Culture
(PHILADELPHIA) - N-acetylcysteine (NAC) is a naturally occurring molecule that replenishes one of the body's antioxidants and now shows potential benefit as part of a standard course of treatment for patients with Parkinson's disease, according to a study published in the journal, Clinical Pharmacology & Therapeutics. The study found improvements in dopamine levels, the primary neurotransmitter that is specifically decreased in Parkinson's disease, as well as improvements in clini
The researchers first looked at fly densities inside and outside groups of wild sooty mangabeys and chimpanzees in Tai National Park, Ivory Coast, finding many more flies in primate social groups than outside them. First author Jan Gogarten then carried out a quirky experiment to understand how this high density of flies was maintained, marking over 1,700 flies with nail polish in a group of mangabeys. To their surprise, the researchers recaptured these colorful flies in the mangabey group up to two weeks later and nearly a kilometer and a half from where they were marked.
Researchers at the University of Nottingham have discovered that repurposing a heart drug could significantly increase the survival rate for children with ependymoma - a type of brain tumour.
The findings, published in Scientific Reports and led by experts in the University's Schools of Medicine and Life Sciences, suggest that co-treatment with a drug normally used to treat cardiac hypertrophy can overcome chemotherapy resistance and increase survival in over a third of ependymoma patients.
Women tend to have a greater immune response to a flu vaccination compared to men, but their advantage largely disappears as they age and their estrogen levels decline, suggests a study from researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Pick your chicken wisely. The choice could make or break your marriage.
For generations, household farmers in the Horn of Africa have selectively chosen chickens with certain traits that make them more appealing. Some choices are driven by the farmers' traditional courtship rituals; others are guided by more mundane concerns, such as taste and disease resistance.
A study at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center discovered a cellular pathway tied to cancer that may be beneficial in reducing side effects and extending duration of immunotherapy in some patients with hepatocellular carcinoma, the most common form of liver cancer.
The duration of floods can be determined by river flow, precipitation and atmospheric blocking. Now an international team of researchers led by Nasser Najibi and Naresh Devineni at The City College of New York is offering a novel physically based Bayesian network model for inference and prediction of flood duration. The model also accurately examines the timescales of flooding.
Flourishing in spectacular numbers in lakes and ponds around the world, tiny creatures known as Daphnia play an essential role in freshwater ecology. Daphnia, a type of planktonic crustacean, are the primary consumers of algae and are an important food source for fish and other aquatic life.
Bone marrow transplants of hematopoietic stem cells have become standard treatment for a host of conditions including cancers of the blood and lymphatic systems, sickle cell anemia, inherited metabolic disorders, and radiation damage. Unfortunately, many bone marrow transplants fail due to rejection by the patient's immune system or graft-versus-host disease (in which the transplanted marrow cells attack the patient's healthy cells), both of which can be fatal.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, is an adult-onset neurodegenerative disease that causes paralysis and ultimately death when the nerves enervating the lungs cease to carry the signals needed for breathing. The disease has what is called a "focal onset," where paralysis starts with an arm or a leg and spreads throughout the body as motor neurons in the spinal cord and brain die off.
Key Takeaways:
Drivers who switch insurance companies bring higher risk than "equivalent own" customers.
Only 50 percent of the risk gap between switchers and non-switchers can be accounted by the difference in observable drivers characteristics
Even drivers with excellent driving records that switch insurers carry higher risk.
It is well established that diet influences health and disease, but the mechanisms underlying this effect are not fully understood. Shedding light on the diet-health connection, a team led by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine reports today in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition an association between diet quality and microbiome composition in human colonic mucosa. The researchers found that a high-quality diet is linked to more potentially beneficial bacteria; while a low-quality diet is associated with an increase in potentially harmful bacteria.
CINCINNATI--Scientists created human pancreas on a chip that allowed them to identify the possible cause of a frequent and deadly complication of cystic fibrosis (CF) called CF-Related Diabetes, or CFRD.
BOSTON - By examining both blood samples and tumor tissues from patients with non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), investigators at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have identified markers that can distinguish between major subtypes of lung cancer and can accurately identify lung cancer stage. Their proof-of-concept test accurately predicted whether the blood samples they examined came from patients with shorter or longer survival following lung cancer surgery, including patients with early-stage disease.