While complex hands seem to offer generality, simple hands are often more practical. This raises the question: how do generality and simplicity trade off in the design of robot hands? This paper explores the tension between simplicity in hand design and generality in hand function. It raises arguments both for and against simple hands; it considers several familiar examples; and it proposes a c...

To cite: Brissos J, Gouveia C, Neves C, et al. BMJ Case Rep Published online: [please include Day Month Year] doi:10.1136/ bcr-2013-200594 DESCRIPTION A healthy 3-year-old boy presented to our emergency department with a 2-week history of inflammatory scalp lesions. Physical examination revealed diffuse erythematous lesions, with focal areas of alopecia and several pustular patches with extensi...

Antibodies against a vaccine vector render T cells more susceptible to HIV-1 infection, say Perreau et al. on page 2717. Their results may help explain the failure of a recent HIV vaccine trial. The HIV-1 vaccine used in Merck's STEP trial relied on a weakened form of a common cold virus, Adenovirus 5 (Ad5), to carry bits of HIV into the body. One worry about the Ad5 vector was that widespread ...

"Working memory" is used for the transient storage of information in the brain. In this issue of Cell, Wang et al. (2007) now reveal how a series of molecular events involving alpha2A-adrenoceptors and a class of ion channels gated by cAMP tune the responses of neural circuits that function in working memory in mammals.