Short course: Study finds problem drinkers get bigger endorphin kick

In a study of more than 15,000 adults ages 18 to 85,researchers at Johns Hopkins University found that after blood levels exceeded 21 nanograms per milliliter — the lower end of what is usually considered normal — any additional vitamin D led to an increase in CRP.

The association held after the researchers accounted for the effects of factors like obesity,smoking,cholesterol and high blood pressure. There was also a dose-response relationship: above 21 units,each 10-unit increase in vitamin D was accompanied by a 0.06 milligrams per deciliter increase in CRP. Vitamin D is good to a certain level, said the lead author,Dr Muhammad Amer,an assistant professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins. “But don’t just keep on taking it. Have your blood drawn and your levels checked.”

The study was published online in The American Journal of Cardiology.

When too much vitamin D is too much

TOO MUCH vitamin D may be just as bad as too little,a recent study suggests. Vitamin D supplements reduce blood levels of C-reactive protein,or CRP,an indicator of inflammation that is linked to cardiovascular disease. But supplements help only up to a point.

In a study of more than 15,000 adults ages 18 to 85,researchers at Johns Hopkins University found that after blood levels exceeded 21 nanograms per milliliter the lower end of what is usually considered normal any additional vitamin D led to an increase in CRP.

The association held after the researchers accounted for the effects of factors like obesity,smoking,cholesterol and high blood pressure. There was also a dose-response relationship: above 21 units,each 10-unit increase in vitamin D was accompanied by a 0.06 milligrams per deciliter increase

in CRP.

Vitamin D is good to a certain level, said the lead author,Dr Muhammad Amer,an assistant professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins. But dont just keep on taking it. Have your blood drawn and your levels checked.

The study was published online in The American Journal of Cardiology.

Synthetic windpipe for cancerous one

Surgeons in Sweden have replaced the cancerous windpipe of a Maryland man with one made in a laboratory and seeded with the mans cells. The windpipe,or trachea,made from minuscule plastic fibers and covered in stem cells taken from the mans bone marrow,was implanted last November. The patient,Christopher Lyles,30,whose tracheal cancer had progressed to the point where it was considered inoperable,arrived home in Baltimore this Wednesday. It was the second procedure of its kind and the first for an American.

Im feeling good, Lyles said in a telephone interview from his home. Im just thankful for a second chance at life. He said he hoped to resume his job,as an electrical engineer with the Department of Defense,as soon as he regained full strength.

He went home in very good shape, said Dr Paolo Macchiarini,director of the Advanced Center for Translational Regenerative Medicine at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.

Dr Macchiarini is a leader in the field of tissue engineering,in which the goal is to produce replacement tissues and organs outside the body.

What we did is surgically remove his malignant tumour, Dr Macchiarini said. Then we replaced the trachea with this tissue-engineered scaffold. The Y-shaped scaffold,fashioned from nano-size fibers of a type of plastic called PET that is commonly used in soda bottles,was seeded with stem cells from Lyless bone marrow. It was then placed in a bioreactor a shoebox-size container holding the stem cells in solution and rotated like a rotisserie chicken to allow the cells to soak in. After two days,it was installed in Lyles during an elaborate operation in which it was sutured to his throat and lungs.