Culture

ROCHESTER, Minn. — A new study led by researchers from Mayo Clinic in collaboration with six other U.S. institutions has found that patients with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma who smoked, consumed alcohol or were obese before their cancer diagnosis had poorer overall survival, compared to patients who did not have these risk factors. This association held after accounting for clinical and demographic factors, and also when considering only deaths due to this kind of lymphoma.

There once was a time conservationists believed selective methods for fishing were best for the ecosystem. Not so. A less selective approach to commercial fishing is needed to ensure the ongoing productivity of marine ecosystems and to maintain biodiversity, according to a paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

The paper, 'Ecosystem-based fisheries management requires a change to the selective fishing philosophy', was written by a team of authors led by Shijie Zhou of the CSIRO Wealth from Oceans Flagship.

Male physical competition, not attraction, was central in winning mates among human ancestors, according to a Penn State anthropologist.

"There is sexual competition in many species, including humans," said David A. Puts, assistant professor of biological anthropology.

"Placing students on probation increases the probability that they will drop out," Lindo said. "For those students who return to school, their GPA goes up by about 0.2 grade points." The real impact, he added, is seen in what happens to young men.

For men, academic probation doubles the likelihood that they will drop out of school -- from a 3 percent probability to a 6 percent probability, Lindo said.

A first-of-its-kind study examining the long-term economic consequences of childhood psychological disorders finds the conditions diminish people's ability to work and earn as adults, costing $2.1 trillion over the lifetimes of all affected Americans.

People who suffer from childhood conditions such as depression and substance abuse are less likely to be married, attain less education and see their income reduced by about 20 percent over their lifetimes, according to findings published online by the journal Social Science & Medicine.

When pollsters ask Americans to name the most important problem facing the country, the environment is rarely mentioned. But this time-honored polling question masks the public's true concern about environmental issues, according to Stanford University researchers.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – In the animal kingdom, sexual signals often are manifested as displays of bright coloration or, in the case of crickets, as loud song.

Adult male crickets produce loud song to attract females, but the song, which permeates the environment, can be overheard also by unintended receivers - such as young males unable to produce song due to a mutation they carry.

As part of its most comprehensive assessment to date, the National Research Council – the operating arm of the National Academy of Sciences and National Academy of Engineering – will release three new reports examining how the nation can combat the effects of global warming. One focuses on the science that supports human-induced climate change, and the others review options for limiting the magnitude of and adapting to the impacts of global warming. The reports are part of a congressionally requested suite of studies known as America's Climate Choices.

The scientific method, derided by critics because science does not always know everything without making some mistakes, showed its awesome power again on Easter Island.

Bared teeth are a prominent and eye-catching feature on many historical and archaeological artifacts, and are commonly interpreted as representing death, aggression and the shamanic trance. But a study in the forthcoming issue of Current Anthropology argues that the bared-teeth motif often expresses something a bit less sinister: the smile.

HOUSTON (May 4, 2010) – Advances in vaccine delivery and efficacy were discussed at the 44th National Immunization Conference sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). A research study by each of the four directors from the Center for Vaccine Awareness and Research at Texas Children's Hospital was presented. Held in Atlanta, more than 1,600 health professionals and medical experts attended the conference and explored innovative strategies for developing programs, policy and research to promote immunizations.

BATON ROUGE – In a paper published in the May 2010 issue of the scholarly journal Annals of Epidemiology, two LSU researchers tackle a problem seldom acknowledged in the United States – the incidence of malnutrition-related deaths among older adults.

In the first randomized trial of art therapy for asthma, National Jewish Health researchers found that children with persistent asthma enjoyed decreased anxiety and increased quality of life after seven weekly art-therapy sessions.