Science
press releases.

Science30 Oct 2024

McMahon receives NIH grant to help build TTUHSC research capacity

As a leader in academic health and biomedical research training, the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC) covers the West Texas region that comprises half of the state’s land mass and is home to 10% of its population. Research at TTUHSC drives innovation and discovery, changing the lives of those it serves and attracting talented faculty, staff and students. During the latest reporting period (2020-2022), TTUHSC received an average of $12,539,679 annually in National Institutes ...

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Science30 Oct 2024

Women entering menopause later in life at greater risk for asthma

CLEVELAND, Ohio (Oct. 30, 2024)—Many studies suggest that an earlier age at menopause is more detrimental to a woman’s health, leading to an increased risk for adverse health conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, and depression, among others. However, a new study is linking a later age at natural menopause with a greater risk for asthma. Results of the study are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The Menopause Society. Asthma is a common, chronic disease affecting more than 300 million people worldwide. The prevalence of asthma ...

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Science30 Oct 2024

Sinuses prevented prehistoric croc relatives from deep diving

EMBARGOED: NOT FOR RELEASE UNTIL 00.05 (UK TIME) WEDNESDAY 30 OCTOBER 2024 An international team of paleobiologists have found that the sinuses of ocean dwelling relatives of modern-day crocodiles prevented them from evolving into deep divers like whales and dolphins. A new paper published today [30 October] in Royal Society Open Science suggests that thalattosuchians, which lived at the time of the dinosaurs, were stopped from exploring the deep due to their large snout sinuses. Whales and dolphins (cetaceans) ...

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Science30 Oct 2024

Britain’s brass bands older than we thought and invented by soldiers from the Napoleonic Wars, new study reveals

University of Cambridge media release Britain’s brass bands older than we thought and invented by soldiers from the Napoleonic Wars, new study reveals UNDER STRICT EMBARGO UNTIL 00:01 AM (UK TIME) ON WEDNESDAY 30TH OCTOBER 2024 Military musicians returning from the Napoleonic wars established Britain’s first brass bands earlier than previously thought, new research reveals. The study undermines the idea that brass bands were a civilian and exclusively northern creation. It is widely believed that brass bands originated with coal miners and other industrial communities ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

For the love of suckers: Volunteers contribute to research on key freshwater fishes

A new paper published today, led by Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium, reveals how volunteers across Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan enabled researchers to gather seven years of data on the spawning migrations of suckers, an understudied yet essential group of freshwater fishes. Using observations collected by trained members of the public, the collaborative team of researchers have discovered that temperature is the primary trigger for sucker spawning migration, which can help inform conservation strategies in light of a changing climate. “We believe that conservation of native, non-game fishes ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Bill and Mary Anne Dingus commit $1M to fund Human Impacts on the Earth Fund at Rice

Bill Dingus ’81, a Rice University alumnus, and his wife Mary Anne have pledged $1 million to support the university’s Human Impacts on the Earth Fund, dedicated to mitigating and addressing the negative environmental effects caused by human activities on the planet. Additionally, the Dingus family is matching other donors’ contributions to the fund up to $250,000. The Dingus’ donation enables the launch of the Earth and Planetary Opportunities in Research (EXPLORE) program, a new initiative offered through the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences (EEPS) that allows undergraduates of any major hands-on experience in research projects ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Cerebral embolic protection by geographic region

About The Study: The PROTECTED transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) trial could not show that the use of cerebral embolic protection (CEP) had a significant effect on the incidence of periprocedural stroke during TAVR. Although there was no significant interaction by geographic region, this exploratory post hoc analysis suggests a trend toward greater stroke reduction in the U.S. cohort but not in the outside the U.S. cohort. These findings are hypothesis generating, and further research is needed to determine if regional differences in patient characteristics or procedural practices ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

People’s exposure to toxic chemicals declined in the U.S. following listing under California law

With growing concern about the ubiquity of toxic chemicals in consumer products, many states have passed laws aimed at protecting people from harmful substances in everyday items like cosmetics, cleaning supplies, plastics, and food packaging. California’s Proposition 65, for instance, is considered one of the most extensive toxics laws in the country. But does the law work? According to a new study published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, it does. “Not only have people’s exposures to specific toxic chemicals gone down in California, ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

A navigation system for microswimmers

Microswimmers often need to independently navigate narrow environments like microchannels through porous media or blood vessels. The swimmers can be of biological origin, like algae or bacteria, but also constitute custom designed structures used for the transport of chemicals and drugs. In these cases, it is important to control how they swim in relation to walls and boundaries - as one might want them to exchange fuel or information, but also avoid them to stick where they are not supposed to. Many swimmers are electrically ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Suicide-related emergencies underdetected among minority, male youth, and preteens, study finds

A new study by UCLA Health reveals that hospital emergency departments may be missing signs of suicidal thoughts and behaviors in children, boys and Black and Hispanic youth. The research, published in the journal JAMA Open Network, analyzed electronic health records of nearly 3,000 children and teenagers presenting to two emergency departments in southern California for mental health reasons. Using machine learning algorithms, the researchers determined standard medical record surveillance methods miss youth with suicide-related emergencies. These methods disproportionately missed suicide-related visits among Black, Hispanic, male, and preteen youths, compared with ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Treating severe calcification with an atherectomy device does not improve cardiac stenting outcomes, study finds

Routine use of an orbital atherectomy device to remove calcium from severely blocked coronary arteries before patients undergo cardiac stenting procedures does not improve outcomes, a Mount Sinai-led study has found. The results of the ECLIPSE study were announced during a late-breaking trial presentation at the Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics Annual Meeting on Tuesday, October 29. This is the first large-scale study to study this specific device in severely calcified lesions, and the results support reserving its use for extreme cases. “Operators across the United States currently have different thresholds ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Study uncovers alarming patterns in the effects of family violence

A new synthesis of global evidence highlights a strong connection between family violence and long-term health consequences, significantly impacting the psychological and physical well-being of millions worldwide. This comprehensive review, the first of its kind, synthesises the findings from the most rigorous studies on child maltreatment and intimate partner violence, uncovering alarming patterns in the long-term effects of family violence. According to the study, led by Matthias Burghart of the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security, and Law, and Sophia ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Making scents of aromas that differentiate beer and wine

Today, people increasingly seek non-alcoholic versions of beer or wine. Despite boasting different flavors, these two drinks share many aromas, which makes it difficult to produce alcohol-free versions that mimic the real thing. Researchers in ACS’ Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry report on a literature analysis and experiment to characterize the chemical compounds that give beer and wine their unique fragrances. They say their findings could aid the development of flavorful, non-alcoholic substitutes. Food and beverage researchers are working to recreate the enjoyable aromas and flavors of beer and wine in alcohol-free substitutes. However, because both beer and ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Internet activity reveals national allergy patterns

Complaining about your allergies online might provide valuable data to researchers. Over 25% of Americans experience seasonal allergies, but how the prevalence of seasonal allergies varies across space and time remains obscure, in part because allergies seldom warrant visits to healthcare providers. Elias Stallard-Olivera and Noah Fierer mined Twitter (now X) posts and Google searches from 2016–2020 to extrapolate spatial and temporal allergy patterns. A natural language processing model sorted posts that indicated symptoms (e.g., “My allergies are really bad today!!”) from posts that include key words but did not indicate the presence of symptoms (e.g., “Gluten ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

New study confirms beehive fences as highly effective in reducing human-elephant conflict, but researchers warn of future risks

[11:00 GMT - 29 Oct 2024] A groundbreaking, nine-year study has revealed that elephants approaching small-scale farms in Kenya avoid beehive fences housing live honey bees up to 86% of the time during peak crop seasons, helping to reduce human-elephant conflict for local farmers and boost income. Link to images and video of the project available Key findings include: Beehive fences are a proven success in reducing human-elephant conflict in Africa. Savannah elephants avoid beehive fences housing live honey bees up to 86% of the time during peak crop seasons. Across all seasons and the entire study period, the fences deterred an annual average of 76% of 3,999 ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

More than half of European heat-related deaths in summer 2022 attributed to anthropogenic warming

The unprecedented temperatures in the summer of 2022 caused more than 68,000 deaths on the continent, according to a study by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), a centre supported by the 'la Caixa' Foundation. A new study has now found that more than half - 56% - of the heat-related deaths in the summer of 2022 were related to human-induced climate change. According to the research, 38,154 of the 68,593 heat-related deaths in the summer of 2022 would not have occurred without anthropogenic warming. The ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Have we found all the major Maya cities? Not even close, new research suggests

Using laser-guided imaging to peer through dense jungle forests, Tulane University researchers have uncovered vast unexplored Maya settlements in Mexico and a better understanding of the ancient civilization's extent and complexity. The new research, published in the journal Antiquity, was led by Tulane University anthropology doctoral student Luke Auld-Thomas and his advisor, Professor Marcello A. Canuto. The team used lidar, a laser-based detection system, to survey 50 square miles of land in Campeche, Mexico, an area largely overlooked by archaeologists. Their findings included evidence of more than 6,500 pre-Hispanic structures, including a previously unknown ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Change in the law could help families of missing persons

AN EXPERT on missing persons and unidentified human remains is hoping her research can help bring about a change in the law. Work carried out by Emma Tilley, who is completing her PhD in Criminology and Policing at University of Staffordshire, is included in a Law Commission public consultation on burial and cremation. Emma, who has starred in Locate International’s Channel 4 documentary series The Body Detectives, has been critically reviewing the cross-matching of unidentified human remains ...

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Science29 Oct 2024

Subtle eye movements optimize vision

Our ability to see starts with the light-sensitive photoreceptor cells in our eyes. A specific region of the retina, termed fovea, is responsible for sharp vision. Here, the color-sensitive cone photoreceptors allow us to detect even the smallest details. The density of these cells varies from person to person. Additionally, when we fixate on an object, our eyes make subtle, continuous movements, which also differ between individuals. Researchers from the University Hospital Bonn (UKB) and the University of Bonn have now investigated how sharp vision is linked to these tiny eye movements and ...

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Science28 Oct 2024

Developing kidneys from scratch

To Alex Hughes, Assistant Professor in Bioengineering within Penn Engineering and in Cell and Developmental Biology within Penn Medicine, the kidney is a work of art. “I find the development of the kidney to be a really beautiful process,” says Hughes. Most people only ever see the organ in cross-section, through textbooks or by dissecting animal kidneys in high school biology class: a bean-shaped slice with lots of tiny tubes. “I think that really undersells how amazing the structure is,” says ...

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Science28 Oct 2024

Airbnbs associated with more crime in London, new study shows

Since its founding in 2008, the short-term homestay platform Airbnb has expanded to 100,000 cities in more than 220 countries, and, according to data from the company, 1.5 billion guests had stayed in Airbnb-listed properties through 2023. Much of the academic research on Airbnb activity comes from economics and business literature and focuses on housing-supply impacts, says David Kirk, professor of criminology at the University of Pennsylvania. Yet research on neighborhood impacts is limited, and that research neglects the impacts of Airbnb activity on measures of community cohesion and safety. Kirk teamed with University of Cambridge criminologist ...

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Science28 Oct 2024

Risky choices: How US laws affect migrant children’s journeys to border

U.S. immigration law and the legal categorizations it imposes on migrants shape the journeys of migrant children from Central America as they move through Mexico toward the southern U.S. border, according to a new Yale study. In the study, sociologist Ángel Escamilla García documents the various hard decisions Central American youth are forced to make during their journeys to maximize their chances of not being deported once they reach the United States. Those choices include concealing sexual assaults, beatings, and other crimes ...

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Science28 Oct 2024

Scientists address risks to supply chain in a connected world

RICHLAND, Wash.—Scientists are gathering at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory this week for a first-ever conference to consider ways to protect critical systems such as our electrical grid, water treatment plants and financial networks that are vulnerable in new ways. The Cyber Supply Chain Risk Management Conference, known as CySCRM 2024, is being held on the PNNL campus Tuesday-Wednesday, Oct. 29-30. It’s a new kind of science meeting, one that scientist Jess Smith and colleagues felt compelled to create as they eye a new kind of risk—a ...

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Science28 Oct 2024

Penn Nursing awarded $3.2 million grant to improve firearm safety

PHILADELPHIA (October 28, 2024) – The University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing (Penn Nursing) has been awarded a $3.2 million, 5-year grant from the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR) to scale out an evidence-based secure firearm storage intervention at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). Firearms are now the leading cause of death for U.S. children and teens, driving the largest spike in children’s mortality in more than 50 years. The study aims to keep children safer from firearm injury and mortality by promoting secure firearm storage. The intervention, ...

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Science28 Oct 2024

Bird wings inspire new approach to flight safety

Taking inspiration from bird feathers, Princeton engineers have found that adding rows of flaps to a remote-controlled aircraft’s wings improves flight performance and helps prevent stalling, a condition that can jeopardize a plane’s ability to stay aloft. “These flaps can both help the plane avoid stall and make it easier to regain control when stall does occur,” said Aimy Wissa, assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and principal investigator of the study, published in the Proceedings ...

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