About The Study: Pandemic-exposed children (assessment after March 11, 2020) had significantly higher problem solving and fine motor skills at 24 months of age but lower personal-social skills compared with non-exposed children in this study including data from the Ontario Birth Study. At 54 months of age, pandemic-exposed children had significantly higher vocabulary, visual memory, and overall cognitive performance compared with non-exposed children.  Authors: Mark Wade, Ph.D., C.Psych., of the University of Toronto, is the corresponding author.  To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website ...

About The Study: This study of 11,000 participants with type 2 diabetes found that food insecurity, housing insecurity, mental health concerns, and the perceived importance of practitioner concordance were associated with a lower likelihood of receiving eye care. Such findings highlight the self-reported barriers to seeking care and the importance of taking steps to promote health equity. Authors: Sophia Y. Wang, M.D., M.S., of Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, is the corresponding author. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/  (doi:10.1001/jamaophthalmol.2023.5287) Editor’s ...

A team of pioneering researchers from the Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation (CABBI) has made a significant leap forward in the complex world of molecular chemistry. Their focus? Azaarenes, unique molecular puzzle pieces crucial to many everyday products, from eco-friendly agrochemicals to essential medicines. The CABBI team demonstrated an innovative way to modify these molecules, a groundbreaking discovery that holds promise for new industrially relevant chemical reactions and sustainable energy solutions. Central to their ...

Key takeaways UCLA researchers looked at nearly 4,400 hospitals across the U.S., including 864 with high numbers of Black and Hispanic patients. Hospitals serving Black, Hispanic and other racial and ethnic minority patients were significantly less likely than other hospitals to have access to core cancer services like PET/CT scanners, robotic surgery and palliative care. The researchers say further work is need to understand how geographic, linguistic, cultural, cost and discrimination factors affect these cancer care disparities.   Among the nation’s ...

Deep learning — a form of artificial intelligence capable of improving itself with limited user input — has radically reshaped the landscape of biomedical research since its emergence in the early 2010s. It’s been particularly impactful in genomics, a field of biology that examines how our DNA is organized into genes and how these genes are activated or deactivated in individual cells. Despite this synergy, genomics researchers wanting to employ this technology are often challenged by the actual coding necessary to analyze vast pools of dense data. Now, ...

A hunger hormone produced in the gut can directly impact a decision-making part of the brain in order to drive an animal’s behaviour, finds a new study by UCL (University College London) researchers. The study in mice, published in Neuron, is the first to show how hunger hormones can directly impact activity of the brain’s hippocampus when an animal is considering food. Lead author Dr Andrew MacAskill (UCL Neuroscience, Physiology & Pharmacology) said: “We all know our decisions ...

University of Oxford news release Institute of New Economic Thinking   Embargoed until Thursday, 16 November 2023, 16:00 GMT   Is lockdown an effective response to a pandemic, or would it be better to let individuals spontaneously reduce their risk of infection?  Research published today suggests these two highly-debated options lead to similar outcomes.  A ground-breaking economic-pandemic model, created by an international team of researchers, addresses some of the key policy debates of the Covid-19 pandemic but it ...

Medical research has shown promising results regarding the potential of gene therapy to cure genetic conditions such as sickle cell disease and the findings of this study, published in Nature Medicine, offer important new insights into processes happening in the body after treatment. The present study looked at samples from six patients with sickle cell disease who were undergoing gene therapy as part of a major clinical trial at Boston Children’s Hospital. The research brought together an international team of experts, to take a closer look at the genetic changes in the stem cells of patients before and after gene therapy ...

Depression is one of the most common mental illnesses in the world, but current anti-depressants have yet to meet the needs of many patients. Neuroscientists from City University of Hong Kong (CityU) recently discovered a small molecule that can effectively alleviate stress-induced depressive symptoms in mice by preventing aversive memory formation with a lower dosage, offering a new direction for developing anti-depressants in the future. “Depression affects millions of individuals worldwide, necessitating more effective treatments. Conventional methods, such as drug therapy with delayed onset of action and psychotherapy, have limitations in yielding satisfactory ...

DURHAM, N.C. -- Once a favored food of grazing dinosaurs, an ancient lineage of plants called cycads helped sustain these and other prehistoric animals during the Mesozoic Era, starting 252 million years ago, by being plentiful in the forest understory. Today, just a few species of the palm-like plants survive in tropical and subtropical habitats. Like their lumbering grazers, most cycads have gone extinct. Their disappearance from their prior habitats began during the late Mesozoic and continued into the early Cenozoic Era, punctuated by the cataclysmic asteroid impact and volcanic activity that mark the K-Pg boundary 66 million years ago. However, unlike the dinosaurs, somehow a few groups ...

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – In the background of image recognition software that can ID our friends on social media and wildflowers in our yard are neural networks, a type of artificial intelligence inspired by how own our brains process data. While neural networks sprint through data, their architecture makes it difficult to trace the origin of errors that are obvious to humans — like confusing a Converse high-top with an ankle boot — limiting their use in more vital work like health care image analysis or research. A new tool developed at Purdue University makes finding those errors as simple as spotting mountaintops from an airplane.   “In a sense, if a neural ...

Amsterdam, November 16, 2023 – A large case series aimed at understanding the factors underlying Motorist Disorientation Syndrome (MDS) has found that patients experience severe, consistent symptoms comparable to vestibular migraine. Previously there has been speculation that underlying peripheral vestibular hypofunction, when the inner ear part of the balance system is not working properly, contributes to this presentation. However, vestibular deficits were not a consistent feature in the patients studied. The findings have been published in the Journal of Vestibular Research. In ...

Rabies virus variants closely related to variants present in White-tufted marmosets (Callithrix jacchus) have been detected in bats in Ceará state, Northeast Brazil.  Rabies is a deadly disease for humans. Its emergence in distinct wildlife species is a potential source of human infection and hence a public health concern. Marmosets are common in forests and conservation units throughout Brazil. In or near urban areas, they are often captured as pets and later abandoned. They have been linked ...

A rare but potent genetic mutation that alters a protein in the brain’s immune cells, known as microglia, can give people as much as a three-fold greater risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease. A new study by researchers in The Picower Institute for Learning and Memory at MIT details how the mutation undermines microglia function, explaining how it seems to generate that higher risk. “This TREM2 R47H/+ mutation is a pretty important risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease,” said study lead author Jay Penney, a former postdoc in the MIT lab of Picower Professor Li-Huei ...

An international research team is the first to use artificial intelligence (AI) analysis to identify dual-purpose target candidates for the treatment of cancer and aging, the most promising of which was experimentally validated. The findings were published in the journal Aging Cell.  Researchers from the University of Oslo, University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, and clinical stage AI-driven drug discovery company Insilico Medicine used Insilico’s AI target discovery engine, PandaOmics, to analyze transcriptomic data derived from ...

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a neurodegenerative disease that affects neurons in the brain and spinal cord causing loss of muscle control. A study by the University of Barcelona has designed a potential therapeutic strategy to tackle this pathology that has no treatment to date. It is a molecular trap that prevents one of the most common genetic ALS-causing peptide compounds, the Poly-GR dipeptide, from causing its toxic effects in the body. The results show that this strategy reduces the death of neurons in patients and in an animal model (vinegar flies) of the disease.   The first authors of this international research study published in the journal Science Advances are ...

After 40 years of treating metastatic bladder cancer with chemotherapy as a primary treatment, scientists now present a new approach using immunotherapy combinations. The results of not just one, but two studies have been presented at the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) conference in Madrid. The outcomes of these studies are going to revolutionize the landscape of bladder cancer treatment. Traditionally, cisplatin-based chemotherapy has been the standard treatment for bladder cancer patients who are able to tolerate this drug. However, responses have been limited, and durable outcomes rare. Over the past years, two phase-3 clinical trials studied the effects ...

Ithaca, N.Y.—Many songbirds are nesting earlier in spring because of warmer temperatures brought about by climate change. But the shift brings another danger that is especially deadly for nestlings: greater exposure to temperature variability in the form of cold snaps and heat waves. Such extremes result in more nest failures. These findings come from a Cornell Lab of Ornithology study just published in the journal Nature Communications.   "When we talk about temperature changes, the focus is mostly on averages," said co-lead author Conor Taff, a researcher in Cornell University's ...

Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) is a widely used advanced life support procedure that provides cardiac and respiratory support to critically ill patients. ECMO use has been increasing exponentially over the last decade as it has shown success in resuscitating patients in critical situations like the COVID-19 pandemic and is now a lifesaving treatment modality in intensive care units (ICUs). However, prolonged ECMO use may be associated with an increased risk of mortality. Identifying risk factors for in-hospital mortality and developing standardized nursing practice guidelines for ECMO management may improve the survival rates in patients. In this vein, ...

CLEVELAND—A combined $1.35 million from the Dr. Ralph and Marian Falk Medical Research Trust was awarded to two researchers from the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine to advance their work on finding more effective treatments—and better options—for two debilitating diseases. The Falk Trust awarded Reshmi Parameswaran, an assistant professor in the Department of Medicine, Division of Hematology/Oncology, pathology and pediatrics at the School of Medicine, $1 million over three years for her work in cancer cell therapy. Carlos Subauste, a professor of medicine and pathology at the School of Medicine, received a two-year, ...

WASHINGTON – Children whose mothers are highly stressed, anxious or depressed during pregnancy may be at higher risk for mental health and behavior issues during their childhood and teen years, according to research published by the American Psychological Association. “Our research suggests that psychological distress during the pregnancy period has a small but persistent effect on children’s risk for aggressive, disinhibited and impulsive behaviors,” said study author Irene Tung, PhD, of California State University Dominguez Hills. “These findings add to the evidence that providing widely accessible mental health care and support ...

DALLAS, November 16, 2023 — Disparities in health care persist, with Hispanic and Black adults reporting less satisfaction with their interactions with physicians, leading to poorer quality of care and health outcomes.[1],[2],[3] While 19% of people in the U.S. identify as Hispanic, fewer than 7% of physicians do.[4] This lack of representation in the delivery of health care has been shown to exacerbate health disparities among underrepresented groups and is a significant barrier to the Hispanic Latino community achieving optimal health.[5] In response to this challenge, the American Heart Association, a global force for ...

The use of lithium metal as the anode for batteries is one of the smarter options with better energy density than other materials. However, the interface between the electrode and electrolyte has quite a few issues that can be addressed for a safer and more functional outcome in the future.   The researchers are keen on replacing the graphite anode with lithium metal anode to construct a battery system with higher energy density. However, the Li metal anode is unstable and readily reacting with electrolyte to form a solid-electrolyte interphase (SEI). Unfortunately, the natural SEI is brittle and fragile, resulting in poor ...

Philadelphia, November 16, 2023 – Immunotherapies that target the CD20 antigen have revolutionized how patients with a variety of blood cancers and hematologic disorders have been treated. However, many patients develop resistance to these treatments due to a loss of the antigen that’s being targeted. Now, a new study from researchers at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) has found that gene splicing occurring within these cells can cause significant changes in CD20 protein levels that render the therapies ineffective. The findings, published today by ...

November 16, 2023, Republic of Korea  — The International Vaccine Institute (IVI), an international organization with a mission to discover, develop, and deliver safe, effective, and affordable vaccines for global health, signed an MOU yesterday with University of Cambridge (UCAM), University of Hong Kong (HKU), and the Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) to promote vaccine research and global health initiatives, including the establishment of the Hong Kong Jockey Club Global Health Institute (HKJCGHI).   HKJC will support the HKJCGHI through one of their largest donations in history, ...