Earth

Use of certain diabetes drugs, known as dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibitors, is associated with an increased risk of inflammatory bowel disease, the digestive condition that causes stomach pain and bloating, finds a study published by The BMJ today.

The researchers stress that the absolute risk is low - and that their findings need to be replicated - but say "physicians should be made aware of this possible association."

Alexandria, VA, USA - At the 47th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Dental Research (AADR), held in conjunction with the 42nd Annual Meeting of the Canadian Association for Dental Research (CADR), Alen Blagajcevic, student at Tufts University School of Dental Medicine, Boston, Mass., presented an oral session titled "Bioengineered Tooth Bud Model Functionalized With Decellularized Tooth Bud ECM." The AADR/CADR Annual Meeting is in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., USA from March 21-24, 2018.

When a doctor or nurse suspects something is wrong with a patient's heart, there's a simple way to check: put a stethoscope over the heart and listen to the sounds it makes. Doctors and nurses can use the same diagnostic tool to figure out what's going on with the lungs, stomach and more, but not the brain - although that could change with a new device.

James Cook University (JCU) scientists in Australia have found high carbon dioxide levels cause squid to bungle attacks on their prey.

PhD candidate Blake Spady from JCU's ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies led the investigation. He said that the oceans absorb over one-quarter of all the excess carbon dioxide (CO2) released into the atmosphere by humans and this uptake of additional CO2 causes seawater to become more acidic.

VCU Massey Cancer Center researchers have identified two genes that are responsible for governing the replication of the Epstein-Barr virus, an infection that drives the growth of several types of cancer. The discovery could lead to the development of novel therapies for virus-associated diseases including stomach cancer and lymphomas.

Most parenting programs aim to teach parents how to reduce their children's disruptive behavior. New research looked at more than 150 studies of these programs, finding differences in what works best according to whether or not children already showed behavior problems.

The work was conducted by researchers at the University of Amsterdam, Cardiff University, University of Oxford, and Utrecht University. It appears in the journal Child Development, a publication of the Society for Research in Child Development.

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, IL (March 19, 2018) - In January 2017 guidelines were released urging parents to begin early introduction of peanut-containing foods to reduce the risk of peanut allergy. A new study shows those who are aware of the guidelines are still hesitant to put them into place and not everyone has heard of them.

After a biopsy or surgery, doctors often get a molecular snapshot of a patient's tumor. This snapshot is important - knowing the genetics that cause a cancer can help match a patient with a genetically-targeted treatment. But recent work increasingly shows that tumors are not static - the populations of cells that make up a tumor evolve over time in response to treatment, often in ways that lead to treatment immunity. Instead of being defined by a snapshot, tumors are more like a movie.

PHOENIX, Ariz. and OSLO, Norway -- March 19, 2018 -- For decades, ultrasound has been used to image organs such as the heart and kidneys, check blood flow, monitor the development of fetuses, reduce pain and even break up kidney stones.

Now, a Norwegian biotech company called Phoenix Solutions AS is working with the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen), a Phoenix, Arizona-based biomedical research facility, to test the use of these pulsed sound waves to direct and focus cancer drug therapies.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- As children hit the "tween" stage between early elementary grades and the teenage years, parents may struggle balancing the need for independence with appropriate supervision, a new national poll suggests.

Canada's major medical journal, CMAJ, will champion the health of vulnerable populations with a special focus on groups that experience adverse health outcomes because of poverty, isolation, discrimination and other factors.

CHICAGO -- New research in mice provides an explanation for how exposure to the widely used chemical bisphenol A (BPA) during pregnancy, even at levels lower than the regulated "safe" human exposure level, can lead to altered brain development and behavior later in life. The research will be presented Monday, March 19 at ENDO 2018, the 100th annual meeting of the Endocrine Society in Chicago, Ill.

Airborne soot produced by wildfires and fossil-fuel combustion and transported to the remote McMurdo Dry Valleys of Antarctica contains levels of black carbon too low to contribute significantly to the melting of local glaciers, according to a new study by researchers supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Strong winds in the Dry Valleys, however, can temporarily cause large spikes in the amount of locally produced black carbon, which is distributed through the ecosystem, the researchers found.

Everyone has experienced the awkward situation of meeting someone and then forgetting their name shortly after. Among older adults, this happens more often than not.

Baycrest researchers have discovered a new method to resolve this problem by tapping into a natural memory change during aging. Their work, which was recently published in the journal, Psychology and Aging, could be incorporated into a smartphone application as an accessible memory training tool.

Birds do it and so do doughnut-shaped fusion facilities called "tokamaks." But tokamak chirping-- a rapidly changing frequency wave that can be far above what the human ear can detect -- is hardly welcome to researchers who seek to bring the fusion that powers the sun and stars to Earth. Such chirping signals a loss of heat that can slow fusion reactions, a loss that has long puzzled scientists.