Do heart medications affect COVID-19 outcomes?

BOSTON - Significant amounts of atherosclerotic plaque have been found in the coronary arteries of people with HIV, even in those considered by traditional measures to be at low-to-moderate risk of future heart disease, according to a study published in JAMA Network Open. This finding emerged from the global REPRIEVE (Randomized Trial to Prevent Vascular Events in HIV) study, in which Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) is playing a key coordinating role. Researchers found that the higher-than-expected levels of plaque could not be attributed simply to traditional cardiovascular disease risk factors like smoking, hypertension, and lipids in the blood, but were independently related to increased arterial inflammation ...

The expected decline in the number of landfills across the United States coupled with bans on disposing large amounts of organic waste in landfills that have been enacted in multiple states has prompted researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) to examine other ways to grapple with the issue of food waste disposal. The researchers determined no single solution exists in the United States for dealing with food waste disposal. NREL researchers Alex Badgett a­­nd Anelia Milbrandt came to that conclusion after examining the economics involved in five different ways to ...

In Brazil, researchers at the University of São Paulo’s Medical School (FM-USP) have discovered that SARS-CoV-2 infects and replicates in the salivary glands. Analysis of samples from three types of salivary gland obtained during a minimally invasive autopsy procedure performed on patients who died from complications of COVID-19 at Hospital das Clínicas, FM-USP’s hospital complex, showed that tissues specializing in producing and secreting saliva serve as reservoirs for the novel coronavirus. The study was supported by FAPESP and reported in an article published in the Journal of Pathology. The researchers said the discovery ...

Bioenergy crops are an alternative energy source that, unlike fossil fuels, could positively impact the environment by reducing greenhouse gases, soil erosion, and carbon dioxide levels. They can be produced even more sustainably if they are grown on poor quality land unsuitable for food. To make up for the poor land quality, these crops can rely on soil microbes like bacteria and fungi to help them access nutrients and water and store more carbon. Switchgrass, a native prairie species, is championed as a promising bioenergy crop due to its ability to grow across many climates. ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. - How the media frame stories about science affects the public's perception about scientific accuracy and reliability, and one particular type of narrative can help ameliorate the harm to science's reputation sometimes caused by different journalistic approaches to scientific storytelling, according to a new study led by a University at Buffalo researcher. "What our experiment shows is that the way the news media talk about science focuses too much attention on individuals in a way that doesn't accurately describe the way science actually works," says ...

Amid calls for racial and social justice nationwide, businesses and educational institutions are grappling with how to adopt more inclusive organizational practices, including more diversified hiring. However, recruitment teams and strategic leaders often blame their lack of a diverse workforce on a lack of diverse applicants. A large study of recruitment data suggests a simple and efficient way of increasing diversity in applicant pools: have more diverse recruitment committees and leadership teams. The study, led by researchers at the University of Houston's Center for ADVANCING ...

Findings from a study published today [6 July] in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) have prompted new World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations to use interleukin-6 antagonists in patients with severe or critical COVID-19 along with corticosteroids. A new analysis of 27 randomised trials involving nearly 11,000 patients found that treating hospitalised COVID-19 patients with drugs that block the effects of interleukin-6 (the interleukin-6 antagonists tocilizumab and sarilumab) reduces the risk of death and the need for mechanical ventilation. The study, which was coordinated by WHO in partnership with King's College London, University of Bristol, University ...

ITHACA, N.Y. - As offices nationwide spring back to life, interior space designers and architects will soon have an easy-to-use planning tool to place indoor workplace furniture, staff, partitions and ventilation in a manner that maximizes fresh air flow and reduces the risk of airborne pathogens. The Cornell Environmental Systems Lab in the College of Architecture, Art and Planning will introduce a new indoor module for their existing Eddy3D software, a professional-level airflow and microclimate simulator that can help improve ventilation. The new indoor module will be released this summer, while the research supporting it will ...

Scientists and engineers are constantly looking for ways to better our world. Synthetic biology is an emerging field with promise for improving our ability to manufacture chemicals, develop therapeutic medicines such as biopharmaceuticals and vaccines, and enhance agricultural production, among other things. It relies on taking natural or engineered pieces of DNA and combining them in new ways in biological systems, such as microbes, bacteria or other organisms. According to University of Delaware's Aditya Kunjapur, assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, as these sophisticated microbial technologies are advanced, scientists need to explore ways to keep these organisms from ending up in the wrong environment. For example, a bacterium that is good at making ...

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- What if the COVID-19 virus could be used against itself? Researchers at Penn State have designed a proof-of-concept therapeutic that may be able to do just that. The team designed a synthetic defective SARS-CoV-2 virus that is innocuous but interferes with the real virus's growth, potentially causing the extinction of both the disease-causing virus and the synthetic virus. "In our experiments, we show that the wild-type [disease-causing] SARS-CoV-2 virus actually enables the replication and spread of our synthetic virus, thereby effectively promoting its own decline," said Marco Archetti, associate professor of biology, Penn State. "A version of this synthetic construct could be used as a self-promoting ...