Many middle-aged and older adults with diabetes are sexually active, according to a new survey. Seventy percent of partnered men with diabetes and 62 percent of partnered women with diabetes engaged in sexual activity two or three times a month, comparable to those without diabetes. The disease takes a toll, however, on the desire for and rewards of sexual activity.

Mothers who did not breastfeed their children have significantly higher rates of type 2 diabetes later in life than moms who breastfed, report University of Pittsburgh researchers in a study published in the September issue of the American Journal of Medicine. Twenty-seven percent of mothers who did not breastfeed developed type 2 diabetes and were almost twice as likely to develop the disease as women who had breastfed or never given birth.

Ongoing research finds that a blend of plant substances -- such as resveratrol and grape seed extract -- can prevent skin cancer in mice.

Computational scientists and geophysicists at the University of Texas at Austin and the California Institute of Technology have developed new computer algorithms that for the first time allow for the simultaneous modeling of the earth's Earth's mantle flow, large-scale tectonic plate motions, and the behavior of individual fault zones, to produce an unprecedented view of plate tectonics and the forces that drive it.

In a bid to unlock long-standing mysteries of the sun, including the impacts on Earth of its 11-year cycle, an international team of scientists has successfully probed a distant star.

In the first study of its kind, researchers have found compelling evidence that our best and worst experiences in life are likely to involve not individual accomplishments, but interaction with other people and the fulfillment of an urge for social connection.

Researchers have isolated a molecule, small enough to be used as a drug, that can shut down a dysfunctional -- and at times, deadly -- immune response known as the complement system.

Vitamin A and beta-carotene supplements are unsafe for HIV-positive women who breastfeed because they may boost the excretion of HIV in breast milk -- thereby increasing the chances of transmitting the infection to the child, a pair of new studies suggest.

Traumatic brain injury, currently considered a singular event by the insurance industry and many health care providers, is instead the beginning of an ongoing process that impacts multiple organ systems and may cause or accelerate other diseases and disorders that can reduce life expectancy, according to research from the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston.

Crazy bands are cool because no matter how long they've been stretched around a kid's wrist, they always return to their original shape, be it a lion or a kangaroo. Now a Duke and Stanford chemistry team has found a polymer molecule that's so springy it snaps back from stretching much smaller than it was before.

Subfertility of breeding stallions -- meaning the horses are less able to sire foals -- is a well-recognized problem that has caused multimillion-dollar losses in the equine industry, experts say. Texas A&M researchers believe they are making progress in solving the problem by using an approach that might provide tools and resources necessary to study subfertility without causing stallions the angst of providing testicular samples for testing.

Radiocarbon dating is used to determine the age of everything from ancient artifacts to prehistoric corals on the ocean bottom. But in a recent study appearing in the Aug. 26 edition of the journal, Nature, a Lawrence Livermore scientist and his colleagues used the method to trace the pathway of carbon dioxide released from the deep ocean to the atmosphere at the end of the last ice age.

A team of three University of Florida astronomers contributed to the Kepler spacecraft's discovery of two Saturn-sized planets, plus a possible third planet with a radius just one-and-a-half times that of Earth, orbiting a distant star.

NASA's Kepler Mission has discovered the first confirmed planetary system with more than one planet transiting the same star.

Recent incidents of adulteration involving infant formula, other milk products and pet food with the industrial chemical melamine revealed the weaknesses of current methods widely used across the domestic and global food industry for determining protein content in foods. The possible utility of alternative existing and emerging methods is the subject of a new paper published in Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety, a peer-reviewed journal of the Institute of Food Technologists.

Scientists link a recent, temporary shrinking of a high atmospheric layer with a sharp drop in the sun's ultraviolet radiation levels.

By comparing two species of ants, Shelley Berger, Ph.D., the Daniel S. Och University Professor at the University of Pennsylvania, and colleagues Danny Reinberg, Ph.D., New York University, and Juergen Liebig, Ph.D., Arizona State University, have established an important new avenue of research for epigenetics -- the study of how the expression or suppression of particular genes affects an organism's characteristics, development and even behavior.

University of Miami researcher, Kenny Broad led an expedition to the underwater caves of the Bahamas, known as "blue holes." The expedition is featured as the cover story of the most recent issue of National Geographic Magazine (August 2010) and in a one-hour NOVA PBS special titled "Extreme Cave Diving."

The drug disulfiram, used for years to deter recovering alcoholics from drinking, also can treat cocaine addiction. Disulfiram prevents rats from seeking cocaine after a break, a model for addicts tempted to relapse. Disulfiram appears to work by inhibiting the enzyme dopamine beta-hydroxylase, which is required for the production of the neurotransmitter norepinephrine. A selective inhibitor of that enzyme, nepicastat, is also effective in the same model of cocaine relapse.

A specific type of fat present in cell membranes also serves as a cellular pH sensor, a team of University of British Columbia researchers has discovered.