Culture
Although the exact causes of multiple sclerosis still remain unknown, it is assumed that the disease is triggered by a combination of genetic and environmental risk factors. But which? In a mouse model of the disease, researchers at the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and the Geneva University Hospitals (HUG) , Switzerland, studied the potential link between transient cerebral viral infections in early childhood and the development of this cerebral autoimmune disease later in life.
Scientists from Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) and Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology (SIBCB) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences revealed that UDP-glucose accelerates SNAI1 mRNA decay and impairs lung cancer metastasis. Their findings were published in Nature.
Archaeologists working in two Italian caves have discovered some of the earliest known examples of ancient humans using an adhesive on their stone tools--an important technological advance called "hafting."
The new study, which included CU Boulder's Paola Villa, shows that Neanderthals living in Europe from about 55 to 40 thousand years ago traveled away from their caves to collect resin from pine trees. They then used that sticky substance to glue stone tools to handles made out of wood or bone.
In the early 20th century, researchers in Massachusetts studied the first community-based health intervention in the world, the Framingham Health and Tuberculosis Demonstration, deeming it highly successful in controlling tuberculosis (TB) and reducing mortality. Now a new study, which used recently digitized data on causes of death during that period, has concluded that the effort was not as successful as initially thought, and suggests that the intervention cannot be cited as evidence for the success of health policies in the era before antibiotics became available.
A robotic gripping arm that uses engineered bacteria to "taste" for a specific chemical has been developed by engineers at the University of California, Davis, and Carnegie Mellon University. The gripper is a proof-of-concept for biologically-based soft robotics.
"Our long-term vision is about building a synthetic microbiota for soft robots that can help with repair, energy generation or biosensing of the environment," said Cheemeng Tan, assistant professor of biomedical engineering at UC Davis. The work was published June 26 in the journal Science Robotics.
Argonne team combines cutting-edge modeling with 300-year-old statistical analysis technique to enhance material properties.
At some point in your life, you’ve probably had somebody — a parent, a teacher, a mentor — tell you that “the more you practice, the better you become.” The expression is often attributed to Thomas Bayes, an 18th century British minister who was interested in winning at games and formalized this simple observation into a now-famous mathematical expression.
The Himalaya Mountains are a geological wonder, drawing adventurers and religious devotees from near and far to the world's highest peaks. The mountains were created along a fault where the Earth's plates crash into each other and press up toward the sky. But the same fault that formed the piercing summits of the Himalayas produces large earthquakes that can cause immense loss of life in the densely populated plains of northern India and southern Nepal.
The existing approach to brain stimulation for rehabilitation after a stroke does not take into account the diversity of lesions and the individual characteristics of patients' brains. This was the conclusion made by researchers of the Higher School of Economics (HSE University) and the Max Planck Institute of Cognitive Sciences in their article, 'Predicting the Response to Non-Invasive Brain Stimulation in Stroke'.
Bats are creatures of the night and are accustomed to complete darkness. They harness their hypersensitive hearing to feed, to fend off prey and to mate.
But that's not the entire story. A new Tel Aviv University study finds that fruit bats actually integrate vision and echolocation to flourish in the dead of night. The new research was led by Prof. Yossi Yovel and conducted by Dr. Sasha Danilovich, both of TAU's George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences, and was published on June 26 in Science Advances.
Hospital-wide introduction of new female external catheter technology halved the number of catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs) according to new research presented last week in Philadelphia at the 46th Annual Conference of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC).
An interdisciplinary approach to antimicrobial stewardship involving comprehensive blood culture identification (BCID) testing decreased broad spectrum antibiotic use, according to new research presented last week in Philadelphia at the 46th Annual Conference of the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC).
The summer's annual conference of the American Society for Horticultural Science in Las Vegas, will deliver a variety of crucial issues facing today's world and how the realm of horticulture is addressing them. There is one presentation that holds all the intrigue of a murder mystery and all the painstaking, arduous pursuit of an archeological dig, along with a touch of serendipity.
A recent study conducted at The Westmead Institute for Medical Research has shed light on the role of vitamin D in muscle cells. The study looked at the role of vitamin D in muscles in mice, and showed that vitamin D signaling (how cells communicate with one another) is needed for normal muscle size and strength.
Researchers found that mice missing the vitamin D receptor only in myocytes (muscle cells) had smaller muscles, and they were less strong. They also had significantly decreased running speed and didn't run as far as mice with normal vitamin D action.
Parkinson's disease can begin in the gut and spread to the brain via the vagus nerve, researchers report June 26th in the journal Neuron. This pathway was observed in a new mouse model, which recapitulates both motor and non-motor deficits as well as early-stage and late-stage features associated with Parkinson's disease.
Many psychiatric drugs act on the receptors or transporters of certain neurotransmitters in the brain. However, there is a great need for alternatives, and research is looking at other targets along the brain's metabolic pathways. Lack of glycine betaine contributes to brain pathology in schizophrenia, and new research from the RIKEN Center for Brain Science (CBS) shows that betaine supplementation can counteract psychiatric symptoms in mice.