In the past few weeks, the dreaded H5N1 bird flu spread from Asia to the UK. Should we really be scared, or is it just media propaganda, popular because it 'sells'? Is it really a new phenomenon that will lead to the next influenza pandemic, or its a normal process that were investigating for the first time? Discuss!

• Brain Images Reveal Menstrual Cycle Patterns
• Fresh bird flu fears rattle Asia
• Wired reef to spot polluters
• New technique reveals the strength of bones
• The tale of the dead parrot
• Twelve chickens dead from bird flu in Russia
• Counterfeit Tamiflu drug a very real threat

Breastfeeding does not raise the risk of mother-to-child transmission of hepatitis C virus (HCV), according to two new studies published in the December 1 issue of The Journal of Infectious Diseases, now available online.

Virginia Tech's starting running back Cedric Humes was able to play against Boston College despite a broken arm (the ulna bone) thanks, in part, to a prototype composite brace designed for him by Virginia Tech engineers.

In the event of an influenza pandemic, the world's vaccine manufacturers will be in a race against time to forestall calamity. But now, thanks to a new technique to more efficiently produce the disarmed viruses that are the seed stock for making flu vaccine in large quantities, life-saving inoculations may be available more readily than before. The work is especially important as governments worldwide prepare for a predicted pandemic of avian influenza.

What would you call an alien if you encountered it on the street tomorrow? What if that alien didn't come from another world but rather was created in a laboratory right here on Earth and functioned differently from other Earth life?

Visual information can be processed unconsciously when the area of the brain that records what the eye sees is temporarily shut down, according to research at Rice University in Houston.

A molecule consisting of two "cages" of metallic atoms bound to carbon has shown great promise in preliminary tests of becoming a new weapon in the anti-HIV arsenal, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center report. The molecule - called metallacarborane - and its variants appear to fight HIV protease, an enzyme critical in the virus' life cycle. Protease inhibitors are some of the key drugs used to fight HIV/AIDS, but they have side effects, and viruses can develop resistance to them.

Updated data from a study on a promising new vaccine against a pre-cancerous cervical virus shows superior efficacy in preventing cervical pre-cancers and non-invasive cervical cancer, according to a study presented today during the American Association for Cancer Research's 4th Annual Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research meeting in Baltimore.

Research with female monkeys at the Tulane National Primate Research Center has for the first time shown that three different anti-viral agents in a vaginal gel protect the animals against an HIV-like virus. The research suggests that a microbicide using compounds that inhibit the processes by which HIV attaches to and enters target cells could potentially provide a safe, effective and practical way to prevent HIV transmission in women, according to study investigators. The study, published online October 30 in the journal Nature was funded principally by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) of the National Institutes of Health.

A mutated plant that seems to return from the dead may hold the secret to how some flora protect their progeny during yield-limiting drought and other stresses, according to Purdue University scientists whose study of the plant led to discovery of a gene.

A new study of genetic changes in bacteria may ultimately help drug makers stay a step ahead of disease-causing bacteria that can become resistant to antibiotics.