Culture
Below please find a summary and link(s) of new coronavirus-related content published today in Annals of Internal Medicine. The summary below is not intended to substitute for the full article as a source of information. A collection of coronavirus-related content is free to the public at http://go.annals.org/coronavirus.
Scientists have discovered that measuring brainwaves produced during REM sleep can predict whether a patient will respond to treatment from depression. This enables patients to switch to a new treatment rather than continue the ineffective treatment (and the depression) for weeks without knowing the outcome.
As study leader, Dr Thorsten Mikoteit said, "In real terms it means that patients, often in the depths of despair, might not need to wait weeks to see if their therapy is working before modifying their treatment". This work is presented at the ECNP Congress.
The bulk of the DNA in the cells of higher organisms is confined to the nucleus, while all other organellar DNAs are restricted to defined intracellular compartments in the cytoplasm. The appearance of DNA in the soluble phase of the cytoplasm is therefore interpreted by the innate immune system as signaling the presence of intracellular pathogens - usually bacteria or viruses, although tumor cells and senescent cells can also release nuclear or mitochondrial DNA into the cytosol.
When volcanos erupt, these geologic monsters produce tremendous clouds of ash and dust--plumes that can blacken the sky, shut down air traffic and reach heights of roughly 25 miles above Earth's surface.
A new study led by the University of Colorado Boulder suggests that such volcanic ash may also have a larger influence on the planet's climate than scientists previously suspected.
PITTSBURGH--The science community has responded to the COVID-19 pandemic with such a flurry of research studies that it is hard for anyone to digest them all, underscoring a long-standing need to make scientific publication more accessible, transparent and accountable, two artificial intelligence experts assert in a data science journal.
What The Study Did: Psychological symptoms, nonsuicidal self-injury and suicidal ideation, plans, and attempts among children and adolescents were investigated in this observational study before the COVID-19 outbreak started (early November 2019) and two weeks after school reopening (mid-May 2020) in an area of China with low risk of COVID-19.
Authors: Ying Sun, M.D., of Anhui Medical University in the Anhui province of China, is the corresponding author.
What The Study Did: This observational study investigated demographic and military service characteristics associated with suicide risk among U.S. veterans after the transition from active military service to civilian life.
Authors: Mark A. Reger, Ph.D., of the Veterans Affairs Puget Sound Health Care System in Seattle, is the corresponding author.
To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/
What The Study Did: Researchers compared changes from 2000 to 2017 in premature deaths in the U.S. due to drug poisonings, suicide and alcohol-induced causes by geographic areas and demographic characteristics.
Authors: Meredith S. Shiels, Ph.D., of the National Cancer Institute in Rockville, Maryland, 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/jamanetworkopen.2020.16217)
Clinical studies have found that bone mineral density in patients with anxiety or depression is lower than in ordinary people.
The brain, commander of the body, receives and processes external signals, and then sends instructions to peripheral bones. But how does anxiety induce a decline in bone mineral density?
Researchers working on the Seeds of Discovery (SeeD) initiative, which aims to facilitate the effective use of genetic diversity of maize and wheat, have genetically characterized 79,191 samples of wheat from the germplasm banks of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA).
In a new study in Cell Discovery, Liang Li and Chen-Yu Zhang group at Nanjing University and two other groups report that SIDT1 polymorphism remarkably decreases HD-MIR2911 absorption in human. Exosome isolated from volunteers that carry SIDT1 polymorphism has lower level of HD-MIR2911 and fails to inhibit of SARS-CoV-2 replication.
For anisotropic crystals, it has been known for many years that the birefringence effect rising from anisotropic refractive index should be considered for angle-resolved polarized Raman (ARPR) intensity. For opaque anisotropic crystals (OAC), not only the birefringence effect but also the dichroism effect from anisotropic absorption is responsible for ARPR intensity.
Luxembourg, 10 September 2020 - In a seven-year research effort, an international team of scientists has clarified the cause for certain genetic forms of Parkinson's disease, and has identified potential pharmacological treatments. The interdisciplinary research team, led by Prof. Rejko Krüger, of the Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine (LCSB) of the University of Luxembourg, experimented on patient-based cell cultures in the laboratory. The new combination of active substances they identified will have to undergo clinical trials before they can be used to treat patients.
Since every process in lateral root development, including initiation, emergence and elongation is governed by auxin, the question arises of how auxin responds to the local presence of ammonium which is a major nitrogen source in natural and agricultural soils. "Our work shows that ammonium uptake by roots provokes pH changes that bring the plant hormone auxin into a protonated form allowing auxin to diffuse into outer root cells where it triggers the emergence of lateral roots", says Prof. von Wirén.
Insect pollination is as important to Arctic plants as it is to plants further south. When flowers abound, the plants have to compete for pollinators. Researchers at the University of Helsinki reveal that higher temperatures cause the flowering periods of different plant species to pile up in time. As a consequence, climate change may affect the competitive relationships of plants.
The most attractive plant species steal the majority of pollinators, making other plants flowering at the same time suffer from poorer pollination.