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Washington, DC - September 1, 2016 - An international team of researchers has sequenced a strain of the Zika virus that will be used as a World Health Organization (WHO) reference strain to identify Zika virus infection in the blood, thus making it easier to diagnose the disease. While the reference material will undergo formal WHO review in October, the agency has given the go-ahead for the strain's use given the urgent need of medical products to diagnose and treat Zika.

An analysis of the fossil known as the Minden Monster has enabled paleontologists to assign the largest predatory dinosaur ever found in Germany to a previously unknown genus, among a group that underwent rapid diversification in the Middle Jurassic.

Various applications of nanosubstances in industrial and consumer goods sectors are becoming increasingly common because of their useful chemical and physical properties. Therefore the development of methods for the assessment of potential hazards to human and ecological health posed by increased exposure to nanosubstances is necessary.

A research group led by Professor Hannes Lohi at the University of Helsinki and Folkhälsan Research Centre has conducted a unique study on the health of Finnish cats. The most typical health issues in cats have to do with the mouth, skin and kidneys. In addition, the research group identified nearly 60 illnesses specific to particular breeds. These results can be used to improve cat welfare and develop breeding programmes, and they provide a solid foundation for future genetic research, particularly on breed-specific diseases.

The cost of treating a smoking-related chronic lung disease will exceed more than £2.3 billion per year in England - and £200 million in Scotland - by 2030, research suggests.

Rising healthcare costs will be caused by a substantial increase in the number of people living with the condition in the coming years, experts project.

Researchers say that healthcare services should adapt now to be able to meet the rising demand.

Philadelphia, PA, September 1, 2016 - The children of traumatized people have long been known to be at increased risk for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and mood and anxiety disorders. However, according to Rachel Yehuda from the James J. Peters Veterans Affairs Medical Center at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai who led a new study in Biological Psychiatry, there are very few opportunities to examine biologic alterations in the context of a watershed trauma in exposed people and their adult children born after the event.

The killer shrimp is not as bad as its reputation: Researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have discovered that the amphipod crustacean, which is native to the Ponto-Caspian region, is not a true predator and only plays an indirect role in the massive species extinction of small crustaceans in native waters. According to experimental results, the invasive killer shrimp actually only drove native amphipods out of their hiding places, making them easy prey for the round goby, a species which also originates from the Black Sea region.

A new marine biodiversity study in one of the largest Marine Protected Areas in the world reveals the impact of environmental change on subantarctic seabed animals and answers big questions about the extent of South Georgia's ice sheet during the Last Glacial Maximum around 20,000 years ago.

Are you a fitness enthusiast? If so, moderation and appropriate rest periods may be the key to healthier exercise, as consecutive CrossFit-style workouts could impair the immune system by affecting inflammatory proteins.

An Umeå-based team in collaboration with US researchers reveals a new link between nicotine and inflammation. They report that nicotine strongly activates immune cells to release DNA fibres decorated with pro-inflammatory molecules, so called neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs). The continuous exposure to these NETs can harm the tissue and could explain the hazardous consequences of tobacco consumption for human health.

ITHACA, NY-- Researchers at the Boyce Thompson Institute (BTI) and Virginia Tech have discovered a new mechanism in the continual arms race between plants and pathogenic bacteria, which tomatoes use to detect the causal agent of bacterial speck disease.

The team identified a new receptor in tomato plants, called FLAGELLIN-SENSING 3 (FLS3), that triggers defenses against a bacterial attack. FLS3 is present in a small number of plant species, including tomato, potato and pepper. The study appears in Nature Plants.

Dressing changes have been identified as one of the major contributors to perceived pain during burn care, and so it is important that pain be assessed accurately. But a new study from the Center for Pediatric Trauma Research at Nationwide Children's Hospital suggests that pediatric burn pain assessment can vary not only based on patient pain intensity, but also nurse clinical experience.

Scientists from the United States have made an important step toward eliminating cancer recurrence by combining immunotherapy with chemotherapy. Specifically, they found that chemotherapy alone leads to two types of dormant cancer cells that are not killed outright and become resistant to additional chemotherapy, but when combined with immunotherapy, a majority of dormant cells also is destroyed. The report appears in the September 2016 issue of the Journal of Leukocyte Biology.

CLEVELAND - Case Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers, a research collaboration which includes University Hospitals Seidman Cancer Center and Case Western Reserve University, who last year identified new gene mutations unique to colon cancers in African Americans, have found that tumors with these mutations are highly aggressive and more likely to recur and metastasize. These findings partly may explain why African Americans have the highest incidence and death rates of any group for this disease.

(PHILADELPHIA) - Although there is some overlap, past research has shown that the challenges faced by African American breast cancer survivors differ somewhat from Caucasian women. But the studies that demonstrated difference were not designed to explore those challenges in depth.