Culture | Page 2696 | Science Codex

New studies highlight needs of boys in K-12, higher education

Fairbanks, Alaska—Boys face high rates of a variety of mental health issues, in addition to lagging behind girls in academic performance and college attendance, according to two new papers by University of Alaska Fairbanks researcher Judith Kleinfeld.

The studies, recently published in the journal Gender Issues, note that boys have higher rates of suicide, conduct disorders, emotional disturbance, premature death and juvenile delinquency than their female peers, as well as lower grades, test scores and college attendance rates.

New study finds 125 million pregnancies globally at risk from malaria every year

A new study by the Malaria in Pregnancy Consortium has estimated that more than 125 million pregnancies around the world are at risk from malaria every year. Until now, estimates have only been available for endemic areas in Africa.

The Malaria in Pregnancy Consortium was established in 2007 at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine to improve the control of malaria in pregnancy. Burden assessment is an important first step in a country's malaria control plan in order to target limited resources and, as such, is one of the Consortium's four key work areas.

American Academy of Neurology evaluates treatments for kids with cerebral palsy

ST. PAUL, Minn. – A new guideline from the American Academy of Neurology and the Child Neurology Society finds botulinum toxin type A to be an effective treatment for spasticity, muscle tightness that interferes with movement, in children and adolescents with cerebral palsy, but poses some risk. The guideline is published in the January 26, 2010, issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

Everybody laughs, everybody cries: Researchers identify universal emotions

Here's a piece of research that might leave you tickled: laughter is a universal language, according to new research. The study, conducted with people from Britain and Namibia, suggests that basic emotions such as amusement, anger, fear and sadness are shared by all humans.

No evidence of a post-Olympics boom or bust for host city real estate prices: UBC study

Cities that win Olympic bids experience neither boom nor bust in their real estate prices, but gain construction jobs as they prepare for the Games, according to researchers at the Sauder School of Business at the University of British Columbia.

The UBC study is the first to use real estate variables to test the Games' economic impact on host cities. Sauder School of Business researchers analyzed house prices and construction employment in the years leading up to and after the Olympics in Australian, Canadian and U.S. cities.

70 percent of Inuit preschoolers live in food insecure homes

Seventy percent of Inuit preschoolers in Nunavut, Canada's largest territory, live in households where there isn't enough food, a situation with implications for children's academic and psychosocial development, found an article in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).

The study, conducted by researchers at McGill University and the Government of Nunavut, looked at 388 Inuit children aged 3-5 years in 16 communities from 2007-2008.

A pregnant woman does not look like an olive

CHICAGO – Replacing confusing language and icons on standard warnings labels for prescription medicine and listing only the most important warnings could make a big difference in how well patients understand the instructions that are critical to their health, according to a new study from Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

The NHS and the cost-benefit dilemma

New research by health economists at the University of York has raised concerns over any move to broaden the range of costs and economic benefits considered in the analysis of new NHS treatments.

A study by the University's Centre for Health Economics suggests that widening the perspective used by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) to assess the cost-effectiveness of new technologies may not benefit either the NHS or the wider economy.

The research examined a range of possible policies and a number of case studies from past NICE appraisals.

Kibbutz transformation continues

Over the course of 2009, five more kibbutzim converted to the "renewing kibbutz" model (paying its members differential wages) bringing the percentage of such kibbutzim up to 72% of all the kibbutzim in Israel. "It is highly probable that by the end of 2012 the number of kibbutzim shifting to alternative models will be higher than the number of the kibbutzim that did so over 2009," says Dr. Shlomo Getz, Head of the Institute for the Research of the Kibbutz and the Cooperative Idea at the University of Haifa who carried out the survey.

Acrocephalus orinus - world's least known bird rediscovered

A species of bird, which has only been observed alive on three previous occasions since it was first discovered in 1867, has been rediscovered in a remote land corridor in north-eastern Afghanistan. The discovery was made as part of an international collaboration, which included researchers at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

Prostate cancer treated differently at county vs. private hospitals

Researchers at Moores Cancer Center at the University of California, San Diego and colleagues have found that prostate cancer treatments varied significantly between county hospitals and private providers. Patients treated in county hospitals are more likely to undergo surgery while patients treated in private facilities tend to receive radiation or hormone therapy. These findings were published online by the journal Cancer on January 25.

Fast food menus with calorie information lead to lower calorie selections for young children

In a new study, the amount of calories selected by parents for their child's hypothetical meal at McDonald's restaurants were reduced by an average of 102 calories when the menus clearly showed the calories for each item. This is the first study to suggest that labeled menus may lead to significantly reduced calorie intake in fast food restaurant meals purchased for children. Led by researcher Pooja S.

Using supercomputers to explore nuclear energy

UNIC has run successfully at DOE leadership computing facilities, home to some of the world's fastest supercomputers, including the energy-efficient IBM Blue Gene/P at Argonne and the Cray XT5 at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Although still under development, the code has already produced new scientific results.

Autism Speaks responds to recent publications citing autism clusters in California

NEW YORK, N.Y. (January 21, 2010) –Two recent, separate publications identified regions with higher than expected numbers of autism cases – or clusters – in California. Using data collected by the California Department of Developmental Services (DDS) on 2.5 million births including almost 10,000 autism cases from 1996-2000, investigators at UC Davis uncovered several clusters of elevated risk for autism.

Report examines options for detecting and countering near-Earth objects

WASHINGTON -- A new report from the National Research Council lays out options NASA could follow to detect more near-Earth objects (NEOs) – asteroids and comets that could pose a hazard if they cross Earth's orbit. The report says the $4 million the U.S. spends annually to search for NEOs is insufficient to meet a congressionally mandated requirement to detect NEOs that could threaten Earth.