Highlights: The American Heart Association awarded four new scientific research grants to evaluate the role of race in measuring heart disease risk. The funded studies are focused on multi-ethnic groups and studying how race, considered a social rather than biological construct, affects health risk prediction when it is incorporated as a variable in algorithms. This research is funded by a grant from the Doris Duke Foundation to study the complex issue of how race and ethnicity, when factored into cardiovascular clinical care algorithms ...

Background and objectives Breast cancer remains a significant global health concern, warranting further exploration into its genetic basis and potential therapeutic targets. This study aimed to elucidate the genetic associations of seven pivotal genes with breast cancer and discern their potential role in disease prognosis.   Methods The genes VEGFA, BRCA1, RAD51, CCNB1, CHEK1, CDK1, and XRCC4 were curated from over 30 articles. Their association with breast cancer was analyzed using both in silico and in vitro techniques. The in silico assessment ...

Background and Aims Hepatopulmonary syndrome (HPS) is characterized by arterial oxygenation defects due to pulmonary vascular dilation in liver disease. To date, liver transplantation remains the only effective treatment for HPS. This study aimed to explore the preventative role of baicalein in HPS development.   Methods Sixty male rats were randomly assigned to three groups: sham, common bile duct ligation (CBDL), and baicalein, receiving intraperitoneal injections of baicalein (40 mg·kg−1·d−1, diluted in saline) for 21 days. Survival rate, liver and kidney function, and bile acid metabolism levels were evaluated. Liver and lung angiogenesis ...

Background and objectives Honey is a viscous, hygroscopic liquid in nature. It has the ability to treat wounds, wrinkles, aging, and inflammation. This study’s objective was to create and characterize a nanoemulsion containing honey and evaluate its stability.   Methods A pseudo-ternary phase diagram was retraced with several concentrations of the Smix, water, and liquid paraffin oil to formulate nanoemulsions containing honey. From the results of pre-formulation stability studies, formulation HNE-19, with a hydrophilic lipophilic balance ...

As embryos, all complex organisms are partially made up of pluripotent stem cells, a term for cells that have the capacity to differentiate into any kind of cell: nerve cells, muscle cells, blood cells, skin cells, and the like. As the ultimate biological “shape-shifters,” these cells are proving key to regenerative medicine, drug development, genetic research, and related fields. Within a pluripotent stem cell, certain genes get activated and express information that ultimately decides a cell’s fate. The first step in this expression process is called transcription, a process that turns out to be incredibly complex, in part ...

Hyperspectral imaging (HSI) is a state-of-the-art technique that captures and processes information across a given electromagnetic spectrum. Unlike traditional imaging techniques that capture light intensity at specific wavelengths, HSI collects a full spectrum at each pixel in an image. This rich spectral data enables the distinction between different materials and substances based on their unique spectral signatures. Near-infrared hyperspectral imaging (NIR-HSI) has attracted significant attention in the food and industrial fields ...

**EMBARGOED BY NATURE GENETICS UNTIL 10AM BST/ 5AM ET/ 3AM MT, APRIL 29** Some families call it a trial of faith. Others just call it a curse. The progressive neurological disease known as spinocerebellar ataxia 4 (SCA4) is a rare condition, but its effects on patients and their families can be severe. For most people, the first sign is difficulty walking and balancing, which gets worse as time progresses. The symptoms usually start in a person’s forties or fifties but can begin as early as the late teens. There is ...

Samples reveal evidence of changes experienced by the surface of asteroid Ryugu, some probably due to micrometeoroid bombardment. Analyzing samples retrieved from the asteroid Ryugu by the Japanese Space Agency’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft has revealed new insights into the magnetic and physical bombardment environment of interplanetary space. The results of the study, carried out by Professor Yuki Kimura at Hokkaido University and co-workers at 13 other institutions in Japan, are published in the journal Nature Communications. The investigations used electron waves penetrating ...

Dinosaurs were as smart as reptiles but not as intelligent as monkeys, as former research suggests. An international team of palaeontologists, behavioural scientists and neurologists have re-examined brain size and structure in dinosaurs and concluded they behaved more like crocodiles and lizards. In a study published last year, it was claimed that dinosaurs like T. rex had an exceptionally high number of neurons and were substantially more intelligent than assumed. It was claimed that these high neuron counts could directly inform on ...

Brown fat, also known as brown adipose tissue (BAT), is a type of fat in our bodies that's different from the white fat around our belly and thighs that we are more familiar with. Brown fat has a special job—it helps to burn calories from the foods that we eat into heat, which can be helpful, especially when we're exposed to cold temperatures like during winter swimming or cryotherapy. For a long time, scientists thought that only small animals like mice and newborns had brown fat. But new research shows that a certain number of adults maintain their brown fat throughout life. Because brown fat is so good at burning calories, scientists ...

Tech Extension Co., Ltd. (referred to hereinafter as TEX)[1] and Tech Extension Taiwan Co., Ltd. (referred to hereinafter as TEX-T)[2] have agreed with Innolux Corporation (referred to hereinafter as INNOLUX)[3] to build in a cleanroom of INNOLUX a manufacturing line intended for next-generation 3D integration[4] based on the Bumpless Build Cube (BBCube[5]), which is a technology achieved through the Tokyo Institute of Technology WOW Alliance[6]. TEX will transfer WOW technology[7] and COW technology[8], which are both based on the BBCube technology platform, to this manufacturing line intended for next-generation 3D integration. ...

Physicists have been hoping for this moment for a long time: for many years, scientists all around the world have been searching for a very specific state of thorium atomic nuclei that promises revolutionary technological applications. It could be used, for example, to build an nuclear clock that could measure time more precisely than the best atomic clocks available today. It could also be used to answer completely new fundamental questions in physics - for example, the question of whether the constants of nature are actually constant or whether they change in space ...

The mysteries of how memory works are explained in a new book that suggests anyone can boost their powers of recall – and that losing your keys is normal. Dr Megan Sumeracki and Dr Althea Need Kaminske say storing and retrieving information is far more complex than people think. Extremes of memory such as photographic or savant are also very rare despite their regular portrayal in films. Their new book The Psychology of Memory outlines simple recollection-boosting techniques to improve learning – or to help remember names and numbers. Forgetting is normal The authors highlight how a degree ...

Compared with people without opioid use disorder, those with opioid use disorder were less likely to receive palliative care in clinics and in their homes, and were dying at younger ages of causes other than opioid use, according to new research published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) https://www.cmaj.ca/lookup/doi/10.1503/cmaj.231419. “The majority of conversations about the opioid crisis focus on the high number of opioid toxicity deaths. The unfortunate reality is that people with opioid use disorder ...

-With images- A new study led by researchers at Durham University has uncovered a novel mechanism that could solve a long-standing mystery about decaying planetary orbits around stars like our Sun. The study, published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, proposes that stellar magnetic fields play a crucial role in dissipating the gravitational tides responsible for the orbital decay of ‘hot Jupiter’ exoplanets. Hot Jupiters are massive, gaseous planets similar to Jupiter that orbit extraordinarily close to their parent stars, taking only a few days to complete ...

Consistently high vaccination rates and global health surveillance programmes have helped eliminate poliomyelitis (polio) in almost all countries of the world, except Afghanistan and Pakistan. Yet non-polio enteroviruses can also lead to the same devastating symptoms of ‘acute flaccid paralysis’ (AFP), but the world is lacking formal surveillance systems to trace and control these viruses with paralytic potential. In a presentation at this year’s ESCMID Global Congress (formerly ECCMID) (Barcelona 27-30 April), Prof Thea Kølsen Fischer, Nordsjællands Hospital & University of Copenhagen, Denmark will highlight the continuous dangers that ...

With artificial intelligence (AI) poised to become a fundamental part of clinical research and decision making, many still question the accuracy of ChatGPT, a sophisticated AI language model, to support complex diagnostic and treatment processes. Now a new study, being presented at this year’s ESCMID Global Congress (formerly ECCMID) in Barcelona, Spain (27-30 April), which pitted ChatGPT against the ESCMID guideline for the management of brain abscesses, found that while ChatGPT seems able to give recommendations on key questions about diagnosis and treatment in most cases, some of the AI model’s ...

**Note: the release below is from the ESCMID Global Congress (formerly ECCMID, Barcelona, Spain, 27-30 April). Please credit the congress if you use this story** New research presented at the ESCMID Global Congress (formerly ECCMID) in Barcelona, Spain (27-30 April) has found substantial levels of resistance to critically important antibiotics in meat sold for human and animal consumption. The study is by Dr Jordan Sealey, Professor Matthew Avison and colleagues from the University of Bristol, UK. Meat sold for consumption by humans and companion animals in the UK is regulated by the UK Government Food Standards Agency (FSA) to ensure it falls within bacterial limits deemed ...

With the creation of safe and efficacious vaccines to target human papillomavirus in the first decade of this century, WHO has an ambitious target to lower cervical cancer incidence (mostly caused by HPV) and mortality by 30% by 2030, meaning each country has a target of vaccinating 90% of girls by age 15, 70% of women receiving a high precision screening test at least at age 35 and 45 years of age, and 90% of all women requiring treatment at any age to receive it. The targets are aspirational and as yet, it appears no country has been ...

It’s time to take a new approach to addressing negative messaging about vaccines, including avoiding the use of the term “anti-vaxxers”, say the researchers. **ECCMID has now changed name to ESCMID Global, please credit ESCMID Global Congress in all future stories** There was a marked increase in negativity about vaccines on Twitter after COVID-19 vaccines became available, the ESCMID Global Congress (formerly ECCMID) in Barcelona, Spain (27-30 April) will hear. The analysis also found that spikes in the number of negative tweets coincided with announcements ...

Provisional global total of 321,582 cases for 2023 is almost double (88% higher) than 2022 figure of 171,153 **ECCMID has now changed name to ESCMID Global, please credit ESCMID Global Congress in all future stories** Measles outbreaks are still occurring and in some cases increasing, among a wide variety of countries, raising concerns of an acceleration similar to just before the COVID pandemic. Dr Patrick O’Connor, of WHO Headquarters, Geneva, Switzerland will give an overview of the global measles situation at this year’s ...

WHAT:  A dose-sparing intradermal mpox vaccination regimen was safe and generated an antibody response equivalent to that induced by the standard regimen at six weeks (two weeks after the second dose), according to findings presented today at the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases Global Congress in Barcelona. The results suggest that antibody responses contributed to the effectiveness of dose-sparing mpox vaccine regimens used during the 2022 U.S. outbreak.  The ...

Personalised “cocktails” of antibiotics, probiotics and prebiotics hold great promise in the treatment of a common form of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), the ESCMID Global Congress (formerly ECCMID) in Barcelona, Spain (27-30 April) will hear. Post-infection IBS (PI-IBS) is a form of irritable bowel syndrome that occurs after gastroenteritis or food poisoning.  Lead researcher Professor Maurizio Sanguinetti, of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Rome, Italy, says: “Estimates vary, but research ...

Some immune-enhancing therapies already exist, and their use could be investigated while other immunomodulatory drugs specific to different sub-groups of TB disease are being developed Experts are working on novel immune-enhancing therapies called host-directed therapies to use the body’s own immune system to target tuberculosis, with hopes that they could tackle even the drug-resistant forms of the disease. In a presentation at this year’s ESCMID Global Congress (formerly ECCMID) in Barcelona (27-30 April), Associate Professor Susanna Brighenti, Center for Infectious Medicine (CIM), ANA Futura at the Karolinska ...

Individuals requiring blood transfusion are a vulnerable population, often with debilitating conditions like cancer, and transfusion-transmitted malaria is often fatal. Current serological tests used to identify “at risk” donors are not sensitive enough to completely eliminate malaria transfusion risk. The current challenges are to optimise the testing strategy to minimise the loss of blood products (especially those rare blood phenotypes) and to enhance screening sensitivity for infectious immuno-tolerant donors who are difficult to identify. **ECCMID has now changed its name to ESCMID Global, please credit ...