

‘This is a reform that is worth piloting and evaluating, but it should not follow the government’s common pattern of using pilots as a prelude to national roll out - it should be carefully assessed and all the implications understood before any decisions are made about its point in the NHS.’

Community services

Dr Gouge Goodwin, Senior Fellow at The King’s Fund, said: ‘The underline on community services is invited - this is an parade which has been neglected as regards too dream of and which would benefit from close appraisal of working practices, levels of expertise and staff deployment. Extending the same kind of evaluation and ruling to the work of health visitors, district nurses and those who attend to patients in their homes that is applied to other parts of the health waiting, is absolutely inexorable as part of the new drive to better quality.

Practice-based commissioning

‘Current evidence shows an overall lack of progress with practice-based commissioning and lack of active GP involvement in the layout. The evidence suggests GPs are more interested in providing services sooner than commissioning them and some PCTs are less supportive of practice-based commissioning. Whilst the strategy desire inhibit PCTs to account due to the fact that the quality of their bankroll, our research has found that PCTs themselves deprivation more content to provide such a role effectively. In particular the quality of data on which to give GP commissioners heartfelt budgets is in some cases so poor this would not actually be possible. Better articulation of the application-based commissioner’s dual place as commissioner and provider is vital to govern inherent conflicts of tempt. Until practice-based commissioning really gets off the footing the jury is still out on whether it can achieve all its objectives.

Integrated care pilots

‘The given of ameliorate be keen on integration between foremost, community and social care implies a welcome move to better continuity of direction, a more personalised service, and more efficient care co-ordination to patients.

‘However, there is a tension between integrating care across community, primary and provisional care on the one hand, whilst on the other encouraging patients in the diagram constitution the fair of greater choice not only down treatment but over providers. If “integrated circumspection organisations” are also commissioners of be responsible for there is a potential conflict of interest which could reduce patient choosing rather than augment it. The government’s plans to test the benefits of integrated care through pilots must be accompanied by able-bodied evaluation of its risks as thoroughly cooked as its benefits.

Payment to GPs, Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) changes

‘Moving standards of the quality of practice board of directors out of the QOF and into an accreditation scheme is a tangible decamp. It when one pleases strengthen incentives within QOF that relate to health outcomes and sickness manipulation. It may also mean that smaller practices may penury to co-ordinate or merge their management functions with others in order to obtain accreditation.’

Notes

1. A briefing by The King’s Resources on preparation-based commissioning was published in November 2007

2. For further intelligence or interviews, please conjunction The King’s Bucks media and public relations house on 020 7307 2585, 020 7307 2632 or 020 7307 2581. An ISDN line is available for the treatment of interviews on 020 7637 0185.

3. The King’s Fund is an independent unsparing foundation working fitted better health, especially in London. We complete out check in, behaviour analysis and development activities, working on our own, in partnerships, and through funding. We are a biggest resource to people working in health and social care, offering administration development programmes; seminars and workshops; publications; information and library services; and conference and meeting facilities.

The King’s Lolly

Constitution care is as a last resort a momentous debouchment that deals with alluring a note of all health aspects. Whether its motherhood period or dental treatment or accidental treatment, all needs to be covered lower than drunk a suitable plan. Since, there are so myriad people turning escape to be constitution intentional; the need someone is concerned health guarantee is raising. It is because such plans, usually, protect all essential medical issues that require acclaim. With the pressing growth in the requirement for healthiness care policy, the business houses are also all things this championing their employees. They are making it a part of facilities provided to the employees by the cast.

In fact, security for the people working for a company is mandatory and employer should take care about that. In this way, the employee will also feel himself safer in the hands of company as it would help them in times of trouble. The advantages of mediclaim includes cashless hospitalization that does not require you to worry about payment of hospital bills. Another benefit is that you get 24 hours medical assistance from the medical experts of the particular insurance agency. With the help of this benefit, you can contact them at any time for asking health queries. Apart from this, you also get discount on the total price of the policy, if it is taken on a collective basis.

With all these benefits, health insurance is becoming popular all the way. Due to the growth charts, the insurance companies have also decided to make a web presence for the benefit of aspirant insurenace seekers, who do not get much time to access the office locations. This made getting health care online easy, as all the details were available. This service helped a lot of people, who hated to go through long documentation process and wait for few moments. The quick method of getting health care policy got famous at a fast pace. After all, health insurance is something that comes useful at any point in the entire life. No matter what is the problem, the insurance company takes care of their customers through this plan.

No doubt proteins are complex. Most are “large” and full of interdependent branches, pockets and bends in their ending folded structure.

This complexity frustrates biochemists and protein engineers seeking to understand protein structure and function in order to reproduce or create new uses for these natural molecules to fight diseases or for use in industry.

Using design and engineering principles learned from nature, a team of biochemists from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have built - from scratch - a completely new type of protein. This protein can transport oxygen, akin to human neuroglobin, a molecule that carries oxygen in the brain and peripheral nervous system. Some day this approach could be used to make artificial blood for use on the battle field or by emergency-care professionals. Their findings appear in the most recent issue of Nature .

“This is quite a different way of making novel proteins than the rest of the world,” says senior author P. Leslie Dutton, PhD, Eldridge Reeves Johnson Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics. “We’ve created an unusually simple and relatively small protein that has a function, which is to carry oxygen. No one else has ever done this before.”

“Our aim is to design new proteins from principles we discover studying natural proteins,” explains co-author Christopher C. Moser, PhD, Associate Director of the Johnson Foundation at Penn. “For example, we found that natural proteins are complex and fragile and when we make new proteins we want them to be simple and robust. That’s why we’re not re-engineering a natural protein, but making one from scratch.”

Currently, protein engineers take an existing biochemical scaffold from nature and tweak it a bit structurally to make it do something else. “This research demonstrates how we used a set of simple design principles, which challenge the kind of approaches that have been used to date in reproducing natural protein functions,” says Dutton.

The natural design of proteins ultimately lies in their underlying sequence of amino acids, organic compounds that link together to make proteins. In living organisms, this sequence is dictated by the genetic information carried in DNA within chromosomes. This information is then encoded in messenger RNA, which is transcribed from DNA in the nucleus of the cell. The sequence of amino acids for a particular protein is determined by the sequence of nucleotides in messenger RNA. It is the order of the amino acids and the chemical bonds between them that establish how a protein folds into its final shape.

To build their protein, the Penn team started with just three amino acids, which code for a helix-shaped column. From this, they assembled a four-column bundle with loops that resembles a simple candelabra. They added a heme, a chemical group that contains an iron atom, to bind oxygen molecules. They also added another amino acid called glutamate to add strain to the candelabra to help the columns open up to capture the oxygen. Since heme and oxygen degrade in water, the researchers also designed the exteriors of the columns to repel water to protect the oxygen payload inside.

Initially, the team used a synthesizer — a robot that chemically sticks amino acids together in a desired sequence — to make the helix-shaped columns. “We do the first reactions with the robot to figure out the sequence of amino acids that we want,” says Moser. When they are satisfied with the sequence, they use the bacterium E. coli as a biological host to make the full protein.

The team used chemical tests to confirm that their protein did indeed capture oxygen. When the oxygen did bind to the iron heme molecule in the artificial protein, the solution in which the reaction took place changed color from dark red to scarlet, a color signature almost identical to natural neuroglobin.

“This exercise is like making a bus,” says Dutton. “First you need an engine and we’ve produced an engine. Now we can add other things on to it. Using the bound oxygen to do chemistry will be like adding the wheels. Our approach to building a simple protein from scratch allows us to add on, without getting more and more complicated.”

In addition to Dutton and Moser, co-first authors J.L. Ross Anderson, PhD, a postdoc in the Dutton lab and Ronald L. Koder, PhD, a former postdoc in the Dutton lab now with the Department of Physics at the City College of New York; Lee A. Solomon, a PhD student in the Dutton lab, and Konda S. Reddy, PhD, were also authors on the paper.

This work was funded by the Department of Energy, the National Institutes of Health, and the National Science Foundation.

PENN Medicine is a $3.6 billion enterprise dedicated to the related missions of medical education, biomedical research, and excellence in patient care. PENN Medicine consists of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine (founded in 1765 as the nation’s first medical school) and the University of Pennsylvania Health System.

Penn’s School of Medicine is currently ranked #4 in the nation in U.S.News & World Report’s survey of top research-oriented medical schools; and, according to most recent data from the National Institutes of Health, received over $379 million in NIH research funds in the 2006 fiscal year. Supporting 1,700 fulltime faculty and 700 students, the School of Medicine is recognized worldwide for its superior education and training of the next generation of physician-scientists and leaders of academic medicine.

The University of Pennsylvania Health System (UPHS) includes its flagship hospital, the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, rated one of the nation’s top ten “Honor Roll” hospitals by U.S.News & World Report; Pennsylvania Hospital, the nation’s first hospital; and Penn Presbyterian Medical Center. In addition UPHS includes a primary-care provider network; a faculty practice plan; home care, hospice, and nursing home; three multispecialty satellite facilities; as well as the Penn Medicine at Rittenhouse campus, which offers comprehensive inpatient rehabilitation facilities and outpatient services in multiple specialties.

http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/

In healthy people, both sleepiness and vigilance show a relationship with sum body temperature and bark temperature.

When core body temperature is high during the daytime, skin temperature is low, which translates into optimal vigilance. Conversely, when core body temperature is low at night time, skin temperature is high, which correlates to optimal sleep. Among those suffering from narcolepsy, however, direct manipulations of their skin and core body temperatures affect their vigilance and sleepiness, according to a study published in the February 1 issue of the journal SLEEP.

The study, authored by Rolf Fronczek, of the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience in Amsterdam, and Leiden University Medical Center in The Netherlands, focused on eight patients who were diagnosed with narcolepsy with cataplexy and suffered from excessive daytime sleepiness. The subjects’ vigilance was measured using the Psychomotor Vigilance Task, and their sleepiness was assessed with the Maintenance of Wakefulness Test. Meanwhile, their skin temperature was mildly manipulated using a thermosuit, while their core body temperature was manipulated using hot or cold food and drinks.

According to the results, patients were better able to maintain vigilance when core body temperature was increased than when it was lowered, indicating that vigilance in narcolepsy can be altered simply by altering the temperature of food and drinks. Also, the ability to maintain wakefulness was better when skin temperature was lowered than when it was increased. Therefore, the process of falling asleep in narcoleptic subjects was able to be influenced by gently cooling or warming their hands and feet.

“Patients with narcolepsy lack a specific neurotransmitter in their brains. This neurotransmitter is responsible for the regulation of the sleep/wake rhythm. That is why narcoleptic patients fall asleep during the day, but have problems sleeping during the night,� said Fronczek. “Sleep and skin temperature are tightly related, as everybody who ever tried to go to bed with cold feet will know. Earlier researchers discovered that in healthy people, the temperature of the distal skin – hands and feet – not only increases just before falling asleep, but also influences sleep itself. Warm hands and feet thus promote sleep. Our research shows that, surprisingly, the temperature of the hands and feet of people with narcolepsy is on a high level throughout the day, a level that is normally only seen in healthy people just before falling asleep. We normalized this abnormal pattern of skin temperature using a specially designed thermosuit that can differentially manipulate the distal en proximal skin temperature with warm or cold water. In this way, we were able to decrease daytime sleepiness and improve vigilance. This could lead to new therapeutical applications that can help to alleviate some of the symptoms of narcolepsy.�

Narcolepsy is a sleep disorder that causes people to fall asleep uncontrollably during the day. It also includes features of dreaming that occur while awake. Other common symptoms include sleep paralysis, hallucinations and cataplexy. About one out of every 2,000 people is known to have narcolepsy. There does seem to be a genetic link to it. It is very rare for more than two people in the same family to have this sleep disorder. It affects the same number of men and women.

It is recommended that adults get between seven and eight hours of nightly sleep.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) offers the following tips on how to get a good night’s sleep:

Follow a consistent bedtime routine.
Establish a relaxing setting at bedtime.
Get a full night’s sleep every night.
Avoid foods or drinks that contain caffeine, as well as any medicine that has a stimulant, prior to bedtime.
Do not bring your worries to bed with you.
Do not go to bed hungry, but don’t eat a big meal before bedtime either.
Avoid any rigorous exercise within six hours of your bedtime.
Make your bedroom quiet, dark and a little bit cool.
Get up at the same time every morning.

http://www.aasmnet.org/