Culture
EAU CLAIRE, Wis. -- Before the COVID-19 pandemic, information about the dangers of vaping was emerging. To investigate the potentially serious health and respiratory implications of vaping, Mayo Clinic researchers wanted to better understand the factors influencing vaping in the community. They were ready to launch a survey of young adults in rural and urban areas when COVID-19 shifted the focus of this survey.
In a new publication from Cardiovascular Innovations and Applications; DOI https://doi.org/10.15212/CVIA.2019.1262, Wen-Yuan Ding, Jia-Min Li, Fei Zheng, Li-Li Wang, Xin-Yi Wei and Guo-Hua Li from Shandong Provincial Qianfoshan Hospital, Ji'nan, China, Affiliated Hospital of Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Ji'nan, China and Shandong First Medical University, Tai'an, China consider the challenges of treating acute myocardial infarction due to variant angina.
Researchers at the University of Tokyo have identified how the architecture of the cell nucleus can change gene activity in plants. This discovery reveals fundamental knowledge about genome regulation and points towards future methods for potentially manipulating the expression of many genes simultaneously.
Thanks to modern medicine, humans tend to live much longer than before. Unfortunately, this also opens a wider window to develop chronic diseases with late onset, such as neurodegenerative diseases. Despite considerable research being devoted toward developing a cure for diseases like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, there are currently no effective treatments.
A new study in health care workers led by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), an institution supported by "la Caixa" Foundation and the Hospital Clínic of Barcelona, shows that IgA and IgM antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 decay quickly, while IgG antibody levels are maintained for at least three months after infection. The longer follow-up of this cohort will provide much-needed information on the duration of different types of antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, as well as their role in protecting from disease and reinfection.
There is an idea within the coronavirus research field that there is some kind of T cell abnormality in critically ill COVID-19 patients, but specific details have not yet been clarified. To shed light on the problem, a research collaboration based in Kumamoto University (Japan) has performed a genetic analysis of T cells from lung tissue of COVID-19 patients. Their work revealed abnormalities in T cells that resulted in overactivation that may cause severe pneumonia.
SINGAPORE, 20 November 2020 - Sometimes, too much of a good thing can turn out to be bad. This is certainly the case for the excessive cell growth found in cancer. But when cancers try to grow too fast, this excessive speed can cause a type of cellular ageing that actually results in arrested growth. Scientists at Duke-NUS Medical School have now discovered that a well-known signalling pathway helps cancers grow by blocking the pro-growth signals from a second major cancer pathway.
Glyphosate is the most commonly used broad-spectrum herbicide. Researchers from the University of Turku in Finland have developed a new bioinformatics tool to predict if a microbe, e.g. a human gut bacterium, is sensitive to glyphosate.
"Glyphosate targets an enzyme called EPSPS in the shikimate pathway. This enzyme is crucial to synthesizing three essential amino acids. Based on the structure of the EPSPS enzyme, we are able to classify 80-90% of microbial species into sensitive or resistant to glyphosate," says Docent Pere Puigbò, developer of the new bioinformatics tool.
What The Study Did: Researchers report two cases of ophthalmic clinical examination findings in patients who underwent prolonged prone positioning in the intensive care unit during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Authors: Howard D. Pomeranz, M.D., Ph.D., of Northwell Health in Great Neck, New York, is the corresponding author.
To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/
(doi:10.1001/jamaophthalmol.2020.4988)
November 19, 2020, New York - Water is a ubiquitous liquid with many highly unique properties. The way it responds to changes in pressure and temperature can be completely different from other liquids that we know, and these properties are essential to many practical applications and particularly to life as we know it.
Researchers from Edith Cowan University (ECU) in Western Australia have found a simple way to analyse the effectiveness of exercise training that could one day be conducted easily at a local gym or physio.
Using vertical jumps as a test activity, the researchers could predict detailed information regarding technique and muscle activation patterns just through a relatively simple analysis of forces produced against the ground during the jump.
Fragrances - promising mystery, intrigue and forbidden thrills - are blended by master perfumers, their recipes kept secret. In a new study on the sense of smell, Weizmann Institute of Science researchers have managed to strip much of the mystery from even complex blends of odorants, not by uncovering their secret ingredients, but by recording and mapping how they are perceived. The scientists can now predict how any complex odorant will smell from its molecular structure alone.
Forensic science experts at Flinders University are refining an innovative counter-terrorism technique that checks for environmental DNA in the dust on clothing, baggage, shoes or even a passport.
The Flinders-led research, led by postdoctoral research associate Dr Jennifer Young, will developed a system to trace the source of dust on suspect articles to match a soil profile of a specific area or overseas country.
According to the current state of knowledge, there are no cases that have shown evidence of humans being infected with the novel coronavirus via the consumption of contaminated food. Nor has any reliable evidence being presented to date concerning transmission of the virus via contact with contaminated objects or contaminated surfaces - such as packaging - which would have led to subsequent infections in humans. Imported refrigerated or frozen food and its packaging that has been produced under unhygienic conditions in regions affected by SARS-CoV-2 could contain the virus.
We all react to stress in different ways. A sudden loud noise or flash of light can elicit different degrees of response from people, which indicates that some of us are more susceptible to the impact of stress than others.
Any event that causes stress is called a "stressor". Our bodies are equipped to handle acute exposure to stressors, but chronic exposure can result in mental disorders, e.g. anxiety and depression and even physical changes, e.g. cardiovascular alterations as seen in hypertension or stroke-disorders.