Compared to people in employment, men and women who are unemployed suffer more often and longer from both physical and emotional complaints. Why the un-employed should have health problems more often is discussed by Lars E. Kroll and his coauthor in the current issue of Deutsches Ärzteblatt International (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2011; 4: 47-52), along with a report on the findings of the GEDA study.
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URBANA – A University of Illinois scientist reports that family mealtimes that contain three ingredients in the right amounts can improve the quality of life in children who have chronic asthma.
"Family mealtimes, when they're done right, are linked to many benefits for children, including a reduced risk of substance abuse, eating disorders, and obesity. In this study, we've put these mealtimes under a microscope so we can see minute by minute which factors deliver these healthy outcomes," said Barbara H. Fiese, director of the U of I's Family Resiliency Center.
DURHAM, N.H. – From an environmental perspective, Daphnia pulex -- the waterflea – is the best-studied organism on the planet. Scientists know how this species responds to pollution, predators, day and night, making it an important model for ecological and evolutionary research. Its genome, however, remained elusive, limiting understanding of how the environment and genes interact.
Scientists continuing to investigate a 50 year mystery have discovered another vital clue that could help pave the way for improved medicines. The results feature in a special edition of Nature celebrating the International Year of Chemistry. The findings reveal an important insight into the way carbohydrates (sugars) bond and this will influence the way drugs are designed in the future.
University of British Columbia researchers estimate that fisheries catches in the Arctic totaled 950,000 tonnes from 1950 to 2006, almost 75 times the amount reported to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) during this period.
In our not-so-distant evolutionary past, stress often meant imminent danger, and the risk of blood loss, so part of our body's stress response is to stock-pile blood-clotting factors. Scientists in the Molecular Medicine Partnership Unit (MMPU), a collaboration between the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and the University of Heidelberg Medical Centre, have discovered how stressed cells boost the production of the key blood-clotting factor, thrombin.
This week, the highly-respected US Academy of Sciences journal (PNAS) published an article describing how the first line of defence of the human immune system distinguishes between microbes and the body's own structures. The basis of this recognition mechanism has been unclear since the key protein components were discovered over 30 years ago – and has now finally been cracked by a collaboration between high-level research groups at the University of Helsinki, Finland.
For almost two decades, cardiologists have searched for ways to see dangerous blood clots before they cause heart attacks.
Now, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis report that they have designed nanoparticles that find clots and make them visible to a new kind of X-ray technology.
According to Gregory Lanza, MD, PhD, a Washington University cardiologist at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, these nanoparticles will take the guesswork out of deciding whether a person coming to the hospital with chest pain is actually having a heart attack.
HOUSTON (Feb. 2, 2011) -- For women seeking pregnancy by assisted reproductive technologies, such as in-vitro fertilization (IVF), a new study shows that the health of the uterus is more relevant than egg quality for a newborn to achieve normal birth weight and full gestation. This study, published in Fertility and Sterility, an international journal for obstetricians, offers new information for women with infertility diagnoses considering options for conceiving.
Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) is a significant and growing problem in hospitals and other health care facilities, but no new drugs to treat the condition have been developed in several decades. However, a large-scale, phase 3 trial conducted by Canadian and U.S. researchers shows that the new antibiotic Fidaxomicin is superior to existing treatments, demonstrating a 45 percent reduction in recurrences vs. the existing licensed treatment. Their results were published in February, 2011 in The New England Journal of Medicine.
– Symptomatic lumbar disc disease, a condition caused by degeneration or herniation of the discs of the lower spine, may be inherited, according to a new study published in the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (JBJS).
A team of wildlife experts led by UC Davis called today for a national fight against a new fungus that has killed more than 1 million bats in the eastern United States and is spreading fast throughout North America.
"If we lose bats, we lose keystone species in some communities, predators that consume enormous numbers of insects, and beautiful wildlife species that are important parts of North America's biodiversity," said Janet Foley, a UC Davis professor of veterinary medicine at the Center for Vectorborne Diseases.
Surgery to "deactivate" migraine headaches produces lasting good results, with nearly 90 percent of patients having at least partial relief at five years' follow-up, reports a study in the February issue of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery®, the official medical journal of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS).
In the search for life on Mars or any planet, there is much more than the presence of carbon and oxygen to consider. Using Earth's biogeochemical cycles as a reference point, elements like nitrogen, iron and sulfur are just as important for supporting life. As explored in studies published in February's open-access Special Issue of Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, the most basic elements work together to support an extraordinary diversity of life.
TEMPE, Ariz. – Unraveling the molecular basis of life is an age-old quest of humanity. A breakthrough towards this goal was reported in a pair of studies published Feb. 3 in the scientific journal Nature, detailing a new method developed to determine structures of biomolecules based on diffraction from protein nanocrystals that are so small that they are not even visible under the microscope. A tiny aerojet nozzle provides a fully hydrated constant stream of nanocrystals, both supplied from an interdisciplinary research team at Arizona State University.