Culture

With the COVID-19 pandemic resulting in lockdowns in different parts of the world, from the US to many European nations, there have been intense debates on when and how we can safely reopen the economy.

New research led by Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) computer scientists has used a data-driven modelling approach to answer the time-critical question of when the stringent social distancing and quarantine measures against COVID-19 can be loosened so that normal life and economic activities can be restored in a safe manner.

The research team developed a novel computational model that explicitly characterises and quantifies the underlying transmission patterns among different populations throughout the various phases of the COVID-19 outbreak. Based on the model, the research team carried out a prospective analysis of the different work resumption plans, revealing the respective economic implications and the levels of disease transmission risk associated with each plan.

The original research was titled "What are the Underlying Transmission Patterns of COVID-19 Outbreak? An Age-specific Social Contact Characterization", and it was published in The Lancet's EClinicalMedicine journal.

Novel data science approach to public health issues

The model was developed by a research team from HKBU's Department of Computer Science, and the study was led by Professor Liu Jiming, Chair Professor of the Department, in collaboration with the National Institute of Parasitic Diseases of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

"For over a decade, our research team at HKBU has been dedicated to adopting an interdisciplinary approach while leveraging novel data analytics and artificial intelligence methodologies to address global public health challenges such as malaria and influenza. Our current work, published in an international medical journal, represents a unique scientific attempt in response to the COVID-19 pandemic," said Professor Liu.

An age-specific social contact characterisation model

The researchers were able to characterise the disease transmission patterns by examining the interactions between people. The computational model divided the population into seven age groups with their own specific social circles, gathering places and activity patterns. Four representative social contact settings, namely households, schools, workplaces, and public places, were considered as they are examples of dense populations in which the spread of COVID-19 may occur.

Six cities in mainland China, including Wuhan and five cities from three key economic zones, namely Beijing, Tianjin, Hangzhou, Suzhou, and Shenzhen, were analysed. In each case, a contact matrix was inferred to describe the contact intensity between different age-groups for each of the four settings, and this enabled the dynamics of disease transmission to be computed. Confirmed cases, population sizes, and the cities' respective intervention measures were taken into account when building the model.

Prospective analysis of work resumption plans

With this age-specific social contact-based transmission model, the team proceeded to project the prospective development of the COVID-19 outbreak, with a focus on work resumption plans.

Disease transmission risks and the estimated impact on local GDP growth were examined for the different work resumption plans. These plans vary from more lenient ones, in which work resumes earlier and completes within a shorter time frame, to stricter ones where work resumes later within a longer overall time frame. Results of the analysis on Beijing, Tianjin, Hangzhou, Suzhou, and Shenzhen are summarised in Appendix. Wuhan was also analysed and the researchers suggest that the city should take longer to complete work resumption in order to reduce the potential transmission risk.

Projections that help policymaking

The data-driven computational model developed by the research team provides a science-based analytical solution which enables policymakers to design plans that can achieve both the containment of disease transmission risk and the gradual reopening of affected cities in a safe manner. By conducting a data-driven prospective analysis, policymakers can calculate the best time to reopen the economy. For instance, they can work out whether they should reopen their cities as late as possible and hence have no disease transmission risk, or alternatively, resume work and life gradually and systematically while keeping all the necessary control measures in place to eliminate any potential disease transmission.

The research team will openly share their data-driven computational modelling and analytical tools with public health policymakers and researchers around the world, and this will enable them to capitalise on these tools for decision making using their domestic epidemiological data.

Scientists are one step closer to understanding how the cancer-fighting drug Taxol is produced by trees.

In a recent paper published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, a group of researchers led by Washington State University's Mark Lange, has found candidate genes that could eventually be used to manufacture Taxol more quickly and efficiently.

"Our goal is to find enzymes that activate precursors contributing to the complex structure of Taxol," said Lange, a professor in WSU's Institute of Biological Chemistry. "That will enable engineers to know which genes to throw into the mix to develop organisms that can produce the drug."

Also known as paclitaxel, Taxol is a natural compound discovered in the bark of Pacific Yew trees.

It is used to treat a variety of cancers, from breast to ovarian to bladder to prostate and more.

It used to be harvested directly from trees by stripping their bark, but harvests weren't done sustainably and many of the trees died. Currently, most of the drug sold in the United States is made by extracting the substance from Yew tree cell cultures grown in a laboratory.

This process is time consuming and expensive.

"We've been working on this for many years because the structure of Taxol is so complex," Lange said. "There are over 500 known taxane natural products, of which Taxol is only one. We're trying to find enzymes that activate precursors to make Taxol, but not other taxanes."

Enzymes are substances in living organisms that act as catalysts to start a chemical reaction.

"Ideally, you want an enzyme that activates a specific reaction, as opposed to multiple reactions," Lange said.

These results will be used by other scientists to add genes to yeast or other microbes, allowing them to produce the drug in large quantities.

"It's very challenging," Lange said. "It could involve 30 to 50 genes. But the genes we characterized here can be part of that."

Lange and his team are part of a much larger group working on the project, including a Stanford University engineer and biologists from the University of California system and the John Innes Centre in the UK.

They received a $4 million grant from the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, part of the National Institutes of Health, last fall in support of the project.

Since MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) started the OpenCourseWare movement, by publishing its course materials as open educational resources, many types of initiatives have been developed to open access to education via the use of digital technologies. Among other resources, the MOOCs have proliferated. These offer specialised online courses (frequently free) to an unlimited number of students. However, the drop-out rate of students that starts a MOOC (Massive Open Online Courses) are very high, which makes it useful to analyse the student profiles, establishing typologies and individual profiles. As the study by the LRPC (Personal Network and Community Laboratory) and the JRC shows, the initial diagnosis of learning intention can be very useful for improving educational performance.

Researchers from the University of Seville have carried out a study within the Moocknowledge project, a European initiative which collects data on a large scale on participant in MOOCs between 2014 and 2018. The project gathered information from more than 23,000 users from a total of 84 different MOOCs.

The study analysed the psychological factors that influence the learning of the participants in the massive online courses. Its results show that initial intention is related to individual differences in drop-out probability.

The research was carried out by means of a survey of 1768 participants from 6 different MOOCs. The students were classified in function of their motivational profile and learning intentions at the start of the course. The results show that initial motivation is clearly associated with the satisfaction and the quality perceived on the quality of the learning experience. "A good initial diagnosis of the learning intention and motivational profile of each student can therefore help to design personalised learning plans, as well as improve the degree to which students benefit from the course", explains the University of Seville teacher Isidro Maya.

The Laboratorio de Redes Personales y Comunidades de la Universidad de Sevilla (Personal Network and Community Laboratory) collaborated in the preparation of the databases generated in this European Commission project. Currently, the data is being used in various research projects, and have been especially useful for exploring the impact of the MOOCs on learning, employability and the development of professional careers.

Although the article was available online in June 2019, the printed version was issued in February 2020.

A drug that has life-extending effects on mice also reverses age-related dental problems in the animals, according to a new study published today in eLife.

Periodontal disease, also known as gum disease, is a common problem in older adults that causes painful inflammation, bone loss and changes in the good bacteria that live in the mouth. Yet there are no treatments available beyond tooth removal and/or having good oral hygiene. The findings suggest that treatments targeting the aging process in the mouth might help.

Rapamycin is an immune-suppressing drug currently used to prevent organ rejection in transplant recipients. Previous studies in mice have also suggested that it may have life-extending effects, which has led to interest in studying the drug's effects in many age-related diseases.

"We hypothesised that biological aging contributes to periodontal disease, and that interventions that delay aging should also delay the progress of this disease," says lead author Jonathan An, Acting Assistant Professor at the Department of Oral Health Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, US.

To find out if rapamycin might slow periodontal disease, An and his colleagues added the drug to the food of middle-aged mice for eight weeks and compared their oral health with untreated mice of the same age. Similar to humans, mice also experience bone loss, inflammation and shifts in oral bacteria as they age.

Using a 3D-imaging technique called micro-computed tomography, the team measured the periodontal bone, or bone around the tooth, of the rapamycin-treated and untreated mice. They showed that the treated mice had more bone than the untreated mice, and had actually grown new bone during the period they were receiving rapamycin.

The work also showed that rapamycin-treated mice had less gum inflammation. Genetic sequencing of the bacteria in their mouths also revealed that the animals had fewer bacteria associated with gum disease and a mix of oral bacteria more similar to that found in healthy young mice.

"By targeting this aging process through rapamycin treatment, our work suggests that we can delay the progress of gum disease and actually reverse its clinical features," explains senior author Matt Kaeberlein, Professor of Pathology and Adjunct Professor of Oral Health Sciences at the University of Washington.

However, Kaeberlein adds that while rapamycin is already used to treat certain conditions, it can make people more susceptible to infections and may increase their risk of developing diabetes, at least at the higher chronic doses typically taken by organ transplant patients. "Clinical trials in humans are needed to test whether rapamycin's potential oral health and other benefits outweigh its risks," he concludes.

Food wrapping, fishing gear and plastic waste continue to reach the Antarctic. Two new studies into how plastic debris is reaching sub-Antarctic islands are published this month (April 2020) in the journal Environment International.

New findings include analyses of some of the longest continuous datasets in the world on plastics ingested by seabirds and washed up on beaches, and insights into where this plastic originates. They also highlight the ongoing prevalence of plastic in the Polar Regions, its impact on the environment and the animals that inhabit these remote areas.

Scientists from British Antarctic Survey (BAS) have systematically collected marine debris washed up on the beaches of Bird Island (South Georgia) and Signy Island (South Orkneys) over three decades. Their findings reveal an increase in the amount of debris collected. Over 10,000 items were recovered, the majority of which was plastic.

Lead author Dr Claire Waluda, a marine ecologist at BAS says:

"While we found an increase in the quantity of beached plastic debris, recent surveys have shown increasing numbers of smaller pieces. This might be due to the breakdown of larger pieces of plastic which have been in the Southern Ocean for a long time."

"It's not all bad news. With the amount of plastic recovered on beaches peaking in the 1990s, our study suggests that the measures to restrict the amount of debris entering the Southern Ocean have been successful, at least in part. But more still needs to be done. By putting our data into oceanographic models we will learn more about the sources and sinks of plastic waste and how it is transported into and around the Southern Ocean."

A second BAS-led study used seabirds as sentinels of plastic pollution, due to their natural tendency to consume indigestible items - such as plastic - which they mistake for natural prey. Over 30 years, researchers looked at the variation in plastic ingestion by three species of albatrosses, including the wandering albatross, and giant petrels on Bird Island.

Researchers categorised debris - including type, size, colour and origin. They found substantial differences in the characteristics of the marine debris associated with South Georgia's seabirds.

For example, items ingested by wandering albatrosses and giant petrels were primarily food-related wrapping that had been packaged in South America. These species typically scavenge behind vessels so the debris is highly likely to be waste items that have been discarded or lost overboard.

Lead author and seabird ecologist at BAS, Professor Richard Phillips, says:

"Our study adds to a growing body of evidence that fishing and other vessels make a major contribution to plastic pollution. It's clear that marine plastics are a threat to seabirds and other wildlife and more needs to be done to improve waste-management practices and compliance monitoring both on land and on vessels in the South Atlantic."

"There is some good news, we found that black-browed albatrosses typically ingested relatively low levels of debris, suggesting that plastic pollution in the Antarctic waters where they feed remains relatively low."

Long-term monitoring on the islands continues whilst the rest of the world is in lockdown.

We learned it as children: to cross the street in exemplary fashion, we must first look to the left, then to the right, and finally once more to the left. If we see a car and a cyclist approaching when we first look to the left, this information is stored in our short-term memory. During the second glance to the left, our short-term memory reports: bicycle and car were there before, they are the same ones, they are still far enough away. We cross the street safely.

This is, however, not at all true. Our short-term memory deceives us. When looking to the left the second time, our eyes see something completely different: the bicycle and the car do not have the same colour anymore because they are just now passing through the shadow of a tree, they are no longer in the same location, and the car is perhaps moving more slowly. The fact that we nonetheless immediately recognise the bicycle and the car is due to the fact that the memory of the first leftward look biases the second one.

Scientists at Goethe University, led by psychologist Christoph Bledowski and doctoral student Cora Fischer reconstructed the traffic situation - very abstractly - in the laboratory: student participants were told to remember the motion direction of green or red dots moving across a monitor. During each trial, the test person saw two moving dot fields in short succession and had to subsequently report the motion direction of one of these dot fields. In additional tests, both dot fields were shown simultaneously next to each other. The test persons all completed numerous successive trials.

The Frankfurt scientists were very interested in the mistakes made by the test persons and how these mistakes were systematically connected in successive trials. If for example the observed dots moved in the direction of 10 degrees and in the following trial in the direction of 20 degrees, most people reported 16 to 18 degrees for the second trial. However, if 0 degrees were correct for the following trial, they reported 2 to 4 degrees for the second trial. The direction of the previous trial therefore distorted the perception of the following one - "not very much, but systematically," says Christoph Bledowski. He and his team extended previous studies by investigating the influence of contextual information of the dot fields like colour, spatial position (right or left) and sequence (shown first or second). "In this way we more closely approximate real situations, in which we acquire different types of visual information from objects," Bledowski explains. This contextual information, especially space and sequence, contribute significantly to the distortion of successive perception in short-term memory. First author Cora Fischer says: "The contextual information helps us to differentiate among different objects and consequently to integrate information of the same object through time."

What does this mean for our traffic situation? "Initially, it doesn't sound good if our short-term memory reflects something different from what we physically see," says Bledowski. "But if our short-term memory were unable to do this, we would see a completely new traffic situation when we looked to the left a second time. That would be quite confusing, because a different car and a different cyclist would have suddenly appeared out of nowhere. The slight 'blurring' of our perception by memory ultimately leads us to perceive our environment, whose appearance is constantly changing due to motion and light changes, as stable. In this process, the current perception of the car, for example, is only affected by the previous perception of the car, but not by the perception of the cyclist."

CHICAGO (April 28, 2020): Amid shortages of personal protective equipment due to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, a St. Louis health care system has implemented a process to disinfect disposable N95 respirator masks that allows health care workers to reuse their own mask for up to 20 cycles. The novel disinfection process, developed in collaboration with Washington University School of Medicine, uses vaporized hydrogen peroxide and is described in an "article in press" on the Journal of the American College of Surgeons website in advance of print.

Test results from a pilot program at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and two other hospitals that are also part of BJC HealthCare, showed that the disinfection process kills germs from N95 masks while ensuring that the only person who touches the mask is the original mask wearer, study authors reported.

"Our primary outcome is safety for the health care worker," said project leader and study coauthor Andrew Pierce, MHSA, director of supply plus at Barnes-Jewish. "We want to make it safer for team members who are at risk while taking care of patients with a known or possible COVID-19 diagnosis."

Their program uses a disinfecting procedure first tested by Duke University researchers in 2016.1 However, the Barnes-Jewish process has a unique modification--an identification system that enables the hospital to return the sanitized mask to the same individual each time, said senior author Shaina Eckhouse, MD, FACS, assistant professor of surgery at Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis. Dr. Eckhouse is part of the multidisciplinary team of university and hospital staff who developed the disinfection program.

This approach, according to the authors, increased employee acceptance of reusing what is normally a single-use N95 mask and helped ensure proper fit of the returned mask.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended strategies for conserving personal protective equipment, including decontamination and reuse of N95 masks.2 Almost half of U.S. health care facilities reported being nearly or completely out of N95 respirator masks, according to a March 27 survey conducted by the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology.3

In late March, before the program began, Barnes-Jewish had a low inventory of N95 masks--about a week's worth--and no expectations for replenishment because of international shortages in hospital supply chains, according to Mr. Pierce.

How the process works

The disinfection process that has since been put into place begins at the end of a shift. A health care provider removes his or her N95 mask in that unit's soiled utility room and places it in a sterilization pouch (Crosstex) made of breathable polyethylene fiber (Tyvek by DuPont) on one side. On the other side of the sealed pouch, the worker writes his or her name or employee ID number, hospital, department, and unit location and puts the pouch in the soiled collection bin.

A designated worker wearing proper protection collects the bins twice a day and takes them to a specially designed and sealed disinfection room--built in four days, according to Dr. Eckhouse. There the pouches are arranged, breathable side up, by clinical unit on wire racks. A hydrogen peroxide vapor generator (Bioquell Z-2), which Washington University already owned to decontaminate equipment, fills the room with the chemical.

After 4.5 hours of disinfection, a worker moves the racks of masks to another area that has a fan to offgas the hydrogen peroxide, where the masks stay until sensors record a zero reading. The pouches are returned to their respective units in a decontaminated bin, finishing a process that takes about seven hours, Mr. Pierce said.

Workers can wear their mask up to three weeks because past studies show that disinfection more than 20 times could alter the fit of the mask, he noted.

Since the program began April 1 in the Barnes-Jewish emergency department, it expanded in just two weeks to additional clinical departments and other hospitals in the system, which Mr. Pierce called "an immense achievement."

"A welcome improvement"

Currently, Mr. Pierce said they are disinfecting 240 N95 masks a day and have the capability of disinfecting 1,500 masks daily.

Without the disinfection program, he said the health care system would need to discard a substantial amount of its respirator masks. Because of the disinfection, the hospitals now have enough masks to last for weeks.

"This program is a welcome improvement for extended usage of N95s during the shortage that we are facing," Mr. Pierce said.

Dr. Eckhouse said other hospitals facing mask shortages can reproduce the disinfection program if they bring together experts in environmental health and safety, medicine, and facility management. "Having the infrastructure already in place would improve the ease of deploying an N95 disinfection process," she stated.

CINCINNATI - By leveraging the basics of artificial intelligence technology now used to predict risk for suicide or other mental health issues, researchers developed an AI system that analyzes linguistic patterns to predict a youth's risk for committing acts of school violence.

Study data published in the International Journal of Medical Informatics by physicians and clinical informaticians at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center show the system can detect the risk of aggression for individual subjects.

The AI system uses pattern-recognizing machine learning and natural language processing (NLP) technologies. It combines the analytical scope and speed of information technology with clinical risk-assessment data and practitioner expertise, thereby automating a complex and time-consuming process, according to Yizhao Ni, PhD, co-principal investigator and a clinical informatician in the Division of Biomedical Informatics.

The technology uncovered multiple warning signs that could deliver useful clinical insights to assist personalized interventions, Ni explained. When fully developed, the system's built-in risk assessment scales and automated risk prediction algorithms should produce an accurate and scalable computerized screening service to prevent school violence.

"Students are physically or verbally bullied on school property, electronically through texting or social media, and youth violence costs society billions of dollars in health care expenses or lost productivity," Ni said, citing data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Our study demonstrates that overall, our AI system matches the clinical judgements and accuracy of psychiatrists 94 percent of the time. It has tremendous potential to help address youth violence at school and eventually other mental health conditions."

Empowering a Solution

Earlier research shows that using NLP and machine learning technologies pioneered at Cincinnati Children's and elsewhere improve risk prediction for mental health problems like suicide. Current study authors note that so far there are no automated solutions developed to predict the risk for violent behaviors at school.

Recent advancements in school-based crime prevention programs demonstrate the best results occur when at-risk youth receive timely and individualized intervention, according to Drew Barzman, MD, co-principal investigator and director of the Child and Adolescent Forensic Psychiatry Service at Cincinnati Children's.

But high patient need and busy clinical schedules can constrain the ability to complete the complex, labor intensive tasks needed for timely clinical evaluation of mental health patients. An effective automated system could help overcome this challenge and help mental health caregivers deliver timely interventions based on a youth's individual needs, he said.

Study Design

The study was tested by embedding it as a clinical service in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at Cincinnati Children's. The division's inpatient units receive about 30,000 psychiatric admissions annually. Its outpatient clinic has over 52,000 patient visits every year.

Conducted between May 2015 and April 2018, the study prospectively recruited 131 students between ages 10 and 18 years from middle and high schools in Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, and Tennessee.

Clinical assessments by psychiatrists indicated that 68 students (52 percent) were considered high risk towards others. For analysis with the AI assessment tool, the patients were segmented into smaller groups to compare the system's predictive reliability when compared physician-generated patient clinical assessments. These comparisons yielded the AI system's overall risk assessment match rate of 94 percent.

Future development plans for the tool include seeking research collaborations with other medical institutions and school systems to test live implementation in educational and medical settings, according to the researchers. Researchers said that based on funding capabilities, this will be the next phase of their work.

DALLAS, April 28, 2020 -- Upward income mobility is associated with a trade-off between well-being and cardiometabolic health, according to new research published today in the Journal of the American Heart Association, an open access journal of the American Heart Association. The article appears in a special spotlight issue exploring different aspects of the complex relationships between psychosocial factors and cardiovascular health.

To study cardiometabolic health, the research focused on metabolic syndrome, which is a collection of signs that predispose individuals to later diabetes, stroke and heart attack. These signs include abdominal fat, high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol levels and high blood glucose.

Researchers from Northwestern University and the University of Georgia analyzed data from two multi-decade studies: 7,542 participants in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health and 1,877 participants in the Midlife in the United States Study. The participants entered the studies as youth and were followed into adulthood. They grouped participants into one of four categories based on their family income during childhood and adulthood: those who were consistently advantaged or consistently disadvantaged, and those who experienced upward or downward mobility (meaning higher or lower income in adulthood relative to childhood).

Researchers' key conclusions:

Upwardly mobile participants reported substantially less psychological distress than consistently disadvantaged individuals. In fact, in most comparisons their distress levels were comparable to consistently advantaged participants.

However, this pattern was reversed for metabolic syndrome: upwardly mobile participants fared worse than those with consistent advantage and closely resembled individuals with consistent disadvantage.

Because high socioeconomic status is associated with fewer health problems, it is commonly believed that as people's financial conditions improve, so will their health. However, these results suggest upward mobility entails a trade-off, where improving financial conditions forecast higher psychological well-being, but worse cardiometabolic health.

Upward mobility is not always beneficial for cardiometabolic health, even if it improves economic standing and mental health.

Study coauthors, disclosures and funding sources are detailed in the manuscript.

New research, published online today in the American Journal of Psychiatry, finds that children's rearing environment has a meaningful impact on their risk for major depression later in life, and notes the importance supporting of nurturing environments when children are at risk. In the study, authors analyzed the health records of full and half siblings with at least one biological parent with depression who were raised by either their biological parents or in carefully screened adoptive homes. Generally, the children in adopted homes showed lower risk, but whatever the setting, episodes of major depression in the parents meant the children were more susceptible to depression themselves.

"The Rearing Environment and Risk for Major Depression: A Swedish National High-Risk Home-Reared and Adopted-Away Co-Sibling Control Study"--led by Kenneth S. Kendler, M.D., with Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, and Kristina Sundquist, M.D., Ph.D., from Lund University in Malmö, Sweden--involved data from the Swedish National Sample. The researchers identified 666 high-risk full sibling pairs and 2,596 high-risk pairs of half siblings each with at least one child reared at home and one adopted. High risk was defined as having at least one biological parent with major depression. In Sweden, the adoptive parents are carefully screened and undergo a rigorous selection process to ensure their ability to "provide a supportive and generally advantaged home for their adoptive child."

In the full sibling group, the risk for major depression among adopted siblings was 23% lower than the sibling raised in the home with their birth family. In the group of half siblings, the risk of depression was 19% lower for the adopted siblings. For both the full and half sibling groups, the protective effect of adoption disappeared when an adoptive parent or step-sibling had major depression or when the

The study authors conclude that their results "further strengthen the evidence that high-quality rearing environments can meaningfully reduce rates of major depression in individuals at high familial risk." The research also "supports efforts to improve the rearing environment in high-risk families as an approach to the primary prevention of major depression," the authors note.

Myrna M. Weissman, Ph.D., from Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, noted in her accompanying commentary that to the question of whether it is nature or nurture that contributes to depression risk, the answer remains "yes," it is nature and nurture, with relative proportions and for which type of depression continuing to be examined. Yet, for the present study "the results demonstrate the strong impact of the rearing environment on risk for major depression and support the importance of intervention efforts to improve the rearing environment in high risk families."

In an exploratory study of nearly 10,000 women with no history of cancer, researchers evaluating a multi-cancer blood test report that it successfully detected some cancers, including early cancers that could be localized and surgically removed. Among the cancers detected were ovarian cancers, which are typically diagnosed at an advanced stage. Important to the authors' focus on safety and feasibility, the test could be done without incurring a large number of futile, invasive follow-up tests and without discouraging the participants from engaging in other forms of standard cancer screening such as mammography. Even as further trials will be needed, the study was able to address several fundamental issues about multi-cancer blood tests, the authors say. Diagnosing cancers earlier is one of the keys to reducing future cancer deaths. Presently, screening approaches decrease mortality from colon, breast, lung, and cervical cancers, but adherence varies widely, and some forms of cancer screening are not recommended for average-risk individuals. A minimally invasive, multi-cancer screening test could increase cancer detection rates when applied to a population already following standard screening approaches. Several questions remain about multi-cancer blood-based screening tests, however. In their new study, DETECT-A (Detecting cancers Earlier Through Elective mutation-based blood Collection and Testing), Anne Marie Lennon and colleagues attempted to answer several of these questions, including whether these tests can detect cancer in individuals whose cancer was not previously detected by other means. Lennon and colleagues recruited nearly 10,000 women 65 to 75 years of age with no history of cancer. Their analysis looked for nearly all cancer types, based on circulating DNA and protein biomarkers of cancer. To maximize safety, DETECT-A incorporated three steps prior to initiating a diagnostic work-up for cancer. Only in the third step, if no non-cancer-related cause for an abnormal result was found, were individuals with a positive test invited to undergo the final component of testing - a full-body diagnostic positron emission tomography-computed tomography (PET-CT) scan. This test is routinely used in clinical practice to aid in detecting, localizing, and diagnosing tumors.
The blood test used in the DETECT-A study was an early version of a multi-analyte test called CancerSEEK (http://science.sciencemag.org/cgi/doi/10.1126/science.aar3247) and it ultimately found cancer in 26 women. Other cancers not detected by the blood test were also found in the study participants. In total, 96 cancers were diagnosed during the 12-month study. Of these, 26 were detected by the blood test, 24 by standard screening, and 46 by other means. An analysis of whether participants in the study had fewer mammograms after the baseline blood test than they had in the years prior showed they did not greatly change their habits, suggesting that such a test can be incorporated into routine clinical care and not discourage participants from engaging in standard-of-care screening, which the authors emphasize their approach shouldn't replace. They note that DETECT-A was not designed for regulatory approval of a specific test. Larger trials, including formal registration trials, will be necessary to further evaluate the clinical validity and utility of such testing, they say.

BINGHAMTON, NY -- Go ahead: Give your partner a hug or cuddle while you catch some Netflix. According to recently published research from Binghamton University, State University of New York, it just might build a stronger relationship.

The study, led by Binghamton University doctoral student in psychology Samantha Wagner, particularly looks at the effects of non-sexual intimate touch -- for example, hugging, holding hands or cuddling on the couch, rather than actions intended to lead to sex. Attachment style refers to human social bonds and exists on a spectrum; avoidant individuals prefer more interpersonal distance, while anxious individuals seek greater closeness. This style develops in childhood, but can change over time and vary with the individual in question.

"It all depends on how open, close and secure you feel with that person, which is impacted by many, many factors," Wagner said.

To determine the connection of attachment style, touch satisfaction and marital satisfaction, researchers used a sample of 184 couples over the age of 18, consisting of husbands and wives; same-sex couples were excluded. Because the study protocol included hormonal sampling, individuals on hormonal therapy were also excluded, as well as postmenopausal, pregnant or breastfeeding women. They were interviewed separately on their attachment tendencies, the amount of touch and routine affection in their relationships, and their relationship satisfaction.

Researchers expected to find that avoidant individuals preferred less touch, while anxious people prefer more. What they found was more nuanced.

The more routine affection that couples experienced, the more they felt satisfied with their partners' touch, even if they had avoidant attachment styles. With low levels of physical affection, anxious husbands were less satisfied with the touch they received, but not anxious wives, who may instead choose to solicit the missing affection.

For men, higher levels of routine affection are associated with relationship satisfaction; in other words, touch is a positive, the icing on the marriage cake. For women, lower levels of routine affection correlated with relationship dissatisfaction, meaning that touch is an essential ingredient and its absence is a negative. It's a subtle distinction.

"There's something specific about touch satisfaction that interplays with relationship satisfaction but not dissatisfaction for wives," said Wagner, who noted that further research studies may be able to clarify the distinction.

Whatever a couple's attachment insecurities, the perception of how their partner touches them has the greatest association with "touch satisfaction." In other words, more is better because they can more easily see that their partner is trying to engage with them.

Overall, the study shows an association between non-sexual physical affection and solid marriages, although the current data can't establish cause and effect.

"Interestingly, there's some evidence that holding your partner's hand while you're arguing de-escalates the argument and makes it more productive," said Wagner, who has used the technique with clients.

However, Wagner emphasized that the study focused only on healthy, consensual touch -- not manipulation or abuse. Touch holds different meanings for people, she pointed out; someone with autism spectrum disorder may be overwhelmed by tactile sensitivity, and someone with a history of trauma may experience touch as averse.

Wagner is, by her own admission, a hugger and has long been fascinated by the healing possibilities of touch; she wrote her senior thesis as a qualitative review of the uses and benefit of touch across the lifespan. But questions continued to arise: Why do some people enjoy touch more than others? And do they benefit more as a result?

As the coronavirus pandemic continues, couples may want to consider adding more affection to decrease stress -- as long as their partners are receptive and willing.

"Feel free to give some extra snugs on the couch. There's plenty of evidence that suggests touch as a way to decrease stress," she said.

But she notes that the coronavirus pandemic also may lead to touch deprivation, as social distancing keeps us physically apart from one another. Consider, for example, healthcare workers who are quarantining themselves from their own families when they return home, to keep the virus from spreading to their loved ones.

"I think we should all hold the loved ones we can a little closer and be thoughtful of the struggles that others might be having because they can't do just that," she said. "If anything is true for me, a hug has become even more precious than it was before."

Most treatment providers for individuals with alcohol use disorders are well versed in either the 12-Step Alcoholics Anonymous program or in a different treatment such as cognitive behavioral therapy -- but the two approaches can mesh well, according to a Baylor University researcher.

Alcohol use disorders are among the most common psychological disorders experienced by Americans, according to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Only an estimated 10 percent of those with disorders receive treatment, with the most popular treatment being some form of Alcoholics Anonymous 12-Step involvement. But many misconceptions about AA continue to exist.

"Clinicians should be mindful if they have biases or misconceptions about the AA program and AA members, and empirical research on how well 12-Step programs work is now widely available," said Sara Dolan, Ph. D., associate professor of psychology and neuroscience and director of the doctor of clinical psychology (Psy.D.) graduate program at Baylor University. "Because it is likely that clinicians will work with people who engage in 12-Step programs, we should learn as much as we can about how to integrate 12-Step treatment into our work with these clients."

The article -- "Treatment of Alcohol use disorder: Integration of Alcoholics Anonymous and cognitive behavioral therapy" -- is published in the American Psychological Association journal Training and Education in Professional Psychology.

Authors discussed misconceptions about AA, including these beliefs:

That AA is a religious program requiring belief in God to work the steps. While a historic Christian influence exists in AA's principles (self-examination, confession, restitution and service to others), AA considers itself a "spiritual program of action." It is not allied with any sect, denomination, politics, organization or institution, and it does not endorse or support causes. The Big Book -- AA's recovery manual -- asks only whether one is "even willing to believe that there is a Power greater than myself," with no requirement to define this Power or state with absolute certainty it exists.

That AA negates personal responsibility for sobriety. Although the First Step of the program asks individuals to admit "powerlessness" over alcohol, the program aims to help individuals accept personal responsibility for their actions.

Some important distinctions do exist between AA and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), Dolan said. While AA's goal is total abstinence, CBT sometimes encourages total abstinence and sometimes seeks to reduce the amount one drinks to reduce harm to self or others. Another difference is that in AA, the primary therapeutic relationship is with a peer -- someone who is in recovery from harmful alcohol and substance use. In CBT, the primary relationship is with a psychotherapist who may or may not be in recovery. Yet another difference is that in AA or 12-step programs, clients can get free help that protects their anonymity.

But the two approaches have much in common, Dolan said. In both, the work that is done to achieve control over drinking is fundamentally cognitive-behavioral in nature.

For example, AA strives to identify the thoughts, emotions, attitudes and behaviors that cause problems, then replace them with new, more adaptive ones to overcome problematic alcohol and other drug use and to engage in altruistic behavior.

Similarly, cognitive behavioral therapy seeks to identify and replace dysfunctional beliefs and help clients learn to cope through means other than drinking, Dolan said.

AA and cognitive behavioral therapy have similar definitions of alcohol and substance use disorder and are alike in that they urge individuals to take stock of emotions and behaviors -- CBT through a daily thought record of negative emotions and AA through daily admittance of selfish, dishonest, self-seeking or fearful thoughts or behaviors.

Some interventions and skills also are similar. CBT promotes social support, interpersonal skills training and learning to regulate emotion and tolerate distress; AA advocates avoiding former "people, places and things" conducive to drinking, instead using sponsors and support groups and modeling the behavior of sober AA members.

Both approaches advocate taking responsibility for one's actions, acceptance and times of self-examination and relaxation, researchers wrote. CBT advises using relaxation techniques and training, while AA suggests prayer and meditation.

The article recommends that clinicians be aware of their misconceptions about AA and AA members and educate themselves about AA. For example, attendance as a guest at AA meetings (some are open to guests, while others are members only) would be helpful, as well as reading AA's program material, including the Big Book.

In addition, the authors suggest that efforts to "translate" 12-Step language into the terminology of cognitive behavioral therapy may help clinical trainees understand the corollaries between the two approaches and bridge the gap.

Rutgers engineers have created a highly effective way to paint complex 3D-printed objects, such as lightweight frames for aircraft and biomedical stents, that could save manufacturers time and money and provide new opportunities to create "smart skins" for printed parts.

The findings are published in the journal ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.

Conventional sprays and brushes can't reach all nooks and crannies in complex 3D-printed objects, but the new technique coats any exposed surface and fosters rapid prototyping.

"Our technique is a more efficient way to coat not only conventional objects, but even hydrogel soft robots, and our coatings are robust enough to survive complete immersion in water and repeated swelling and de-swelling by humidity," said senior author Jonathan P. Singer, an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering in the School of Engineering at Rutgers University-New Brunswick.

The engineers discovered new capabilities of a technology that creates a fine spray of droplets by applying a voltage to fluid flowing through a nozzle. This technique (electrospray deposition) has been used mainly for analytical chemistry. But in recent decades, it has also been used in lab-scale demonstrations of coatings that deliver vaccines, light-absorbing layers of solar cells and fluorescent quantum dots (tiny particles) for LED displays.

Using their approach, Rutgers engineers are building an accessory for 3D printers that will, for the first time, allow automated coating of 3D-printed parts with functional, protective or aesthetic layers of paint. Their technique features much thinner and better-targeted paint application, using significantly fewer materials than traditional methods. That means engineers can use cutting-edge materials, such as nanoparticles and bioactive ingredients, that would otherwise be too costly in paints, according to Singer.

Next steps include creating surfaces that can change their properties or trigger chemical reactions to create paints that can sense their environment and report stimuli to onboard electronics. The engineers hope to commercialize their technique and create a new paradigm of rapid coating immediately after printing that complements 3D printing.

A new study warns mobile phones could be acting as 'Trojan horses' for coronavirus and urges billions of users worldwide to decontaminate their devices daily.

The research, led by Associate Professor Lotti Tajouri of Bond University, reviewed 56 studies from 24 countries and found phones host a staggering cocktail of live germs.

While all the studies predate the current pandemic, the authors say the virus responsible for COVID-19 -- SARS-CoV-2 -- is probably present on mobile phones and other touch-screen devices of coronavirus sufferers.

"Our recommendation is that phones should be decontaminated daily and regularly with either 70 per cent isopropyl or by sanitising with (ultraviolet) devices like PhoneSoap," the study says.

The systematic review found golden staph and E. Coli microbes were among the most common bugs on phones.

Dr Tajouri, a biomedical scientist, said mobile devices were 'five-star hotels with premium heated spas, free buffet for microbes to thrive on'.

"They have temperature control, we keep them in our pockets, we are addicted to them," he said.

"We talk into them and deposit droplets that can be full of viruses, bacteria -- you name it.

"We eat with them, so we give nutrients to micro-organisms.

"And nobody -- absolutely nobody - washes or decontaminates their phone."

He said people travelled with their phones "and no border officers check them. It surely causes a biosecurity concern.

"That's why mobile phones are Trojan horses. We don't know that we are carrying the enemy."

Dr Tajouri said phone super-users touched their devices up to 5000 times a day and even the average user handled them an average of three hours a day.

"We know from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that 80 per cent of all infections are associated with our hands.

"You can wash your hands as many times as you like -- and you should -- but if you then touch a contaminated phone you are contaminating yourself all over again.

Think of your phone as your third hand."

Community transmission could occur when an infected person touched their phone and then a pole on a bus which was grasped by an elderly person, he said.

"The extraordinarily fast contagion that has scientists puzzled might reside within these mobile phones spreading COVID-19 everywhere at ultra-speed," Dr Tajouri said.

"After all, they're everywhere, travelling the world in planes, cruise ships and trains.

"Let's take that hypothesis seriously. If we clean our phones daily and this makes a difference then we might with this little action curve down the COVID-19 epidemic and save lives."

But Dr Tajouri said more research was needed to determine the role contaminated phones were playing in the coronavirus pandemic.