Scientists have shown that E. coli – one of the best known and extensively studied organisms in the world – remains an enigma that may hold the key to human diseases, such as cancer.

An international team of researchers has determined key structural features of the largest known virus, findings that could help scientists studying how the simplest life evolved and whether the unusual virus causes any human diseases.

Researchers at the University of Southern California (USC) have, for the first time in history, derived authentic embryonic stem (ES) cells from rats. This breakthrough finding will enable scientists to create far more effective animal models for the study of a range of human diseases.

Increased use of computers to create predictive models of human disease is likely following a workshop organised by the European Science Foundation (ESF), which urged for a collaborative effort between specialists in the field.

Two groups of researchers, one in the United States and one in Australia, are announcing the development of new optical techniques for visualizing the invisible processes at work in several human diseases.

Scientists at the Consortium for Conservation Medicine Wildlife Trust New York, the Zoological Society of London, Columbia University (New York) and the University of Georgia seem to have found some answers concerning the origin of diseases like HIV/AIDS and SARS. These data can help to further predict and prevent future devastating pandemics.

Zebrafish are genetically similar to humans and are good models for human biology and disease. Now, researchers at Children's Hospital Boston have created a zebrafish that is transparent throughout its life.

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have received a $4.7 million grant to develop cutting edge methods for detecting diseases in humans exposed to environmental contaminants, the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) announced on Tuesday, Sept. 4.

The fragile head and brain of a fly are not easy things to examine but MRC scientists have figured out how to make it a little simpler. And they hope their research will shed light on human disease.

About 40 percent of deaths worldwide are caused by water, air and soil pollution, concludes a Cornell researcher. Such environmental degradation, coupled with the growth in world population, are major causes behind the rapid increase in human diseases, which the World Health Organization has recently reported. Both factors contribute to the malnourishment and disease susceptibility of 3.7 billion people, he says.

Researchers at the McKnight Brain Institute of the University of Florida have initiated a project to treat human brain and other diseases by plundering the secrets of regeneration from creatures with remarkable powers of self-renewal, such as salamanders, newts, starfish and flatworms.

Those small fruit flies buzzing around your bananas are more than pests-they may be allies in a fruitful search for clues to human diseases caused when genes malfunction.