DON’T BLAME BROCCOLI. Blame your genes. Researchers at the Medical Center have helped identify a gene responsible for “tasting,” a.k.a. sensitivity to spicy and sweet foods—and to that phenylthiocarbamide-dipped paper someone handed you in high school biology. Also of note: the number of gene variations differed by ethnic group; people of African descent had the most variations, while Native Americans had the fewest.
GIVE IT A SHOT: Administering a vaccine for human papilloma virus to 2 million 12-year-old girls would cost $246 per person, prevent 3,300 cases of cervical cancer and save 1,300 lives, according to predictive models designed by assistant professor of medicine Gillian Sanders, PhD ’98, and third-year medical student Al Taira, ’86. “This is definitely seen as cost-effective compared to other things we pay for,” Sanders says.
