Faculty Bibliography

The researchers, who reported their finding at a meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology in San Francisco, do not know whether the virus causes prostate cancer, infection or any other ailment in humans. The virus, called XMRV, could prove to be harmless. Still, finding a virus in a rare form of prostate cancer intrigues scientists because of growing suspicions that prostate cancer might result from chronic inflammation caused by bacteria or a virus. The XMRV virus is closely related to a group of retroviruses found in mice and known as xenotropic murine leukemia virus. (Xenotropic means the virus crossed species.) Though such viruses can cause disease in animals other than mice, there has been no documented human infection until the new report

Both men were hospitalized after complaining of pain. Governor [George E. Pataki] had his appendix removed on Feb. 16, developed intestinal complications, and was transferred to another hospital for more surgery. Governor Fletcher had a gallstone removed, then his gall bladder, and later developed an infection in his abdomen and bloodstream. David M. Catalfamo, the communications director for Governor Pataki, said the administration has been trying to strike the right balance between informing the public of important developments about the governor's health while preserving some of his privacy. He said that the written statements his office has issued over the last few days have updated the public on the salient points about the governor's health. But some other doctors not connected with the case have said that the statements were sparse in detail. Since then, the administration has relied on the written statements to discuss his condition. But the absence of specific detail led many news outlets to call doctors who are not involved in Governor Pataki's care and invite them to speculate about the causes of his intestinal complications. After The Daily News quoted a doctor who raised the possibility that the governor's digestive system had been blocked by surgical error, Mr. Catalfamo issued a statement which said that the blockage ''was not a result of surgical error.''

The man who contracted inhalation anthrax, Vado Diomande, a drummer and dancer, collapsed after a performance in Pennsylvania and was hospitalized there last Thursday. On Tuesday, after blood tests confirmed the presence of anthrax, Pennsylvania authorities alerted New York City officials. Yesterday morning, federal authorities concluded definitively that Mr. Diomande had inhalation anthrax. Officials in Pennsylvania also took steps last night to reassure students and employees at the school, Mansfield University in Mansfield, Pa., where Mr. Diomande performed before he collapsed. Mr. Diomande, who is conscious and cooperating with investigators, remained in fair condition last night in the intensive-care unit at Robert Packer Hospital in Sayre, Pa. After Vado Diomande was hospitalized in Pennsylvania with anthrax, an investigation led officials yesterday to a Brooklyn warehouse and the man's van nearby. (Photo by Robert Stolarik for The New York Times); (Photo by Kotchegna Dance Company via Getty Images)(pg. B1); Police yesterday entered the apartment of Vado Diomande at 31 Downing Street in the West Village, after he was found to have anthrax. (Photo by Robert Caplin for The New York Times); From left: Health Commissioner [Thomas R. Frieden]; [Mark J. Mershon] of the F.B.I.; Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly; Joseph F. Bruno, emergency management chief; and Mayor [Michael R. Bloomberg]. (Photo by Michelle V. Agins/The New York Times)(pg. B5)

The governor's doctors have not addressed reporters since Mr. [George E. Pataki] left the first hospital, Hudson Valley Hospital Center in Cortlandt Manor. In his statement, Mr. [David M. Catalfamo] said that the surgery to ease the governor's digestive system had gone as expected, and that the governor was awake and able to work on his laptop and walk around. John F. Kilcooley, who was visiting his brother-in-law at the hospital, said he had bumped into Governor Pataki and his wife, Libby, as they walked through the halls of the McKeen Pavilion at the NewYork-Presbyterian hospital yesterday. He said that Mr. Pataki, clad in pajamas and a robe, looked well, and that he was wheeling an intravenous unit with him as he walked. Mr. Pataki is also at risk for developing other complications, like infections and abscesses. Mr. Pataki's doctors would be expected to do additional tests, including imaging procedures like CT scans, at the first sign of a fever or increased white blood count or pain, Dr. [Ralph S. Greco] said

Mr. [George E. Pataki] was transferred to the Manhattan hospital yesterday morning from Hudson Valley Hospital Center in Cortlandt Manor in Westchester County, where he underwent the emergency appendectomy. Doctors there said that after the appendectomy, Mr. Pataki experienced an ileus, which means that for some reason the bowel stopped functioning normally, producing a blockage. ''It is not routine to go back and relieve an obstruction this early in the postoperative course'' after appendicitis, even a perforated appendix, Dr. [Matthew M. Hutter] said in a telephone interview. But, Dr. Hutter said, the need for such an operation would depend on what Mr. Pataki's surgeons found when they performed the appendectomy and what CT scans and other imaging tests might have shown since then. Mr. [David Catalfamo]'s statement did not say what caused Mr. Pataki's bowel obstruction. So his statement did not necessarily rule out the possibility that Mr. Pataki, who is 60, had an additional medical problem causing the obstruction

Mr. [Bush]'s comments were his first on the matter since Mr. [Dick Cheney] wounded the victim, a 78-year-old lawyer, Harry M. Whittington, on a quail-hunting expedition in Texas last weekend and his first public reaction to an interview that Mr. Cheney gave about the incident on Wednesday to Fox News. The president's words appeared to be an effort to tamp down widespread talk about tensions between him and Mr. Cheney. Mr. Bush's aides had made little secret all week that they wished Mr. Cheney had handled the matter differently -- in particular by disclosing it more quickly and via a more established channel than the Web site of a local newspaper in Texas. And on Wednesday, the White House signaled that Mr. Bush was sympathetic to that view. The incident was not made public for more than 18 hours. As Mr. Bush spoke, Mr. Cheney headed to Wyoming, his home state, to make a speech to the Legislature on Friday. Mr. Cheney was expected to mention the hunting accident in his remarks, which were scheduled before the accident

Peter Banko, the Texas hospital's emergency department medical director, said doctors there did an ultrasound, a CT scan and a cardiac catheterization, which provide two-dimensional images. Banko said the hospital had a 64-slice CT scan that could provide three- dimensional images, but he did not say that the doctors performed the more sophisticated one on [Harry Whittington], or if so, when. Doctors try to synchronize such CT X-rays with the heartbeat to avoid blurring from motion, said Jeffrey Goldman, a specialist in heart CT scans at Manhattan Diagnostic Radiology. But, Goldman said, doctors cannot synchronize a CT scan in patients with atrial fibrillation. Metal in a pellet can cause a different kind of blurring in CT scans. But the Texas doctors did not say that they performed a 64- slice CT scan after they learned Whittington had a pellet near his heart and before he developed the abnormal heart rhythm

Peter Banko, the Texas hospital's emergency department medical director, said doctors there did an ultrasound, a CT scan and a cardiac catheterization, which provide two-dimensional images. Banko said the hospital had a 64-slice CT scan that could provide three- dimensional images, but he did not say that the doctors performed the more sophisticated one on [Harry Whittington], or if so, when. Doctors try to synchronize such CT X-rays with the heartbeat to avoid blurring from motion, said Jeffrey Goldman, a specialist in heart CT scans at Manhattan Diagnostic Radiology. But, Goldman said, doctors cannot synchronize a CT scan in patients with atrial fibrillation. Metal in a pellet can cause a different kind of blurring in CT scans. But the Texas doctors did not say that they performed a 64- slice CT scan after they learned Whittington had a pellet near his heart and before he developed the abnormal heart rhythm

Dr. Peter Banko, the Texas hospital's emergency department medical director, said doctors there did an ultrasound, a CT scan and a cardiac catheterization, which provide two-dimensional images. Dr. Banko said the hospital had a 64-slice CT scan that could provide three-dimensional images, but he did not say that the doctors performed the more sophisticated one on Mr. [Harry M. Whittington], or if so, when. Doctors try to synchronize such CT X-rays with the heartbeat to avoid blurring from motion, said Dr. Jeffrey P. Goldman, a specialist in heart CT scans at Manhattan Diagnostic Radiology. But, Dr. Goldman said, doctors cannot synchronize a CT scan in patients with atrial fibrillation. Metal in a pellet can cause a different kind of blurring in CT scans. But the Texas doctors did not say that they performed a 64-slice CT scan after they learned Mr. Whittington had a pellet near his heart and before he developed the abnormal rhythm

The lethal A(H5N1) bird flu virus has been detected in wild birds in Italy and Greece, European officials announced yesterday, the first time its presence has been detected in the European Union. It was also detected in Bulgaria. Only about 160 people have become infected with the disease, mostly through close contact with sick birds, and about half of them have died. In Italy, police officers near Messina, in Sicily, found two dead swans on Thursday and performed rapid screening tests on them in the wild, which suggested that the swans had a flu virus, according to ANSA, the official Italian news agency. Such simple tests are not specific enough to indicate a particular virus or strain, like A(H5N1). The variant strain of the A(H5N1) flu found in Turkey and confirmed in Africa last week is identical to one found last year in dead migratory birds in a nature reserve in northern China, and later in Siberia. It is different from strains circulating among poultry in Southeast Asia and Indonesia. Two species of ducks, the northern pintail and the garganey, migrate in a southwesterly direction each fall from Siberia to Turkey and the Black Sea coast, and in some cases to central Africa, according to a recent article in New Scientist. Other species that share the same African wetlands migrate north in the spring, which raises the threat that the disease will be spread more widely around Western Europe later this year