Culture

Chronic short sleep is associated with increased risk of clogged arteries, heart disease, and thus increased morbidity and mortality. New research in Experimental Physiology may have figured out why lack of sleep increases susceptibility to heart disease, and allowing doctors to identify the patients who might need to change their habits before they develop disease.

In adults who regularly slept fewer than 7 hours per night, the levels of certain microRNAs, (molecules that influence whether or not a gene is expressed) were lower. These molecules play a key role in regulating vascular health and thus levels are now recognized to be sensitive and specific biomarkers of cardiovascular health, inflammation and disease. In other words, a lowered level of these molecules is associated with heart disease, so they could be used as a biomarker to determine who is more susceptible to disease.

Researchers tested sedentary, middle-aged adults without heart disease from the local major metropolitan surrounding Denver and Boulder, Colorado. Subjects were asked to complete a questionnaire designed to accurately estimate average nightly sleep and a small amount of blood was taken from each subject after an overnight fast. MicroRNAs 125a, 126 and 146a were extracted from the blood and measured.

Jamie Hijmans, an author on the study said: "The link between insufficient sleep and cardiovascular disease may be due, in part, to changes in microRNAs. These findings suggest there may be a "fingerprint" associated with a person's sleep habits, and that fluctuations in miRNA levels may serve as a warning or guide to disease stage and progression."

Irvine, Calif., May 2, 2019 - Water polo athletes take note: A new study by University of California, Irvine researchers maps out the frequency of head injuries in the sport and reveals which positions are the most vulnerable.

The first-of-its-kind report, which tracked several dozen male collegiate water polo players over three seasons, was published today in PLOS One, a peer-reviewed, open-access scientific journal.

"For years, water polo's head trauma risks have been downplayed or overshadowed by football-related brain injuries," said study co-author James Hicks, professor and chair of UCI's Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology. "Our data quantifies the extent of the problem and sets the stage for additional research and possible rule changes or protective gear to improve water polo safety."

During the study, players wore caps embedded with electronic sensors. Over time, every participant got bopped in the head by balls or rival players, but some fared worse -occasionally far worse - than others.

Offensive players were more likely to get battered than defensive and transition positions (60 percent versus 23 percent and 17 percent, respectively). And swimmers attacking from the left side of the goal suffered more head hits than players on the right, possibly because right-handed athletes commonly throw shots from the left zone, so there's more activity in that area, researchers theorized.

The most unsafe position, according to the study, was offensive center. On average, those players endured nearly seven blows to the skull per game, which amounted to 37 percent of all head impacts recorded by UCI scientists. In contrast, the second-most vulnerable position, defensive center, averaged two head strikes a game, the study found.

Overall, researchers counted an average of 18 head hits per game. Although no concussions were diagnosed, the force of the blows was "similar to those observed in collegiate soccer, another sport that is commonly studied for the risks associated with repeated head impact exposure," Hicks said.

Next up, UCI researchers are preparing a manuscript that details how water polo head shots affect brain function.

Hicks got interested in the subject while watching his three sons play the sport. "People who've never seen a game may not realize how physical it is," he said. "Head-butts and elbows. Balls flying up to 50 mph. I've witnessed players get dragged out of the pool in a daze after a blow to the head, and I've sat in an emergency room while my kid received stitches from being struck in the face. I began to wonder what the concussion rate was."

After discovering a dearth of studies, he launched his own. In the first, published three years ago in Frontiers in Neurology, Hicks and Dr. Steven Small, UCI professor of neurology, surveyed 1,500 USA Water Polo members and discovered that 36 percent recalled suffering at least one concussion during their playing career.

PHILADELPHIA - A study of a blood pressure drug does not show any benefit for people with Parkinson's disease, according to findings released today that will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology's 71st Annual Meeting in Philadelphia, May 4 to 10, 2019.

The drug isradipine had shown promise in small, early studies and hopes were high that this could be the first drug to slow the progression of the disease.

"Unfortunately, the people who were taking isradipine did not have any difference in their Parkinson's symptoms over the three years of the study compared to the people who took a placebo," said study author Tanya Simuni, MD, of Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago and a member of the American Academy of Neurology.

The phase 3 study involved 336 people with early Parkinson's disease at 54 sites in the US and Canada as part of the Parkinson Study Group. Half of the participants received 10 milligrams daily of isradipine for three years, while the other half received a placebo.

The drug had shown promise in animal studies, and a phase 2 study in humans did not show any safety concerns. Researchers became interested in the drug when the observation was made that use of the drug for high blood pressure was associated with a lower risk of developing Parkinson's disease.

"Of course, this is disappointing news for everyone with Parkinson's disease and their families, as well as the research community," Simuni said. "However, negative results are important because they provide a clear answer, especially for the drug that is commercially available. We will all continue to work to find a treatment that can slow down or even cure this disease."

A new study by American Cancer Society researchers finds medical financial hardship is very common among people in the United States, with more than half reporting problems with affordability, stress, or delaying care because of cost. The study, appearing early online in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, estimates more than 100 million people in the U.S. experience medical financial hardship.

High out-of-pocket spending for medical care is an increasingly critical issue for patients in the United States. It can lead to a depletion of assets and medical debt, as well as distress and worry about household finances. Patients may delay or forgo needed medical care because of cost, jeopardizing benefits of treatment. Illness can also impact the ability to work and reduce productivity, limiting household income, and potentially reducing access to employer-sponsored health insurance in the working age population ages 18-64 years.

While many studies have looked at the financial toll of a cancer diagnosis, less is known about financial hardship in the general population, outside of oncology. For the latest study, researchers led by Robin Yabroff, PhD, assessed the prevalence of material (e.g., problems paying medical bills), psychological (e.g., worry about medical bills) and behavioral (delaying or forgoing medical care because of cost) domains of financial hardship using data from the 2015-2017 National Health Interview Survey.

They found overall, 56.0 % of adults reported at least one domain of medical financial hardship, representing 137.1 million adults in the United States. Compared with those 65 years and older, adults 18 to 64 reported higher material (28.9% vs. 15.3%), psychological (46.9% vs. 28.4%) and behavioral (21.2% vs. 12.7%) medical financial hardship.

Among adults 18 to 64, those with less educational attainment and more health conditions were more likely to report great intensity of hardship. Women were more likely to report multiple domains of hardship than men. And the uninsured were more likely to report multiple domains of hardship (52.8%), compared to those with some public (26.5%) and private insurance (23.2%).

The authors say unless action is taken, the problem is likely to worsen. "With increasing prevalence of multiple chronic conditions; higher patient cost-sharing; and higher costs of healthcare; the risk of hardship will likely increase in the future. Thus, development and evaluation of the comparative effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of strategies to minimize medical financial hardship will be important."

A new study in The Auk: Ornithological Advances suggests that some birds prioritize social information over visual evidence when making breeding choices.

The quality of an environment can be difficult for a bird to assess and, therefore, continuously gathering information is a good way to stay up-to-date with breeding conditions. In this field study, researchers tested how the wild Zebra Finch (Taeniopygia guttata) is attracted to successful nest sites. They presented the Zebra Finch with different visual or acoustic cues in nest boxes, simulating the presence of small or large broods, in order to test how birds assess the quality of a potential breeding site.

When discussing the costs and benefits of social information, scientists often argue that socially acquired knowledge is less reliable and more prone to deception. The sounds made by nesting birds, however, are honest indicators of the number of chicks. Predators can use these cues to locate nests. While the calls of chicks serve as signals for the parents and siblings and (inadvertently) also as cues for predators, it is unknown whether chick calls can also function as cues for prospective breeders.

Researchers here aimed to test which social cues from the nests of Zebra Finches attract other Zebra Finches. In two separate experiments, they presented wild Zebra Finches with either acoustic cues (playback of chick calls) or visual cues (eggs) with either small or large broods. Using playbacks of chick calls or nests with unhatched eggs, respectively, allowed them to completely discern brood size from parental activity.

If the presence of fledglings in an area alone would provide all relevant information, there would be no need for wild Zebra Finches to visit nests beforehand. With this experiment, researchers tested the hypothesis that chick begging calls can serve as a source of social information for prospecting Zebra Finches. If the begging calls can also serve as indicators for breeding success, Zebra Finches should visit larger (and potentially more successful) broods more than small ones, as clutch size is correlated with reproductive success. The researchers further predicted the acoustic cues (representing nests at later stages) may be perceived as more reliable than visual cues (i.e. nests at early stages) and hence the distinction between small and large broods should be more pronounced in the nests with chick calls as cues than those with egg cues.

The results showed that more Zebra Finches visited experimental nests that were associated with playback recordings of calls of large broods (7 chicks) as opposed to calls of small broods (3 chicks). Visual cues (nests with different numbers of eggs or rocks), however, representing nests at early stages, did not influence either the probability of visits, nor number or duration of visits. This is the first evidence that calls of chicks in the nest can provide social information that influences bird breeding behavior.

This result is in accordance with the hypothesis that the wild Zebra Finch preferentially visits more successful broods. The chick calls alone provided the necessary social information to attract potential breeders.

Overall, this study provides the first evidence that wild birds can use calls from chicks at the pre-fledging stage as a social signal. This social information could be an important cue to infer breeding success. Even though the parental feeding activity at nests is a known indicator of breeding success in some species, the value of the begging calls in the nest as inadvertent social information has not been demonstrated previously.

"This study helps us understand which cues the Zebra Finches use to find the best nest site," said lead author Hanja Barbara Bandl. "Deciding in which location to build a nest is crucial for birds in order to maximize their breeding success."

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Precise measurements are critical to the discovery, development and usage of medications. Major financial and scientific decisions within pharmaceutical companies are informed by the outcomes of chemical and biological analyses. Even slight measurement variations can add risk and uncertainty in these high-stakes decisions.

A Purdue University professor and expert in measurement science has led a team to design a new filter aimed at helping drug developers and researchers create more exact measurements early in the drug development stage, which can ultimately help move a drug to clinical trials faster.

Garth Simpson, a professor of analytical and physical chemistry in Purdue's College of Science, created the filter as part of his work with the Merck-Purdue Center for Measurement Science. The academic-industrial partnership, which started in 2017, is focused on developing technology to improve drug manufacturing and formulation to support the pharma industry in expediting drug discovery and delivery. According to the Food and Drug Administration, it can take up 10 to 15 years or longer to move a drug from discovery to the public.

The technology is published in the March 25 edition of Analytical Chemistry.

"This center provides real-world test beds for validating emerging technology related to chemical measurements," Simpson said. "Our latest development is this novel filter design for digital deconvolution that helps us remove timing artifacts arising from the response function of the instrument we are using for data acquisition."

Simpson said any practical measurement of an event, including those used for drug discovery, is always a combination of the event itself and the response of the measuring instrument. He said most algorithms used to correct for the response function of the instrument require a great deal of knowledge about the instrument itself.

"Our digital filter approach only requires that a user have the data," Simpson said. "Our filter and algorithm then use non-negative matrix factorization over short sections of data to allow the analysis of data sets that are too large to be characterized by other conventional approaches."

The filter uses mathematical formulas to analyze and organize the data, which sometimes contains millions of individual data points, into useable sets for researchers and drug developers.

Simpson said the Purdue filter can be used for measurements in microscopy, chromatography and triboluminescence, all of which are used in the early stages of drug development to determine which molecules show the greatest potential to move ahead to clinical trials.

Simpson has worked with the Purdue Office of Technology Commercialization to patent his measurement science technologies. His research team is looking for additional researchers and partners to license the technologies.

Their work aligns with Purdue's Giant Leaps celebration, celebrating the global advancements in health and artificial intelligence as part of Purdue's 150th anniversary. Those are two of the four themes of the yearlong celebration's Ideas Festival, designed to showcase Purdue as an intellectual center solving real-world issues.

The biblical King Balak may have been a historical figure, according to a new reading of the Mesha Stele, an inscribed stone dating from the second half of the 9th century BCE.

A name in Line 31 of the stele, previously thought to read ??? ???, 'House of David', could instead read 'Balak', a king of Moab mentioned in the biblical story of Balaam (Numbers 22-24), say archaeologist Prof. Israel Finkelstein and historians and biblical scholars Prof. Nadav Na'aman and Prof. Thomas Römer, in an article published in Tel Aviv: The Journal of the Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University.

The Mesha Stele was found in the 19th century in the ruins of the biblical town of Dibon in Moab (present day Jordan), and is now in the Louvre. The stone's inscription tells the story of the territorial expansion and construction endeavours of King Mesha of Moab, who is mentioned in the Bible. The stele was cracked in the 19th century and parts of it are missing, but portions of the missing parts are preserved in a reverse copy of the inscription, known as a 'squeeze', made before the stele cracked.

The authors studied new high-resolution photographs of the squeeze, and of the stele itself. These new images made it clear that there are three consonants in the name of the monarch mentioned in Line 31, and that the first is the Hebrew letter beth (a 'b' sound).

While the other letters are eroded, the most likely candidate for the monarch's name is 'Balak', the authors say. The seat of the king referred to in Line 31 was at Horonaim, a place mentioned four times in the Bible in relation to the Moabite territory south of the Arnon River. "Thus, Balak may be a historical personality like Balaam, who, before the discovery of the Deir Alla inscription, was considered to be an 'invented' figure," they suggest.

"The new photographs of the Mesha Stele and the squeeze indicate that the reading, 'House of David' - accepted by many scholars for more than two decades - is no longer an option," the authors conclude. "With due caution we suggest the name of the Moabite king Balak, who, according to the Balaam story of Numbers 22-24, sought to bring a divine curse on the people of Israel.

"This story was written down later than the time of the Moabite king referred to in the Mesha Stele. Yet, to give a sense of authenticity to his story, its author must have integrated into the plot certain elements borrowed from the ancient reality, including two personal names: Balaam and Balak."

A study in mice shows that selectively removing cells that are no longer dividing from the brains of mice with a form of Alzheimer's disease can reduce brain damage and inflammation, and slow the pace of cognitive decline. These findings, say researchers, add to evidence that such senescent cells contribute to the damage caused by Alzheimer's disease in people.

"Our results show that eliminating these cells may be a viable route to treat Alzheimer's disease in humans," says Mark Mattson, Ph.D., senior investigator in the Laboratory of Neurosciences at the National Institute on Aging and professor of neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

A report on the work was published April 1 in Nature Neuroscience.

Alzheimer's disease is an age-related degenerative disease of the brain that affects an estimated 5.8 million Americans. The most common cause of age-related dementia, the disorder is marked by the aggregation of amyloid proteins, which can kill off surrounding neurons. The areas of amyloid accumulation and associated nerve cell death, called plaques, are a hallmark of the disease. To date there are no known successful treatments for the disease, and as these plaques begin to form, patients experience progressive memory loss, learning impairment and, in later stages, delusions and paranoia.

Researchers found that a specific brain cell type, called oligodendrocyte progenitor cells, appears in high numbers near plaques. In a healthy brain, oligodendrocyte progenitor cells develop into cells that support nerve cells, wrapping them in a protective layer that heals injury and removes waste. The environment created by the amyloid proteins causes these progenitors to stop dividing and conducting their normal functions. In diseases such as Alzheimer's, the oligodendrocytes instead send out inflammatory signals that contribute more damage to the surrounding brain tissue.

"We believe the amyloid is damaging the neurons, and although the oligodendrocytes move in to repair them, for some reason the amyloid causes them to senesce rather than complete their job," says Mattson.

The researchers suspected that if they could selectively remove malfunctioning senescent oligodendrocyte progenitor cells, they could slow Alzheimer's disease progression.

The researchers tested the concept in mice that were genetically engineered to have some of the characteristics of Alzheimer's disease, such as aggregated amyloid plaques. To remove the senescent cells, the researchers devised a treatment with a mixture of two U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs: dasatinib and quercetin. Dasatinib was originally developed as an anti-cancer drug, and quercetin is a compound found in many fruits and vegetables. The drug combination was proven as an effective way to eliminate senescent cells in previous studies of other diseases.

The researchers administered the drugs to groups of the Alzheimer's mice for nine days, then examined sections of the mice's brains for signs of damage and the presence of senescent oligodendrocyte progenitor cells.

They report that the mice treated with the drugs had approximately the same amount of amyloid plaques as mice that received no treatment. However, the researchers say they found that the number of senescent cells present around these plaques was reduced by more than 90 percent in mice treated with the drug combination.

They also found that the drugs caused the senescent oligodendrocyte progenitor cells to die off. Together, these results show that the dasatinib and quercetin treatment effectively eliminated senescent oligodendrocyte progenitor cells.

The researchers next tested whether the physical benefits of the dasatinib and quercetin treatment could protect the mice against the cognitive decline associated with Alzheimer's disease.

To do that, the researchers fed the genetically engineered mice the dasatinib and quercetin drug combination once weekly for 11 weeks, beginning when the mice were 3 1/2 months old. The researchers periodically evaluated the mice's cognitive function by observing how they navigated mazes.

They found that after 11 weeks, control mice who got no drug treatment took twice as long to solve the maze as their counterparts treated with dasatinib and quercetin.

After 11 weeks, the researchers again analyzed the brains of the mice and found 50 percent less inflammation in mice treated with dasatinib and quercetin, compared with nontreated mice. The researchers say these results show that eliminating senescent cells from the brains of affected mice protected cognitive function and reduced inflammation linked to Alzheimer's disease-like plaques.

Cellular senescence is an emerging area of interest in studies of age-related disease such as Alzheimer's, says Mattson. It has been most extensively studied in peripheral tissues, such as skin, where older cells are rapidly replaced by new ones. In these tissues, senescent cells accumulate as a normal part of aging, causing some of the well-known signs of aging skin, including wrinkles, stiffness and fragility.

Mattson cautions that mice genetically engineered to have Alzheimer's symptoms and characteristics do not directly mimic the biological processes of the human condition. For example, mouse brain cells do not die as amyloid plaques form, while human brain cells do.

An increasingly popular feature of modern video games is attracting gamers who share the beliefs and behaviours of problem gamblers, new UBC research has found.

Gamers who are drawn to "loot boxes"--randomly generated prizes of undisclosed value that can be attained or purchased within a game--bear a closer resemblance to problem gamblers than they do to problem gamers, according to the study published April 16 in Addictive Behaviors.

"Our study is among the first to investigate the links between loot boxes and gambling," said Gabriel Brooks, a PhD student from UBC's Centre for Gambling Research and lead author of the study. "Our findings are consistent with voiced concerns that loot boxes overlap with gambling, and support the need for regulators to consider gambling-like mechanisms within video games."

Loot boxes began appearing in video games in the mid-2000s and have grown in popularity since. In some cases, players earn them as rewards for game play, but players are often encouraged to buy them using real or virtual currency. Players typically do not know what they are getting in a loot box until they open it. It may contain a new outfit for the player's character to wear, for example, or a new weapon for them to use. Often, the most desired prizes are the most rare.

Game developers frequently use loot box sales to monetize free mobile games, and some games have associated online marketplaces where players can trade or sell the items, establishing a monetary value.

For the study, researchers developed five questions designed to measure excessive or risky use of loot boxes. The participating gamers, all North Americans of at least university age, assessed themselves based on statements such as: "I frequently play games longer than I intend to, so I can earn loot boxes" or "I have bought more loot boxes after failing to receive valuable items."

Participants also completed surveys that are commonly used in gambling research to assess gambling behaviour, beliefs about gambling, and risk-taking behaviour, as well as a newer survey designed to identify problem video gaming.

When the researchers analyzed the scores, they found a correlation between excessive engagement with loot boxes and measures of problem gambling, supporting the view that loot boxes are a 'gamblified' feature of modern video games. They found a smaller correlation between loot boxes and problem video gaming.

While the data shows significant overlap between risky loot box use and gambling behaviours, it does not indicate whether one causes the other. It's possible that people predisposed to problem gambling are particularly vulnerable to loot boxes, but it may also be that loot box use leads to risky gambling behaviours.

"Our data involved adult gamers," said Brooks. "There has been substantial concern regarding the impact of loot boxes upon youth. Studying youth exposure to loot box mechanisms would be a logical next step."

About 90 per cent of participants reported that they had opened a loot box in a video game. More than half reported spending money on them, and about one-third reported having sold a loot box item.

Hydrogen is a critical component in the manufacture of thousands of common products from plastic to fertilizers, but producing pure hydrogen is expensive and energy intensive. Now, a research team at Princeton University has harnessed sunlight to isolate hydrogen from industrial wastewater.

In a paper published Feb. 19 in the journal Energy & Environmental Science, the researchers reported that their process doubled the currently accepted rate for scalable technologies that produce hydrogen by splitting water.

The technique uses a specially designed chamber with a "swiss-cheese" black silicon interface to split water and isolate hydrogen gas. The process is aided by bacteria that generate electrical current when consuming organic matter in the wastewater; the current, in turn, aids the water splitting process.

The team, led by Zhiyong Jason Ren, professor of civil and environmental engineering and the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, chose wastewater from breweries for the test. They ran the wastewater through the chamber, used a lamp to simulate sunlight, and watched the organic compounds breakdown and the hydrogen bubble up.

The process "allows us to treat wastewater and simultaneously generate fuels," said Jing Gu, a co-researcher and assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry at San Diego State University.

The researchers said the technology could appeal to refineries and chemical plants, which typically produce their own hydrogen from fossil fuels, and face high costs for cleaning wastewater.

Historically, hydrogen production has relied on oil, gas or coal, and an energy-intensive method that involves processing the hydrocarbon stock with steam. Chemical manufacturers then combine the hydrogen gas with carbon or nitrogen to create high-value chemicals, such as methanol and ammonia. The two are ingredients in synthetic fibers, fertilizer, plastics and cleaning products, among other everyday goods.

Although hydrogen can be used as a vehicle fuel, the chemical industry is currently the largest producer and consumer of hydrogen. Producing chemicals in highly industrialized countries requires more energy than producing iron, steel, metals and food, according to a 2016 report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The report estimates that producing basic chemicals will continue to be the top industrial consumer of energy over the next two decades.

"It's a win-win situation for chemical and other industries," said Lu Lu, the first author on the study and an associate research scholar at the Andlinger Center. "They can save on wastewater treatment and save on their energy use through this hydrogen-creation process."

According to the researchers, this is the first time actual wastewater, not lab-made solutions, has been used to produce hydrogen using photocatalysis. The team produced the gas continuously over four days until the wastewater ran out, which is significant, the researchers said, because comparable systems that produce chemicals from water have historically failed after a couple hours of use. The researchers measured the hydrogen production by monitoring the amount of electrons produced by the bacteria, which directly correlates to the amount of hydrogen produced. The measurement was at the high end for similar lab experiments and, Ren said, twice as high as technologies with the potential to scale for industrial use.

Ren said he sees this technology as scalable because the chamber used to isolate the hydrogen is modular, and several can be stacked to process more wastewater and produce more hydrogen.

Though a lifecycle analysis has not yet been done, the researchers said the process will at least be energy neutral, if not energy positive, and eliminates the need for fossil fuels to create hydrogen.

The researchers said they will likely experiment with producing larger amounts of hydrogen and other gases in the future, and look forward to moving this technology to industry.

A new study has found genetic makeup does not predispose people to tooth decay, however the research did find that children with overweight mothers are more likely to have cavities.

The paper*, published in the latest edition of Pediatrics, estimates that one in three Australian children have tooth decay by the time they start school.

Lead researcher Dr Mihiri Silva, from the Murdoch Children's Research Institute, said the study looked at the teeth of 173 sets of twins (identical and non-identical) from pregnancy through to six years of age.

"How genetics impacts on dental health has not often been studied," Dr Silva said. "This is the first twin study that looks at both genetics and early life risk factors, such as illness and lifestyle.

"We found that identical twins, with identical genomes, have varying degrees of decay. "This means that environmental factors, like a lack of fluoride in water, seem to be the prime cause of cavities not genetic makeup."

However Dr Silva said the research did find a link between the mother's health and lifestyle during pregnancy and the child's future dental health, with obesity in pregnancy a definite marker for increased risk of child tooth decay.

"The relationship between maternal obesity and child tooth decay is complex," Dr Silva said. "Perhaps the mother's weight has a biological influence on the developing fetus or perhaps the risk of decay rises because of increased sugar consumption in that household."

One in three of the twins studied (32.2 per cent) had dental decay, and almost one in four (24.1 per cent) had advanced decay.

Dr Silva said it was important that people don't think of tooth decay as genetic.

"If people think the health of their teeth is down to their genetic make-up, they may not be prepared to make important lifestyle changes," she said.

"Our findings also reinforce how important it is for pediatricians and other health professionals to educate children to start preventive measures early in life, prior to the onset of damage to dental tissues."

Dr Silva said tooth decay was a serious health problem, because there was a clear link between child cavities and developing diabetes and cardiovascular disease later in life.

"Tooth decay is also the leading cause of preventable hospital stays for Australian children," Dr Silva said.

(According to 2011 Victorian (Australia) Department of Health statistics, more than 26,000 Australians under the age of 15 are admitted to hospital to treat tooth decay every year.)

Dr Katrina Scurrah, from Twins Research Australia and the School of Population and Global health at the University of Melbourne (Australia), said the study illustrated the advantages of studying twins to find out about health conditions and the importance of considering the effects of early life risk factors as well as genes.

But she said it's important to try to replicate these findings in other studies that follow children through to adulthood and to explore other risk factors for dental decay.

This latest study in Pediatrics collected data about the twins at 24 and 36-weeks' gestational age, at birth, 18 months and six years of age. This included a dental examination at age six.

Questionnaires about the mother's weight, illnesses, medication use, vitamin D levels, stress, alcohol intake and smoking were collected during pregnancy.

A new study published April 30 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences identified three factors critical in the rise of mammal communities since they first emerged during the Age of Dinosaurs: the rise of flowering plants, also known as angiosperms; the evolution of tribosphenic molars in mammals; and the extinction of non-avian dinosaurs, which reduced competition between mammals and other vertebrates in terrestrial ecosystems.

Previously, mammals in the Age of Dinosaurs were thought to be a relatively small part of their ecosystems and considered to be small-bodied, nocturnal, ground-dwelling insectivores. According to this long-standing theory, it wasn't until the K-Pg mass extinction event about 66 million years ago, which wiped out all non-avian dinosaurs, that mammals were then able to flourish and diversify. An astounding number of fossil discoveries over the past 30 years has challenged this theory, but most studies looked only at individual species and none has quantified community-scale patterns of the rise of mammals in the Mesozoic Era.

Co-authors are Meng Chen, a University of Washington alumnus and current postdoctoral researcher at Nanjing University; Caroline Strömberg, a University of Washington biology professor and curator of paleobotany at the UW's Burke Museum of Natural History & Culture; and Gregory Wilson, a UW associate professor of biology and Burke Museum curator of vertebrate paleontology. The team created a Rubik's Cube-like structure identifying 240 "eco-cells" representing possible ecological roles of mammals in a given ecospace. These 240 eco-cells cover a broad range of body size, dietary preferences, and ways of moving of small-bodied mammals. When a given mammal filled a certain type of role or eco-cell, it filled a spot in the 'Rubik's Cube.' This method provides the first comprehensive analysis of evolutionary and ecological changes of fossil mammal communities before and after K-Pg mass extinction.

"We cannot directly observe the ecology of extinct species, but body size, dietary preferences and locomotion are three aspects of their ecology that can be relatively easily inferred from well-preserved fossils," said Chen. "By constructing the ecospace using these three ecological aspects, we can visually identify the spots filled by species and calculate the distance among them. This allows us to compare the ecological structure of extinct and extant communities even though they don't share any of the same species."

The team analyzed living mammals to infer how fossil mammals filled roles in their ecosystems. They examined 98 small-bodied mammal communities from diverse biomes around the world, an approach that has not been attempted at this scale. They then used this modern-day reference dataset to analyze five exceptionally preserved mammal paleocommunities ? two Jurassic Period and two Cretaceous Period communities from northeastern China, and one Eocene Epoch community from Germany. Usually Mesozoic Era mammal fossils are incomplete and consist of fragmentary bones or teeth. Using these remarkably preserved fossils enabled the team to infer ecology of these extinct mammal species, and look at changes in mammal community structure during the last 165 million years.

The team found that, in current communities of present-day mammals, ecological richness is primarily driven by vegetation type, with 41 percent of small mammals filling eco-cells compared to 16 percent in the paleocommunities. The five mammal paleocommunities were also ecologically distinct from modern communities and pointed to important changes through evolutionary time. Locomotor diversification occurred first during the Mesozoic, possibly due to the diversity of microhabitats, such as trees, soils, lakes and other substrates to occupy in local environments. It wasn't until the Eocene that mammals grew larger and expanded their diets from mostly carnivory, insectivory and omnivory to include more species with diets dominated by plants, including fruit. The team determined that the rise of flowering plants, new types of teeth and the extinction of dinosaurs likely drove these changes.

Before the rise of flowering plants, mammals likely relied on conifers and other seed plants for habitat, and their leaves and possibly seeds for food. By the Eocene, flowering plants were both diverse and dominant across forest ecosystems. Flowering plants provide more readily available nutrients through their fast-growing leaves, fleshy fruits, seeds and tubers. When becoming dominant in forests, they fundamentally changed terrestrial ecosystems by allowing for new modes of life for a diversity of mammals and other forest-dwelling animals, such as birds.

"Flowering plants really revolutionized terrestrial ecosystems," said Strömberg. "They have a broader range of growth forms than all other plant groups ? from giant trees to tiny annual herbs ? and can produce nutrient-rich tissues at a faster rate than other plants. So when they started dominating ecosystems, they allowed for a wider variety of life modes and also for much higher 'packing' of species with similar ecological roles, especially in tropical forests."

Tribosphenic molars ? complex multi-functional cheek teeth ? became prevalent in mammals in the late Cretaceous Period. Mutations and natural selection drastically changed the shapes of these molars, allowing them to do new things like grinding. In turn, this allowed small mammals with these types of teeth to eat new kinds of foods and diversify their diets.

Lastly, the K-Pg mass extinction event that wiped out all dinosaurs except birds 66 million years ago provided an evolutionary and ecological opportunity for mammals. Small body size is a way to avoid being eaten by dinosaurs and other large vertebrates. The mass extinction event not only removed the main predators of mammals, but also removed small dinosaurs that competed with mammals for resources. This ecological release allowed mammals to grow into larger sizes and fill the roles the dinosaurs once had.

"The old theory that early mammals were held in check by dinosaurs has some truth to it," said Wilson. "But our study also shows that the rise of modern mammal communities was multifaceted and depended on dental evolution and the rise of flowering plants."

People living in the most populous, low-income areas in New Jersey with the highest risk for opioid overdoses have less access to the potentially life-saving opioid reversal drug naloxone, Rutgers researchers find.

The study, published in the Journal of Medical Toxicology, analyzed how a city's population and affluence correlated with the availability of naloxone in retail pharmacies. Naloxone, also known by brand names Narcan and Evzio, reverses the effects of opioids on the central nervous system in an overdose. Unfortunately, it also can be expensive and difficult to obtain.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, New Jersey's opioid-related death rates are among the fastest growing in the nation, rising 29 percent from 1,376 deaths in 2016 to 1,969 deaths in 2017.

"Naloxone can be a life-saving drug in the hands of bystanders," said author Lewis Nelson, chair of the emergency medicine department at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School. "Although retail pharmacies in New Jersey are permitted to dispense naloxone without a prescription, not all do."

The study compared naloxone availability in 90 retail pharmacies in 10 New Jersey cities to median household income, population and the prevalence of opioid-related hospital visits over a five-month period.

Researchers found that naloxone was available in 60 percent to 70 percent of retail pharmacies in more affluent, lower-population communities such as Little Silver, Readington and Flemington, but was available in less than 25 percent of lower-income, high-population cities such as Camden, Newark, Atlantic City and Vineland City.

"These cities with limited naloxone access also have the most severe opioid-related public health concerns," said lead author Kevin Lozo, a medical student at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School. "This shows that New Jersey has naloxone 'deserts' where the medication is needed most."

Lozo gave two possible explanations for the disparities: lack of insurance and types of retail pharmacies in low-income areas. "Cities with an underinsured population do not create demand for pharmacies to stock naloxone, which can cost up to thousands of dollars," he said.

Another factor is that the pharmacy retail chains CVS and Walgreens have committed to stocking naloxone in their stores, but fewer of these retail stores may be located in low-income cities. "We found that 75 percent of the CVS and Walgreens stores surveyed had naloxone available versus only 14 percent of other retailers," said Diane Calello, executive and medical director of New Jersey Poison Control based at the medical school and senior author of the study. "This study demonstrates that there is much more to be done to get naloxone into the hands of people who most need it."

PHILADELPHIA - Taking a pharmaceutical formulation of cannabidiol, a cannabis-based medicine, cut seizures nearly in half for children with a rare and severe type of epilepsy called Dravet syndrome, according to a phase 3 study released today that will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology's 71st Annual Meeting in Philadelphia, May 4 to 10, 2019. Dravet syndrome, which starts in infancy, can lead to intellectual disability and frequent, prolonged seizures. Cannabidiol is derived from marijuana that does not include the psychoactive part of the plant that creates a "high."

"It's exciting to be able to offer another alternative for children with this debilitating form of epilepsy and their families," said study author Ian Miller, MD, of Nicklaus Children's Hospital, formerly Miami Children's Hospital, in Florida. "The children in this study had already tried an average of four epilepsy drugs with no success and at the time were taking an average of three additional drugs, so to have this measure of success with cannabidiol is a major victory."

The study involved 199 children with an average age of 9 who were divided into three groups. One group received 20 milligrams per kilogram (mg/kg) per day of cannabidiol, the second group received 10 mg/kg per day and the third group received a placebo.

Seizures were recorded for four weeks before the treatments were started to establish a baseline. Then the participants received the treatment for 14 weeks. By the end of the study, seizures with convulsions had decreased for those taking the high dose of the drug by 46 percent and by 49 percent for those taking the lower dose of the drug, compared to 27 percent for those taking the placebo.

Total seizures reduced by 47 percent for those in the high dose group, by 56 percent for those in the lower dose group and by 30 percent for those in the placebo group. In the high dose group, 49 percent of the participants had their seizures cut in half or more, compared to 44 percent in the low dose group and 26 percent in the placebo group.

All of the groups reported side effects, with 90 percent of the high dose group, 88 percent of the low dose group and 89 percent of the placebo group. The most common side effects were decreased appetite, diarrhea, sleepiness, fever and fatigue. About 25 percent of those in the high dose group had serious side effects, compared to 20 percent of those in the low dose group and 15 percent of those in the placebo group. Only participants in the high dose group stopped taking the drug due to side effects; that number was 7 percent.

"Based on these results, dose increases above 10 mg/kg per day should be carefully considered based on the effectiveness and safety for each individual," Miller said.