University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston researchers have been awarded a five-year, $1.8 million grant by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke to apply the techniques of gene therapy to the problem of neuropathic pain—that is, pain that arises from a malfunction in the nervous system. (Phys.org)

Tennessee Reproductive Medicine partners Dr. Rink Murray and Dr. Jessica Scotchie launched the “IVF Guarantee Program” last week as demonstration of their commitment to “do everything possible to minimize the financial and emotional stress of infertility.” (The Wall Street Journal)

Flesh-eating bacteria amputee Aimee Copeland now uses the latest technology in prosthetic hands to chop vegetables, pick up tiny items like Skittles, and comb and iron press her hair. (CNN)

In 1979 China instituted the one-child policy, which limited every family to just one offspring in a controversial attempt to reduce the country’s burgeoning population. The strictly enforced law had the desired effects: in 2011 researchers estimated that the policy prevented 400 million births. In a new study in Science, researchers find that it has also caused China’s so-called little emperors to be more pessimistic, neurotic and selfish than their peers who have siblings. (Scientific American)

A pioneering programme to test cancer patients for nearly 100 risk genes is to start in London and could represent the future of treatment in the NHS. (BBC)

Upcoming paper in ‘Science’ pushes back against recent recommendations from the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics. (News-medical)

The poorest countries in the world are lagging behind higher-income developing countries in meeting the demand for modern contraception, U.S. researchers say. (UPI)

Australian research has created a molecular roadmap that shows how any cell in the human body can be turned into artificial stem cells. The roadmap, produced in collaboration with Harvard University, is a major advance in cellular reprogramming technology, which is already being exploited in pharmaceutical testing and some clinical settings overseas - but until now wasn’t understood. (The Sydney Morning Herald)

A federal judge on Friday temporarily blocked enforcement of one of the country’s most stringent abortion laws, an Arkansas ban on the procedure at the 12th week of pregnancy, saying the law was likely to be declared unconstitutional. (New York Times)

A coolie in Kanyakumari district has sought permission for euthanasia of his infant son, who has been suffering from an unknown disorder since his birth. (Times of India)

Since the heart is such a delicate and critical organ, clinicians usually opt not to intervene with the dead cells that remain after a heart attack or cardiac disease. (Phys.org)

Some of the UK’s leading neuroscientists, stem cell biologists, psychologists and psychiatrists are uniting to break down scientific barriers in a bid to solve the mystery of mental illness and neurological conditions. (Wellcome Trust)

In the old days, sales representatives from drug companies would chat up local pharmacists to learn what drugs doctors were prescribing. Now such shoulder-rubbing is becoming a quaint memory — thanks to vast databases of patient and doctor information being used by pharmaceutical companies to market drugs. (New York Times)

Applying high-frequency electrical noise to the brain can boost maths skills up to six months later, say Oxford University researchers. (BBC)

People and policymakers may eventually wake up to the fact that we are not a bunch of sick individuals, each of us having a bunch of psychiatric diagnoses, cumulatively constituting a sick society. This is a myth generated by an overly ambitious psychiatry and a remarkably greedy pharmaceutical industry. (Wired)

The People’s Republic of China’s new system for acquiring organs—and the man behind it, former Vice Minister of Health Huang Jiefu—has been lauded in some circles as a decisive break from the use of executed prisoners as organ sources. But critics regard the new arrangements as implicitly coercive, and argue that the lack of transparency allows organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience and others to continue.  (The Epoch Times)

IF A new and deadly strain of influenza were to arise, putting together a vaccine against it in the least possible time would be a priority. To test how quickly that could be done a group of researchers have just had a race with themselves. (The Economist)

Google and NASA are forming a laboratory to study artificial intelligence by means of computers that use the unusual properties of quantum physics. Their quantum computer, which performs complex calculations thousands of times faster than existing supercomputers, is expected to be in active use in the third quarter of this year. (New York Times)

Women aged up to 42 will now get a free cycle, rather than the previous maximum age limit of 40, after undergoing a test to see how many eggs they have left. This is known as their ovarian reserve. (The Telegraph)

Fertility specialists have developed a radical technique that can boost the chances of IVF couples having a healthy baby. Doctors in Nottingham who devised the procedure say it could raise live birthrates at their clinic to 78%, around three times the national average for IVF treatment in the UK. (The Guardian)

Public funding of assisted reproductive technology, including in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatments, broadens the range of couples who seek treatment for infertility by attracting a more diverse population, according to new research from Canada. (Medical Xpress)