Endeavour launches without incident
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla., Feb. 8 (UPI) -- Space shuttle Endeavour roared into the early morning sky over Florida's Kennedy Space Center Monday in the last scheduled night shuttle launch.
Originally set for Sunday morning, the launch had to be delayed because of low clouds over the space center. Endeavour and its external fuel tank, with a combined weight of 4.5 million pounds, finally lifted off at 4:14 a.m. EST Monday without incident and without any pre-launch technical problems.
The shuttle's mission to the International Space Station is being led by Commander George Zamka, with Terry Virts serving as pilot. They and astronauts Nicholas Patrick, Robert Behnken, Stephen Robinson and Kathryn Hire will deliver the Italian-built Tranquility node -- the last of the three nodes that make up the space station -- and a seven-windowed cupola, to be used as a control room for robotics. The two other nodes are Unity and Harmony.
The STS-130 mission marks Endeavour's 24th flight and the 32nd shuttle trip dedicated to space station assembly and maintenance. The mission is to include three spacewalks before Endeavour's scheduled Feb. 20 return to Earth.
Criteria not used to diagnose depression
PROVIDENCE, R.I., Feb. 8 (UPI) -- U.S. researchers say many physicians don't use established criteria to diagnose depression.
Researchers at Rhode Island Hospital in Providence found two-thirds of non-psychiatrist physicians and 25 percent of psychiatrists surveyed said they often did not use the criteria outlined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, when diagnosing major depressive disorder.
Study leader Dr. Mark Zimmerman says that not determining whether the criteria for major depressive disorder are being met, creates the possibility patients who may not actually have major depression are taking medication that may not be helping them.
"These findings are disconcerting," Zimmerman says in a statement.
He suggests if doctors are not using the criteria because of their length or because they may not be able to recall all of the them, a shortened definition may help to facilitate appropriate application of the criteria across all practitioners.
The study, published online ahead of print in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, surveyed 291 physicians attending a continuing medical education conference.
Plasticizer migration preventive created
MADRID, Feb. 8 (UPI) -- Spanish scientists say they've developed a new way of preventing potentially harmful plasticizers from migrating from widely used groups of plastic products.
The researchers from the Institute of Polymer Science and Technology in Madrid said their achievement could lead to a new generation of polyvinyl chloride plastics that are safer than those now used in packaging, medical tubing, toys and other products.
Led by Helmut Reinecke, the research scientists said manufacturers add large amounts of plasticizers to PVC to make it flexible and durable. But those plasticizers migrate to the surface of the plastic over time and escape into the environment. As a result, PVC plastics become less flexible and durable and people who come into contact with the plastics face possible health risks.
The U. S. Consumer Product Safety Commission last year banned use of several plasticizers used to manufacture toys and child care articles.
The scientists describe their achievement in the journal Macromolecules.
HIV key enzyme structure is determined
LONDON, Feb. 8 (UPI) -- U.S. and British scientists say they have determined the three-dimensional structure of a critical enzyme found in HIV and other retroviruses.
The study's lead author, Dr Peter Cherepanov of Imperial College London, said the precise structure of the enzyme called "integrase" was determined by growing a crystal using integrase from a retrovirus called the Prototype Foamy Virus that scientists believe is very similar to the human immunodeficiency virus.
Growing the crystal required 40,000 trials during four years of effort by researchers from Imperial College and Harvard University.
Cherepanov said: "It is a truly amazing story. When we started out, we knew that the project was very difficult, and that many tricks had already been tried and given up by others long ago. … Despite initially painstakingly slow progress and very many failed attempts, we did not give up and our effort was finally rewarded."
Researchers determined the molecular structure of the crystal with X-ray diffraction data from a synchrotron at the Diamond Light Source in South Oxfordshire.
The investigators said their findings will help scientists better understand how existing drugs that inhibit integrase work, how to improve them and how to stop the human immunodeficiency virus from developing resistance to them
The study appeared in the Jan. 31 edition of the journal Nature.
