Culture
COLUMBUS, Ohio - Lactating mothers who use e-cigarettes or nicotine replacement therapies may be putting their breastfed babies at risk for skull defects, a new study in animals suggests.
Cigarette smoking has already been linked to increased risk for these abnormalities in previous research. This study tested the effects of nicotine alone on head and face development.
Plant breeding has considerably increased agricultural yields in recent decades and thus made a major contribution to combating global hunger and poverty. At the same time, however, the intensification of farming has had negative environmental effects. Increases in food production will continue to be crucial for the future because the world population and demand continue to grow.
Two pediatric brain cancers that are challenging to treat if they recur, medulloblastoma and ependymoma, are the target of a clinical trial using a new type of therapy. A multi-institutional, international team led by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine, Texas Children's Hospital and the Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) has developed a novel approach that delivers appropriately-targeted chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy directly into the cerebrospinal fluid that surrounds the tumor.
Biomedical engineers at Duke University have used deep brain stimulation based on light to treat motor dysfunction in an animal model of Parkinson's disease. Succeeding where earlier attempts have failed, the method promises to provide new insights into why deep brain stimulation works and ways in which it can be improved on a patient-by-patient basis.
The results appear online on April 20 in The Journal of Neuroscience.
In the most detailed study to date of epidemic spread, an international team of researchers has modeled measles dynamics based on over 40 years of data collected in England and Wales. The models--which span the prevaccination period, introduction of measles vaccination, and local elimination by vaccination in the 1990s--reveal that, before the introduction of a vaccine, measles could persist in both large population centers and by spread among sets of smaller towns.
A new study finds that earlier high school start times can have significant adverse consequences for students, including increased rates of tardiness and absenteeism.
University of Texas at Dallas researchers have developed a promising method for remotely stimulating activity in deep brain regions, advancing understanding of how molecules act in the brain and paving the way for better cancer treatments and therapies for other diseases.
The approach is based on the powerful combination of gold nanoparticles and lasers, which also plays a critical role in another UT Dallas research project aimed at developing a rapid diagnostic test for influenza and, possibly, the COVID-19 virus.
Gold for Neuromodulation
Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden and the University of North Carolina in the USA have mapped out the cell types behind various brain disorders. The findings are published in Nature Genetics and offer a roadmap for the development of new therapies to target neurological and psychiatric disorders. One interesting finding was that cells from the gut's nervous system are involved in Parkinson's disease, indicating that the disease may start there.
Mylagic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) is a disabling and complex illness. Affected persons often cannot pursue ordinary activities -- physical or mental -- because of an incapacitating loss of energy and other symptoms, and may find themselves confined to bed or house-bound for years.
Free open source hardware and 3D printing could help to alleviate the burden of Covid-19 on global health systems, according to scientists at the University of Sussex.
Free and open source hardware (FOSH) follows an ethos where blueprints for a tool are made freely available so that anyone can study, learn, modify, customize and commercialize them.
Antibiotics save lives -- but using them also helps antibiotic-resistant strains evolve and spread. Each year, antibiotic-resistant bacteria infect some 2.8 million people in the United States, killing more than 35,000, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Infections by multidrug-resistant -- or MDR -- bacteria, which are resistant to two or more antibiotics, are particularly difficult to treat.
April 27, 2020 (Huntsville, Ala.) - Scientists at the HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology, the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), and the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB), have identified a new risk factor for multiple neurodegenerative diseases.
While the human world is reeling from one pandemic, there are several ongoing epidemics that affect crops and put global food production at risk. Oranges, olives, and bananas are already under threat in many areas due to diseases that affect plants' circulatory systems and that cannot be treated by applying pesticides.
A new method developed by engineers at MIT may offer a starting point for delivering life-saving treatments to plants ravaged by such diseases.
New research by academics at the University of Bristol has found evidence that prolonged treatment of synthetic corticosteroid drugs increases adrenal gland inflammation in response to bacterial infection, an effect that in the long-term can damage adrenal function.
Berkeley -- Government-enforced social isolation may help relatively affluent populations limit the spread of COVID-19, but these measures can be devasting for the nearly 1 billion people around the globe currently dwelling in urban slums, where physical space is scarce, and many rely on daily wage labor for survival.