A federal agency has upheld a patent that covers embryonic stem cell research, rejecting a challenge from critics who say the patents are hindering research. An examiner with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office ruled this week that one of three patents can stand. A challenge to two other patents remains pending. ( Associated Press)

Google Inc has unveiled a plan to help U.S. patients gain control of their medical records and is working with doctors’ groups, pharmacies and labs to help them securely share sensitive health data. (Reuters)

All children - not just those under 5 - should get vaccinated against the flu, a federal advisory panel said Wednesday. The panel voted to expand annual flu shots to virtually all children except infants younger than 6 months and those with serious egg allergies. (AP)

A trawl through the genes of white people in Utah and Yoruba people in Nigeria shows a significant number of differences that can explain why some groups respond differently to drugs than others. (Reuters)

Marketing directly to consumers, the new crop of companies has jumped into a realm of dubious science, mining DNA to offer information on ethnic heritage, long-lost relatives, personalized dieting plans — even the sports for which one is best suited. (Chicago Tribune)

What can nanotechnology do right now? What might it do in the future? George A. Kimbrell and Aatish Salvi continue their debate. (Los Angeles Times)

Patients with end-stage chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) who have two lungs transplanted in place of one live nearly two years longer on average, according to a study released Friday. (AFP)

The conflagration over the reauthorization of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) offers a compelling example of Washington’s current inability to address even seemingly uncontroversial matters such as improved health care coverage for children. After the House failed to override President George W. Bush’s veto of a SCHIP expansion in October, Congressional leaders regrouped to develop a compromise measure that would address Bush’s claim that the original bill “moves the health care system in the wrong direction.”1 SCHIP permits coverage of children in families whose incomes (according to evaluation methods developed by the states) are at or below 200% of the federal poverty level. Like the first bill that Congress passed in the fall, the second measure would have provided states with the authority to extend the standard to 300% of the poverty level (with a limit of 350% permitted in New Jersey) while reducing states’ flexibility in determining what income counts in eligibility assessments. The bill also moved more aggressively to end SCHIP coverage of parents and other adults, imposed tougher citizenship-documentation requirements, and required states to try harder to avert health insurance crowd-out — the actual or potential tendency of one form of health insurance to substitute for other available coverage. (NEJM)

Whoever wins the White House, stem cell biotechs stand to reap the benefit from an incoming leader who is friendlier to stem cell researchers than President Bush, and that could lift stocks for the entire sector, experts say. (CNN)