Culture
NEW HAMPTON, N.Y., July 20, 2020 -- On Wednesday, July 15, 2020, the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee (DGAC or Committee) - a group comprised of 20 nationally recognized health and nutrition experts - published the Scientific Report of the 2020 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee: Advisory Report to the Secretary of Agriculture and the Secretary of Health and Human Services.
About a quarter of people with drug or alcohol use disorders also suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which is typically caused by a traumatic or stressful life event such as rape or combat, and which leaves the person with intense anxiety. However, patients and health care providers have been reluctant to pursue the gold-standard treatment for PTSD -- cognitive behavioral therapy -- because they anticipate that thinking and talking about traumatic events during therapy will cause relapse.
Alzheimer's disease is a progressive disorder in which the nerve cells (neurons) in a person's brain and the connections among them degenerate slowly, causing severe memory loss, intellectual deficiencies, and deterioration in motor skills and communication. One of the main causes of Alzheimer's is the accumulation of a protein called amyloid β (Aβ) in clusters around neurons in the brain, which hampers their activity and triggers their degeneration.
In hotter, dryer conditions with climate change, a secret agent for more sustainable agricultural production could lie in harvesting the diverse beneficial soil microbiome in native bushland settings, scientists say.
New research from CSIRO, Flinders University and La Trobe University highlights the importance of soil biological health and further potential to use organic rather than chemical farm inputs for crop production.
Various scientific studies have warned of a global decline in the abundance and diversity of insects. These studies have been carried out mainly on the European and North American continents, with other regions, such as islands, have been less studied.
This in mind, an international research team from Portugal, France and Finland studied the insects captured over six years in the native forests of Terceira island, the Azores.
Scientists and historians working at McMaster University, the Mütter Museum and the University of Sydney have pieced together the genomes of old viruses that were used as vaccination strains during and after the American Civil War ultimately leading to the eradication of smallpox.
Smallpox was one of the most devastating viral diseases ever to strike humankind, killing about three out of every 10 people who were infected. Those who survived were frequently disabled, blind or disfigured.
Toshinori Chiba (ATR) and his collaborators have proposed an innovative new "Reciprocal Inhibition Model" of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which may aid considerably in its treatment. This model comprehensively explains the inhomogeneous nature of PTSD by addressing inter- and intra-patient variabilities at the neural, attentional, and symptom levels. This model may therefore pave the way for individual-tailored clinical PTSD treatment.
Cambridge scientists have developed a new way to fortify shellfish to tackle human nutrient deficiencies which cause severe health problems across the world. The team is now working with major seafood manufacturers to further test their microencapsulation technology, or "Vitamin Bullets".
** A proof of the paper can be downloaded here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/pqmez3rzutbhk55/Willer%20et%20al%20Author%27s%20Proof%2029062020.pdf?dl=0 **
A new guideline aimed at helping clinicians identify the difficult-to-diagnose acute aortic syndrome is published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).
Acute aortic syndrome (AAS) is a life-threatening condition that underlies 1 in 2000 visits to the emergency department for severe chest or back pain. The rate of misdiagnosis is estimated to be as high as 38%, and the risk of death can increase 2% for every hour of delay in diagnosis.
A school-based vision screening program in kindergarten, shown to be effective at identifying untreated vision problems in 1 in 10 students, could be useful to implement widely in diverse communities, according to new research in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).
Vision problems can lead to amblyopia (known as "lazy eye") and potential learning problems.
The “enhanced paper grip test” validated by researchers from the Centre for Biomechanics and Rehabilitation Technologies (CBRT) at Staffordshire University involves pulling a small card from underneath the participant’s foot while asking them to grip with their big toe (Hallux).
The proposed test can potentially be used to monitor muscle weakness in clinics for better falls-risk assessment in patients with diabetes.
PITTSBURGH--A robot travelling from point A to point B is more efficient if it understands that point A is the living room couch and point B is a refrigerator, even if it's in an unfamiliar place. That's the common sense idea behind a "semantic" navigation system developed by Carnegie Mellon University and Facebook AI Research (FAIR).
Asian gypsy moths feed on a wide range of important plants and trees. White pine blister rust can kill young trees in only a couple of years. But it's not always easy to detect the presence of these destructive species just by looking at spots and bumps on a tree, or on the exterior of a cargo ship.
You have been diagnosed with prostate cancer and your doctor gives you the option of not being treated, but of remaining under observation: is there any objective way you can decide to be treated or not treated? What should you do? Now using first results from analysis of the world's biggest Active Surveillance prostate cancer database, the GAP3 consortium* has begun to identify which patients are at risk of the disease developing and which patients can continue to safely delay treatment. This work is presented at the virtual European Association of Urology congress.
The health benefits of maintaining routine childhood vaccination programmes in Africa during the COVID-19 pandemic far outweigh the risk of SARS-CoV-2 transmission that might be associated with clinic visits, according to a modelling study published in The Lancet Global Health journal.