Culture

Eczema is a very common skin problem affecting around one in five children in the UK. Eczema usually starts in infancy, and a generally dry skin is often one of the first symptoms in babies who go on to develop the condition.

It is thought that a faulty skin barrier could be the first step in the development of eczema. Moisturisers improve skin barrier function by providing a covering to the outermost layer of skin and trapping in water.

Analysis of Paleolithic-era teeth from a 28,500-year-old fossil site in the Czech Republic provides supporting evidence for two groups of canids - one dog-like and the other wolf-like - with differing diets, which is consistent with the early domestication of dogs.

The study, published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, was co-directed by Peter Ungar, Distinguished Professor of anthropology at the University of Arkansas.

East Hanover, NJ. February 19, 2020. A team of researchers reported preliminary findings for efficacy of the Spanish version of the modified Story Memory Technique, a cognitive intervention developed at Kessler Foundation (KF-mSMT™). Their study, conducted in Mexicans with multiple sclerosis, is an important step toward addressing the void in evidence-based rehabilitative interventions for treating the cognitive effects of multiple sclerosis across diverse cultural populations.

CLEVELAND, Ohio (February 19, 2020)--A healthy diet rich in fruits and vegetables is known to benefit the human body in so many ways. Now a new study suggests that it may also play a role in lessening various menopause symptoms. Study results are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The North American Menopause Society (NAMS).

LA JOLLA--(February 18, 2020) People with bipolar disorder experience dramatic shifts in mood, oscillating between often debilitating periods of mania and depression. While a third of people with bipolar disorder can be successfully treated with the drug lithium, the majority of patients struggle to find treatment options that work.

Laval, February 19 2020--Fresh produce is a major vehicle for noroviruses, a group of viruses that are the most common cause of gastroenteritis in developed countries. However, the viruses are quite resistant to cold pasteurization treatments such as irradiation, which are used to destroy bacteria, moulds, parasites, and insects. The irradiation process uses gamma rays or X-rays to destroy these viruses but at the dose needed to eliminate them, it can affect the physicochemical properties of fresh produce.

Merely a brief introduction to mindfulness helps people deal with physical pain and negative emotions, a new study by researchers at Yale, Columbia, and Dartmouth shows.

The effect of mindfulness was so pronounced, they found, that even when participants were subjected to high heat on their forearm, their brain responded as if it was experiencing normal temperature.

Two particularly tenacious species of bacteria have colonized the potable water dispenser aboard the International Space Station (ISS), but a new study suggests that they are no more dangerous than closely related strains on Earth. Aubrie O'Rourke of the J. Craig Venter Institute and colleagues report these findings in a new paper published February 19, 2020 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE.

On April 13, 2029, an icy chunk of space rock, wider than the Eiffel Tower is tall, will streak by Earth at 30 kilometers per second, grazing the planet's sphere of geostationary satellites. It will be the closest approach by one of the largest asteroids crossing Earth's orbit in the next decade.

Perennial grasses can be converted into everything from ethanol to bioplastics, but it's unclear which bioproducts hold the greatest potential.

BioSTEAM, a new open-source simulation software package in Python developed by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, gives scientists, engineers, biotechnology companies, and funding agencies a fast, flexible tool to analyze the economics of producing different biofuels and bioproducts -- in a matter of seconds.

In a heavily polluted environment, does it make more sense for a company to keep polluting or start cleaning up its act? If it chooses to employ cleaner technologies and the environment becomes healthier, does the same calculus apply?

SIOP, the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, has just published a video examining how to update performance management practices for success now and in the future of work. Presented by SIOP Fellow Alan Colquitt, PhD, the webinar video"Big Ideas in Performance Management 2.0" provides actionable, evidence-based insights for I-O psychologists, business leaders, and HR practitioners seeking to create better outcomes for workers and organizations through practices that foster engagement and strong workplace performance.

A research group led by Prof. DU Xuemin from the Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology (SIAT) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has developed a "smart" contact lens that can show real-time changes in moisture and pressure by altering colors. The "smart" contact lens can potentially be used for point-of-care (POC) diagnosis of xerophthalmia and high intraocular pressure disease.

Exposure in the womb to phthalates, a group of endocrine-disrupting chemicals present in cosmetics and other common household products, was associated with autistic traits in boys, ages 3 and 4, but not in girls, according to a new study led by a University of Massachusetts Amherst environmental epidemiologist.

Greater use of electric vehicles might be good for the environment, but further growth hinges on continued availability of critical battery components such as cobalt. Cell phones and other electronics also depend on the element's availability. Supplies of the metal are adequate in the short term, but shortages could develop down the road if refining and recycling aren't ramped up or made more efficient, according to research published in ACS' Environmental Science & Technology.