Tech
Immunologists at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital have created a database that identifies gene-regulatory mechanisms in immune cells that facilitate Type 1 diabetes. The findings were published today in Nature Immunology.
Taking the evolutionary plunge into water and abandoning land for good, as some crocodilian ancestors did nearly 200 million years ago, is often framed as choosing freedom: from gravity, from territorial boundaries, from dietary constraints.
Water might inflict more pressure in the pounds-per-square-inch sense, the thinking went, but it also probably relieved some -- especially the sort that kept crocs from going up a size or 10. If they wanted to enjoy the considerable spoils of considerable size, water seemed the easy way.
As the climate is changing, so too are the world's forests. From the misty redwoods in the west to the Blue Ridge forest of Appalachia, many sylvan ecosystems are adapting to drier conditions.
Thirty-four medical centers, representing 11% of facilities that perform transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) in the U.S., saw worse than expected outcomes in terms of survival and quality of life among patients undergoing the procedure in an analysis presented at the American College of Cardiology's Annual Scientific Session Together with World Congress of Cardiology (ACC.20/WCC).
A palette of colours on a silver plate: that is what the world's first colour photograph looks like. It was taken by French physicist Edmond Becquerel in 1848. His process was empirical, never explained, and quickly abandoned. A team at the Centre de recherche sur la conservation (CNRS/Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle/Ministère de la Culture) has now shone a light on this, in collaboration with the SOLEIL synchrotron and the Laboratoire de Physique des Solides (CNRS/Université Paris-Saclay).
By mining a vast trove of genetic data, researchers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine are enhancing doctors' ability to treat cancer, predict patient outcomes and determine which treatments will work best for individual patients.
The researchers have identified inherited variations in our genes that affect how well a patient will do after diagnosis and during treatment. With that information in hand, doctors will be able to examine a patient's genetic makeup to provide truly personalized medicine.
Fair or not, airplanes have a reputation for germs. However, there are ways to minimize the risks.
Historic research based on group movements of humans and animals suggest three simple rules:
move away from those that are too close.
move toward those that are far away.
match the direction of the movement of their neighbors.
While they can't pick out precise numbers, animals can comprehend that more is, well, more. From birds to bees and wolves to frogs, animals use numbers to hunt, find a mate, return to their home, and more--and researchers believe that this ability to process and represent numbers, known as numerical competence, plays an important role in how animals make these decisions and influences an animal's chance of survival.
People continuously exposed to air pollution are at increased risk of dementia, especially if they also suffer from cardiovascular diseases, according to a study at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden published in the journal JAMA Neurology. Therefore, patients with cardiovascular diseases who live in polluted environments may require additional support from care providers to prevent dementia, according to the researchers.
New York City's pioneering Local Law 87 requires office and residential buildings to monitor their energy use, using detailed audits. In a study published today (March 30) in the research journal Nature Energy, Constantine E. Kontokosta, Danielle Spiegel-Feld and Sokratis Papadopoulos of New York University discuss the impact of this requirement on building owners, looking closely at detailed energy use and audit data between 2011 and 2016 from about 4,000 buildings.
Scientists at Flinders University have, for the first time, identified a specific type of sensory nerve ending in the gut and how these may 'talk' to the spinal cord, communicating pain or discomfort to the brain.
This discovery is set to inform the development of new medications to treat problems associated with gut-to-brain communication, paving the way for targeted treatments to mitigate related dysfunction.
The number of people diagnosed with psychiatric disorders in Ontario remained stable between 2002 and 2014, but the number of people self-reporting mental health issues and using mental health services has increased, according to a study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).
The brain is one of our most vulnerable organs, as soft as the softest tofu. Brain implants, on the other hand, are typically made from metal and other rigid materials that over time can cause inflammation and the buildup of scar tissue.
Fiber optic cables, it turns out, can be incredibly useful scientific sensors. Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have studied them for use in carbon sequestration, groundwater mapping, earthquake detection, and monitoring of Arctic permafrost thaw. Now they have been awarded new grants to develop fiber optics for two novel uses: monitoring offshore wind operations and underground natural gas storage.
Globally, there is a growing concern regarding the presence of trace emerging contaminants such as retinoids and oestrogenic endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) in aquatic environments. Retinoids such as retinoic acids and their metabolites, which are the derivatives of vitamin A, can cause abnormal morphological development in amphibians, fish, and snails at elevated levels. Oestrogenic EDCs like alkylphenols and bisphenol A are environmental oestrogens that can induce feminization of male fish and abnormal development in aquatic organisms.