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Glutaric Aciduria Type I: Therapy Should Extend Beyond Childhood
By systematically analysing MRI changes occuring in the brains of children with the metabolic disease glutaric aciduria type I researchers at Heidelberg University Hospital have succeeded for the first time in demonstrating reversible and permanent brain damage as well as elucidating its temporal evolution.

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"Caring For Country" Linked To Good Health, Australia
Indigenous people in the Northern Territory who participate in "caring for country" activities enjoy significantly better health, a study published in the May 18 Indigenous Health issue of the Medical Journal of Australia has found.
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Lambda Legal Files Suit Against Assisted-Living Facility For Allegedly Discriminating Against HIV-Positive Resident
Lambda Legal, a group that represents HIV-positive people, on Tuesday filed a law suit against the Fox Ridge assisted-living facility in North Little Rock, Ark., for allegedly evicting a resident because he is HIV-positive, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports.The Rev. Robert Franke, a retired biology and religion professor who was diagnosed with HIV in 1987, moved into Fox Ridge, which is operated by Parkstone Living Center, in February. The day after he moved into the facility, an unidentified administrator told his daughter, Sara Franke Bowling, that her "superiors" said Franke needed to be discharged from the facility "because of his HIV." Franke disclosed his HIV status on application materials before moving into the facility. The suit alleges that Parkstone violated the Fair Housing Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Arkansas Civil Rights Act and requests a permanent injunction to prevent the facility from denying apartments or services to people living with HIV/AIDS. The suit also seeks compensatory and punitive damages and attorneys" fees and costs. The case was assigned to U.S. District Judge G. Thomas Eisele. The facility declined to comment on the suit. Julie Munsell, a spokesperson for the state Department of Human Services, said Arkansas law allows for people who have been discharged for assisted-living facilities to remain in the facility pending a hearing if the discharge is appealed. Munsell said the department"s Long-Term Care Division received notice that Franke was appealing the discharge but that the appeal was later dismissed without a hearing. According to Munsell, facilities are not permitted to discharge residents based on medical diagnoses but that some facilities have said they do not have the capacity to provide care for certain conditions. Munsell also said that Fox Ridge is "claiming that they did not admit this client so there is no need for a hearing." Scott Schoettes, staff attorney for Lambda"s HIV Project, said that Franke was not seeking medical care from Fox Ridge, although the facility does provide medical services. "He didn"t require any services beyond which they were licensed to provide," Schoettes said. Franke"s eviction is "particularly blatant and egregious, but unfortunately, not all that uncommon," Schoettes said, adding, "This happens all across the country. We want to send a message that this kind of discrimination is not going to be tolerated" (Satter, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, 5/13).
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Study Gives Clues To Increasing X-Rays' Power

Three-dimensional, real-time X-ray images of patients could be closer to reality because of research recently completed by scientists at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and a pair of Russian institutes. In a paper to be published in an upcoming edition of Physical Review Letters, UNL Physics and Astronomy Professor Anthony Starace and his colleagues give scientists important clues into how to unleash coherent, high-powered X-rays. "This could be a contributor to a number of innovations," Starace said. Starace"s work focuses on a process called high-harmonic generation, or HHG. X-ray radiation can be created by focusing an optical laser into atoms of gaseous elements - usually low-electron types such as hydrogen, helium, or neon. HHG is the process that creates the energetic X-rays when the laser light interacts with those atoms" electrons, causing the electrons to vibrate rapidly and emit X-rays. But the problem with HHG has been around almost as long as the onset of the method in 1988: The X-ray light produced by the atoms is very weak. In an effort to make the X-rays more powerful, scientists have attempted using higher-powered lasers on the electrons, but success has been limited. "Using longer wavelength lasers is another way to increase the energy output of the atoms," Starace said. "The problem is, the intensity of the radiation (the atoms) produce drops very quickly." Instead of focusing on low-electron atoms like hydrogen and helium, Starace"s group applied HHG theory to heavier (and more rare) gaseous atoms having many electrons - elements such as xenon, argon and krypton. They discovered that the process would unleash high-energy X-rays with relatively high intensity by using longer wavelength lasers (with wavelengths within certain atom-specific ranges) that happen to drive collective electron oscillations of the many-electron atoms. "If you use these rare gases and shine a laser in on them, they"ll emit X-Rays with an intensity that is much, much stronger (than with the simple atoms)," Starace said. "The atomic structure matters." Starace said that unlocking the high-powered X-rays could lead one day, for example, to more powerful and precise X-ray machines. For instance, he said, heart doctors might conduct an exam by scanning a patient and creating a 3D hologram of his or her heart, beating in real time. Nanoscientists, who study the control of matter on an atomic or molecular scale, also may benefit from this finding, Starace said. Someday, the high-intensity X-rays may be used to make 3D images of the microscopic structures with which nanoscientists work. "With nanotechnology, miniaturization is the order of the day," he said. "But nanoscientists obviously could make use of a method to make the structures they"re building and working with more easily visible." The work is sponsored through funding by the National Science Foundation. Starace said NSF"s sponsorship made the collaboration with his Russian colleagues - Mikhail V. Frolov, N.L. Manakov and T.S. Sarantseva of Voronezh State University, and M.Y. Emelin and M.Y. Ryabikin of the Russian Academy of Sciences - possible. Frolov worked with Starace at UNL from 2002-2004 when he was a postdoctoral research associate in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. He has returned to Lincoln a number of times to collaborate with Starace on the HHG research. Frolov is a Ph.D. student of Manakov, with whom Starace has had a decade-long research collaboration that was initiated with support from NSF. Manakov also has an Adjunct Professor of Physics appointment in the UNL Department of Physics and Astronomy. Steve Smith University of Nebraska-Lincoln


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