Earth
Cervical cancer screening rates in Japan were significantly affected in the years following the devastating Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011, Tohoku University scientists report in the journal PLOS ONE.
"Conflicts and disasters, and the social isolation that often follows, have a major impact on healthcare and lead to delays in the diagnosis and treatment of cancers," says Tohoku University's Yasuhiro Miki, who specializes in disaster obstetrics and gynecology.
Research just published by the Linterman lab shows that the immune system of older mice can be given a helping hand by applying immunology expertise and some genital wart treatment (don't try this at home just yet)!
Mice and humans show similar age-dependent changes in their immune system so this finding offers hope for easily increasing the robustness of vaccination response in the older population.
Growing consumption of energy and fossil fuels over four decades did not play a significant role in increasing life expectancy across 70 countries.
New research, led by the University of Leeds, has quantified the importance of different development factors to improvements in physical health on an international scale.
Because a country's energy use is highly correlated with life expectancy at any single point in time, it has generally been assumed that growth in energy use is required for increases in life expectancy.
In the future's warmer climate, large, abrupt and frequent changes in ocean ventilation may be more likely than currently assumed, according to a new study. While current climate assessments recognize the severe impact that disruption of North Atlantic Deep Water (NADW) ventilation would have on global climate, disruption to this ocean phenomenon is generally considered to be a low probability tipping point.
If circulation of deep waters in the Atlantic stops or slows due to climate change, it could cause cooling in northern North America and Europe - a scenario that has occurred during past cold glacial periods.
Now, a Rutgers coauthored study suggests that short-term disruptions of deep ocean circulation occurred during warm interglacial periods in the last 450,000 years, and may happen again.
Oncotarget Volume 11, Issue 12 reported that using the HL-60 human non-APL AML model where ATRA causes nuclear enrichment of c-Raf that drives differentiation/G0-arrest, the research team now observe that roscovitine enhanced nuclear enrichment of certain traditionally cytoplasmic signaling molecules and enhanced differentiation and cell cycle arrest.
Global warming has caused the total area of more than 600 Greater Caucasus glaciers to drop by approximately 16%, according to an international research team that includes Stanislav Kutuzov, geographer from HSE University. Glaciers without rock debris coverage have decreased more than those with debris coverage.
Warmer Summers, Melting Ice
The area covered by Caucasus glaciers is decreasing by about 0.5% annually; this loss is quite significant.
Deep inside computer chips, tiny wires made of gold and other conductive metals carry the electricity used to process data.
But as these interconnected circuits shrink to nanoscale, engineers worry that pressure, such as that caused by thermal expansion when current flows through these wires, might cause gold to behave more like a liquid than a solid, making nanoelectronics unreliable. That, in turn, could force chip designers to hunt for new materials to make these critical wires.
Since pre-industrial times, the world's oceans have warmed by an average of one degree Celsius (1°C). Now researchers report in Current Biology on March 26th that those rising temperatures have led to widespread changes in the population sizes of marine species. The researchers found a general pattern of species having increasing numbers on their poleward sides and losses toward the equator.
A global analysis of over 300 marine species spanning more than 100 years, shows that mammals, plankton, fish, plants and seabirds have been changing in abundance as our climate warms.
At the cool edge of species ranges marine life is doing well as warming opens up habitat that was previously inaccessible, while at the warmer edge species are declining as conditions become too warm to tolerate.
Australian scientists have unravelled part of the mystery about how nature can usefully access genetic information in cells despite it being so tightly packed away.
The discovery helps solve what is effectively an ‘input/output’ problem caused by the need for cells to pack metres of DNA into a space just millionths of a metre across – but at the same time read, copy and repair the information held in the DNA. It also helps provide pathways to understand how defects in this process contribute to disease such as schizophrenia and cancer.
Retrospective analyses of clinical tumor samples identify TGFβ1 as the most prevalent TGFβ isoform in most solid cancers
Preclinical results demonstrate highly selective inhibition of TGFβ1 activation with SRK 181-mIgG1 overcomes key mechanism of primary resistance to checkpoint inhibition therapy
Selective inhibition of latent TGFβ1 activation with SRK-181 has demonstrated an improved preclinical safety profile compared to conventional inhibitors of TGFβ signaling
Young people who are given a religious upbringing at home by both parents have the strongest faith in God throughout their adolescence. Distancing from and wavering in faith are also less likely among them. They are also clearly different from their peers who are given a religious upbringing by one parent only, or by neither.
The process of making functional brain cells in a lab dish requires the precise activation of selfish genetic elements known as LINE-1 (L1) retrotransposons. The finding, from researchers at KAUST, could lead to safer and more effective regenerative therapies for Parkinson's disease and other brain conditions.
AMHERST, Mass. - A slender little fish called the sand lance plays a big role as "a quintessential forage fish" for puffins, terns and other seabirds, humpback whales and other marine mammals, and even bigger fish such as Atlantic sturgeon, cod and bluefin tuna in the Gulf of Maine and northwest Atlantic Ocean. But scientists say right now they know far too little about its biology and populations to inform "relevant management, climate adaptation and conservation efforts."