Culture
COLUMBIA, SC - Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS), when caused by a bacterial toxin known as Staphylococcal enterotoxin, can be completely prevented by treatment with Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), a cannabinoid found in the cannabis plant. This exciting finding, recently published in the highly cited British Journal of Pharmacology, also suggests a possible treatment for ARDS caused by COVID-19.
A new method of brain imaging analysis offers the potential to greatly improve the effectiveness of noninvasive brain stimulation treatment for Alzheimer's, obsessive compulsive disorder, depression, and other conditions. Duke researchers developed the new method, which for the first time analyzed the whole brain network rather than a single region of the brain. This new method identified brain areas that exert the most control on network function.
A revolutionary group of scientists has been rethinking for two decades how we understand bird song, with women leading the way. Several of these scientists are from UMBC, and their latest research has revealed findings not just about birds, but about bird researchers.
Scientists at Johns Hopkins Medicine using MRI scans and computer modeling say they have further pinpointed areas of the human brain that regulate efforts to deal with fatigue.
The findings, they say, could advance the development of behavioral and other strategies that increase physical performance in healthy people, and also illuminate the neural mechanisms that contribute to fatigue in people with depression, multiple sclerosis and stroke.
The Gerontological Society of America's highly cited, peer-reviewed journals are continuing to publish scientific articles on COVID-19, and all are free to access. The following were published between July 24 and August 25; all are free to access:
Scientists have discovered that testing the levels of certain proteins in blood samples can predict whether a person at risk of psychosis is likely to develop a psychotic disorder years later.
The study is published in the current edition of JAMA Psychiatry and was led by researchers from RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences.
Healthcare systems around the world need to develop ways of supporting people in the community who are recovering from COVID-19, say researchers.
If they don't, there is a risk that people experiencing long-term symptoms will get worse and put additional strain on already-stretched health resources.
Current sequencing techniques lack the sensitivity to detect rare gene mutations in a pool of cells, which is particularly important, for example, in early cancer detection. Now, scientists at KAUST have developed an approach, called targeted individual DNA molecule sequencing (IDMseq), that can accurately detect a single mutation in a pool of 10,000 cells.
In a study published in the Journal of Morphology, a team of researchers from New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), Florida Museum of Natural History, Louisiana State University and Thailand's Maejo University have successfully pieced together the ancestral relationships that make up the family tree of hillstream loaches (Balitoridae), detailing for the first time a range of unusual pelvic adaptations across the family that have given some of its members an ability to crawl, or even walk as salamanders do, to navigate terrestrial surfaces.
Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory have discovered a metal-free carbon-based catalyst that has the potential to be much less expensive and more efficient for many industrial concerns, including manufacturing of bio- and fossil fuels, electrocatalysis, and fuel cells.
Washington, DC (August 2020) - Good news for pasta eaters! New research published in Frontiers in Nutrition this month, analyzing the diets of adults and children who eat pasta, has revealed good news about one of America's favorite foods. The research found that pasta consumption in both children and adults is associated with a better diet quality and better nutrient intakes than that of those adults and children who do not eat pasta. Furthermore, when evaluating weight parameters, no associations were observed in male adults and children.
Within cells, molecules known as transfer RNAs, or "tRNAs," play an important but unglamorous workhorse role in keeping the genetic translation process moving along from codes of DNA to functional proteins.
Because they play such a vital role in this translational "housekeeping," tRNAs are plentiful. There are hundreds of tRNA genes in mammalian cells and more than enough backup copies, just in case anything goes wrong. Yet because there are so many tRNAs, they've been largely overlooked in the search for the roots of disease processes.
Irvine, Calif., Aug. 26, 2020 - The detection more than a decade ago by the Fermi Gamma Ray Space Telescope of an excess of high-energy radiation in the center of the Milky Way convinced some physicists that they were seeing evidence of the annihilation of dark matter particles, but a team led by researchers at the University of California, Irvine has ruled out that interpretation.
LONDON, ONTARIO - A team from Lawson Health Research Institute and Western University has made significant steps forward in understanding COVID-19 through two back-to-back studies published this week in Critical Care Explorations. In one study, the team has identified six molecules that can be used as biomarkers to predict how severely ill a patient will become.
When a star passes too close to a supermassive black hole, tidal forces tear it apart, producing a bright flare of radiation as material from the star falls into the black hole. Astronomers study the light from these "tidal disruption events" (TDEs) for clues to the feeding behavior of the supermassive black holes lurking at the centers of galaxies.