A novel high-tech microscope will be brought to the marketplace, giving laboratories everywhere fascinating new insights into living organisms. EMBLEM Technology Transfer GmbH (EMBLEM), the commercial entity of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), announced today that it has signed a licensing deal with technological leader Carl Zeiss to commercialize a new technology called SPIM (Selective Plane Illumination Microscopy).

Scientists have discovered that a protein that was originally believed to be involved in tuberculosis antibiotic resistance is actually a "missing enzyme" from the biosynthetic pathway for an agent used by the bacteria to scavenge iron.

Scientists at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center and three other institutions are setting out to find what activates the spores in anthrax, the deadly bacterial infection that is back in the news.

Researchers at the University of Minnesota have identified a newly emerging illness, named staphylococcal purpura fulminans. The disease begins as a respiratory tract infection, which then is infected by Staphylococcus aureus. The infection then moves to the lungs, making superantigens (bacterial toxins that activate large numbers of T cells), often leading to death due to hypertension and shock. Purpura fulminans has been identified in five cases in the Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn., metropolitan area during 2000-2004, as described in the April 1, 2005 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases. This new disease has also been determined in seven additional cases nationwide. Of the 12 known cases, only two patients have survived.

New York University biologists have uncovered how the innate immune system in mice's brains fights viral infection of neurons. The findings, published as the cover study in the latest issue of Virology, show that proteins in neurons fight the virus at multiple stages--by preventing the formation of viral RNA and proteins, and blocking the virus' release, which could infect other cells in the brain.

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health are exploring ways to develop new vaccines for a variety of illnesses using genetically modified adenoviruses, a common cause of respiratory infections. Oral adenovirus vaccines have long been proven to be safe and effective. The researchers believe their process for constructing a replicating live recombinant adenovirus could lead to more economical vaccines that provide longer-lasting disease protection, which would be particularly beneficial for people living in the developing countries where resources are limited. Their research was made available online March 14, 2005, in advance of publication in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

As of 29 March 2005, the Ministry of Health has reported a total of 124 cases and 117 deaths in Cabinda, Luanda and Uige. All these cases had originated in Uige Province. Ten of these cases have been laboratory confirmed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Atlanta, USA.

The US Patent Office issued Patent # 6,872,552, "A Method of Reconstituting Nucleic Acid Molecules" today to Burt D. Ensley, Ph.D, Chairman of MatrixDesign, and CEO of DermaPlus, Inc. The patent covers methods for recovering and reconstituting genes from "degraded" DNA samples, and could allow scientists to reassemble everything from prehistoric, extinct animals to unsolved crime scenes.

A new study published in the March 30th edition of the prestigious scientific journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B (a publication of the UK's national academy of science) shows that the transfer of parasitic sea lice from salmon farms to wild salmon populations is much larger and more extensive than previously believed.