The results of the sequencing and analysis of the human body louse genome, which were published on June 21 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), offer new insights into the intriguing biology of this disease-vector insect. The project involved more than 70 international scientists led by Professor Evgeny Zdobnov at the University of Geneva Medical School and the SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, with Professor Barry Pittendrigh at the University of Illinois and Professor Ewen Kirkness at the J. Craig Venter Institute.

Researchers at Virginia Tech, New York University (NYU), and the University of Milan, Italy, have created a data mining algorithm they call GOALIE that can automatically reveal how biological processes are coordinated in time.

The UK's National Physical Laboratory (NPL) is involved in a collaborative project that is helping to further the understanding of HIV viral protein structure which could lead to new molecular medicines.

Consumers shouldn't assume that, because a product is organic, it's also environmentally friendly.