New data suggest that alcohol may protect against rheumatoid arthritis, with three units a week exhibiting protective effects and ten units a week being more protective still. An alcohol consumption of three units per week or more also reduced the risk by smoking or by a genetic predisposition to RA.

Artificial blood vessels have been engineered from muscle-derived stem cells and a biodegradable polymer that exhibit extensive remodeling and remain free of blockages when grafted into rats. This development has potentially significant implications for the treatment of heart and kidney diseases, where there is a critical need for new sources of blood vessels for vascular grafts.

Celebrated in Buddhist temples and cultivated for its wood and cottony fibers, the kapok tree now is upsetting an idea that biologists have clung to for decades: the notion that African and South American rainforests are similar because the continents were connected 96 million years ago.

While companies might be leading the biggest-single-data-leak stakes, various governmental bodies are trying to make up for it in volume. On the federal level, the Veterans Administration has been leading the way, with the TSA right behind, while plenty of state governments and their contractors are getting in on the act, too. Now, in Ohio, the governor has announced that the names and Social Security numbers of 64,000 state employees are out in the wild -- after a storage device containing them was stolen from an intern's car. Yes, you read that correctly. We've wondered in the past just why people are carrying around so much personal information, but the governor claims that it was part of a "protocol intended to keep backup copies of data in case it was lost on state computer systems." Yes, apparently this protocol says that important information should be backed up on storage devices, then given to interns so they can store them in their cars for safekeeping. If you've ever given any personal information to the Ohio government, you might want to start keeping an eye on your credit report, since this is apparently its idea of security.