Crop rotations with beans and peas offer more sustainable and nutritious food production

PITTSBURGH, April 13, 2021 - What can vaccine proponents, clinicians and public health communicators learn from "anti-vaxxers?" A lot, according to new guidance for pro-vaccination social media events written by University of Pittsburgh health scientists. The five-part guidelines, published today in the journal Vaccine, arose from an analysis of a grassroots pro-vaccination campaign organized last year by popular physician and social media personality Zubin Damania, M.D., colloquially known as "ZDoggMD." Unexpectedly, more than three-quarters of the tweets associated with the ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- For young athletes, the new normal on soccer fields and basketball courts means temperature checks before practice, wearing masks through games and a sparse in-person fan base. But that hasn't kept children and teens from playing. Close to a fourth of parents say their child has participated in school, travel, or community sports during the fall or winter months, according to the C.S. Mott Children's Hospital National Poll on Children's Health at the University of Michigan. And while the majority of parents give their child's sports organization high marks for communication about safety protocols, one in four rate their sports ...

Hamilton, ON (April 13, 2021) - Ontario doctors are still hesitant to prescribe medical cannabis to patients suffering long-term pain 20 years after it was first introduced, says a new study carried out at McMaster University. Physicians surveyed said their main concerns relate to possible ill-effects and a lack of understanding regarding their effectiveness as painkillers. Of particular concern among doctors were potentially harmful effects on cognitive development, a possible worsening of existing mental illnesses in patients and the drug's effects in older adults, which may include dizziness or drowsiness. Meanwhile, the ...

As the foremost economic zone in China, the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) region has recently been experiencing more frequent haze events, resulting in dramatic damages to human and ecosystem health. Anthropogenic aerosol emissions play a key role in affecting the formation of haze events. However, aside from local sources of pollution, some studies have found that external and preceding climate drivers, such as Arctic sea ice and subtropical western Pacific sea surface temperature, are also influential factors. However, most research has mainly been confined to analyzing the effects on haze pollution in the Northern Hemisphere, with few considering the Southern Hemisphere. "We found that the December sea surface temperature ...

Scientists found six sex chromosomes in the Odorrana swinhoana frog species endemic in Taiwan, giving new insights into how complex XY systems evolve. The discovery was a surprise to the international research team led by Associate Professor Ikuo Miura of Hiroshima University's Amphibian Research Center. In 1980, the first reported instance of multiple sex chromosome systems in amphibians was found in the Taiwanese brown frog Raina narina -- a synonym for O. swinhoana -- which had a male-specific translocation between two chromosomes. Its sex chromosomes could be described as ?X1Y1X2Y2-?X1X1X2X2. The ...

Niigata, Japan- New insights into the three-dimensional (3D) morphology of the human uterine endometrium could advance our understanding of the mechanisms of endometrial regeneration and fertilized egg implantation while clarifying the pathogenesis of menstrual disorders, infertility and endometrium-related diseases such as adenomyosis, endometriosis, endometrial hyperplasia and endometrial cancer. The endometrial glands are comprised of complicated winding and branching structures, and conventional 2D imaging techniques have been unable to adequately assess their shape. This limitation has prevented elucidation of the mechanisms of endometrial regeneration during the menstrual cycle and the location of endometrial progenitor cells. Recent developments in 3D tissue-clearing imaging ...

A Korean research team succeeded in developing a technology generating various vibration using LED light signals. The technology allows various tactile sensations by area and reduction in size by considerably lowering the cost of light source, and these are expected to be applied to many industries including automobile and electronics. The Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute, or ETRI for short, announced that it succeeded in developing a technology to implement various vibrations using LED. This technology was widely recognized as published on the cover of the February 10 issue of ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces1), a leading ...

Researchers have answered key questions to help prevent damage and improve the safety of hydraulic systems used for pipelines, water turbines and other applications. The work, led by engineers at the University of Waterloo, investigates a phenomenon known as cavitation, or the formation and collapse of destructive gas-filled bubbles resulting from rapid pressure changes in liquids. Cavitation is behind a well-known party trick that involves shattering the bottom of a liquid-filled bottle by striking its open top with the palm of your hand. "The growth and collapse of cavitation bubbles are fascinating," said  Zhao Pan, a professor of mechanical and mechatronics engineering who led the research. ...

RICHMOND, Va. (April 12, 2021) -- E-cigarettes that deliver a cigarette-like amount of nicotine are associated with reduced smoking and reduced exposure to the major tobacco-related pulmonary carcinogen, NNAL, even with concurrent smoking, according to a new study led by researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University and Penn State College of Medicine in Hershey, Pennsylvania. The study, which will be published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine journal, provides new and important information for smokers who may be trying to use e-cigarettes as a means to cut down on their smoking habit and lower their exposure to harmful toxicants. "[We found] e-cigarettes with nicotine delivery like a combustible cigarette were effective in helping reduce ...

Toronto (April 12, 2021) - Researchers from University Health Network have developed and validated an innovative deep learning model to predict a patient's long-term outcome after receiving a liver transplant. First of its kind in the field of Transplantation, this model is the result from a collaboration between the Ajmera Transplant Centre and Peter Munk Cardiac Centre. The study, published in Lancet Digital Health, shows it can significantly improve long-term survival and quality of life for liver transplant recipients. "Historically, we have seen good advances in one-year post-transplant outcomes, but survival in the longer term hasn't significantly improved in the past decades," explains Dr. Mamatha Bhat, a hepatologist with the Ajmera Transplant Centre ...