NEW YORK, NY — Evidence from human famines and animal studies suggests that starvation can affect the health of descendants of famished individuals. But how such an acquired trait might be transmitted from one generation to the next has not been clear. A new study, involving roundworms, shows that starvation induces specific changes in so-called small RNAs and that these changes are inherited through at least three consecutive generations, apparently without any DNA involvement.
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Los Angeles, CA -- Breastfeeding is known to provide significant health benefits for both infants and their mothers. However, while many women intend to breastfeed despite returning to work, a new study finds that mothers who plan to breastfeed for at least three months but return to work full-time are less likely to meet their breastfeeding goals. Conversely, there is no association between women who return to work part-time and failure to reach the breastfeeding goal of at least three months. This new study was published today in the Journal of Human Lactation.
Current guidelines do not distinguish between aspirin and more potent blood thinners for protecting against blood clots in patients who undergo major orthopedic operations, leaving the decision up to individual clinicians. A new analysis published today in the Journal of Hospital Medicine provides much-needed information that summarizes existing studies about which medications are best after different types of surgery.
CHICAGO --- After 50 years of being a mainstay cholesterol therapy, niacin should no longer be prescribed for most patients due to potential increased risk of death, dangerous side effects and no benefit in reducing heart attacks and strokes, writes Northwestern Medicine® preventive cardiologist Donald Lloyd-Jones, M.D., in a New England Journal of Medicine editorial.
Investigators have identified a gene that underlies a very rare but devastating autoinflammatory condition in children. Several existing drugs have shown therapeutic potential in laboratory studies, and one is currently being studied in children with the disease, which the researchers named STING-associated vasculopathy with onset in infancy (SAVI). The findings appeared online today in the New England Journal of Medicine. The research was done at the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS), part of the National Institutes of Health.
HOUSTON – (July 16, 2014) – Rice University scientists have succeeded in analyzing transmembrane protein folding in the same way they study the proteins' free-floating, globular cousins.
Rice theoretical biologist Peter Wolynes and his team at the university's Center for Theoretical Biological Physics (CTBP) have applied his energy landscape theory to proteins that are hard to view because they live and work primarily inside cell membranes.
The choice of contralateral prophylactic mastectomy (CPM) by women with breast cancer (BC) diagnosed in one breast has recently increased in the US but may confer only a marginal life expectancy benefit depending on the type and stage of cancer, according to a study published July 16 in the JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
Medicare spending on breast cancer screening increased substantially between 2001 and 2009 but the detection rates of early stage tumors were unchanged, according to a new study published July 16 in the JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
Older registered nurses are working longer than in the past, one reason that the nation's supply of RNs has grown substantially in recent years, according to a new study.
Researchers found that from 1991 to 2012, among registered nurses working at age 50, 24 percent remained working as late as age 69. This compared to 9 percent during the period from 1969 to 1990. The findings are published online by the journal Health Affairs.
DETROIT – Robot-assisted surgery to remove cancerous prostate glands is effective in controlling the disease for 10 years, according to a new study led by researchers at Henry Ford Hospital.
The study also suggested that traditional methods of measuring the severity and possible spread of the cancer together with molecular techniques might, with further research, help to create personalized, cost-effective treatment regimens for prostate cancer patients who undergo the surgical procedure.
Forest cover in Borneo may have declined by up to 30% over the past 40 years, according to a study published July 16, 2014 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by David Gaveau from the Center for International Forestry Research, Indonesia, and colleagues.
At the fringe of the whale shark range, the volcanic Azore islands may play an increasing role for the north Atlantic population as sea surface temperatures rise, according to a study published July 16, 2014 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Pedro Afonso from University of the Azores and colleagues.
Removal of river water for irrigation and habitat fragmentation by irrigation dams were shown to be the principal factors contributing to the decline of the Indus river dolphin, according to a study published July 16, 2014 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Gill Braulik from the Wildlife Conservation Society and University of St. Andrews and colleagues.
Cardiologists at the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute have developed a minimally invasive gene transplant procedure that changes unspecialized heart cells into "biological pacemaker" cells that keep the heart steadily beating.
New research has identified a potential cause of and a better diagnostic method for preeclampsia, one of the most deadly and poorly understood pregnancy-related conditions in the world. The international team, led by researchers at Nationwide Children's Hospital, discovered that the disease may result from a collection of protein mishaps like those associated with Alzheimer's disease.