Have you ever walked by someone listening to their i-Pod loud enough for you recognize the song? Studies have shown noise-induced hearing loss is going to become the next big epidemic affecting our younger generation though the effects won't show until it is too late to treat.

For the first time, scientists from the University of Washington School of Medicine, Indiana University Bloomington and the University of Cambridge have determined how a plant hormone - auxin - interacts with its hormone receptor, called TIR1.Their report, on the cover of this week's issue of Nature, also may have important implications for the treatment of human disease, because TIR1 is similar to human enzymes that are known to be involved in cancer.

Australian scientists are claiming a significant breakthrough in the fight against cancer. A team from the Children's Medical Research Institute in Sydney has worked out the make-up of the enzyme telomerase, which prevents cancer cells dying as they age.

The cancer drug asparaginase fails to help cure some children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) because molecules released by certain cells in the bone marrow counteract the effect of that drug, according to investigators at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.