More Americans than ever are heeding the call of the outdoors – spending time recreating outside and enjoying national parks. Simultaneously, smoky skies are worsening as the size and severity of wildfires increase and adversely affect air quality across the country. Wildfire smoke threatens human health and welfare, especially if humans are exposed to smoke for long periods or while exercising – such as during a hiking trip to one of America’s beloved national parks. Matthew Clark, a doctoral student at Boise State University studying how social and environmental ...

The COVID-19 pandemic had substantial psychological impacts on the nation and around the world. New research shows patients with HIV were particularly susceptible to psychosocial challenges like depression, anxiety, substance abuse, loneliness and more. The study was co-authored by HIV/AIDS expert Michael Horberg, MD, and published in AIDS Research and Therapy. Researchers analyzed the results from a 2020 survey of nearly 900 Washington, D.C.-based participants diagnosed with HIV. The survey asked patients to rate the degree to which they experienced challenges with financial stability, mental health, social connections ...

Chart captions that explain complex trends and patterns are important for improving a reader’s ability to comprehend and retain the data being presented. And for people with visual disabilities, the information in a caption often provides their only means of understanding the chart. But writing effective, detailed captions is a labor-intensive process. While autocaptioning techniques can alleviate this burden, they often struggle to describe cognitive features that provide additional context. To help people author high-quality chart captions, MIT researchers have developed a dataset to improve automatic ...

The Brain & Behavior Research Foundation (BBRF) is hosting a free webinar, “What Genetics is Telling Us About Substance Use Disorders” on Tuesday, July 11, 2023, at 2:00 pm EST. The presenter will be Sandra Sanchez-Roige, Ph.D. Dr. Sanchez-Roige is an Associate Professor at the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California San Diego, and the Department of Medicine, Division of Genetic Medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. She is also the recipient of a 2018 BBRF Young Investigator Grant. The webinar will be hosted by Jeffrey Borenstein, M.D., President & CEO of the Brain & ...

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Secondhand tobacco smoke continues to be a major source of indoor air pollution that causes more than 41,000 nonsmoking adults to die every year in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The exposure is even more dire for children, who can be more affected by less smoke. It can increase frequency and severity of asthma attacks, respiratory infections, cancer, sudden infant death syndrome and behavioral problems. Now, for the first time, Penn State-led research has shown exposure to tobacco smoke increases the presence of heavy metals in children’s saliva. The ...

ROCHESTER, Minn. — A study published in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons reveals that performing a minor surgical procedure on patients newly diagnosed with pancreatic cancer helps to identify cancer spread early and determine the stage of cancer. The researchers add that the surgery ideally should be performed before the patient begins chemotherapy. "This is an important study because it supports that staging laparoscopy may help with determining a patient's prognosis and better inform treatment so that patients ...

Cyanotriazole compounds are fast-acting topoisomerase II poisons that can selectively and rapidly kill trypanosome parasites that cause Chagas disease and African sleeping sickness, according to a new study. Millions who live in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa are at risk for trypanosomatid infections – pathogenic protozoan parasites that cause Chagas disease and human African trypanosomiasis (HAT), which are potentially fatal if not treated. Although treatments for HAT have improved in recent years, Chagas therapies remain limited and rely on lengthy regimens of toxic drugs. More effective, safer, and shorter-duration ...

From visible starlight to radio waves, the Milky Way galaxy has long been observed through the various frequencies of electromagnetic radiation it emits. Scientists have now revealed a uniquely different image of our galaxy by determining the galactic origin of thousands of neutrinos — invisible "ghost particles" which exist in great quantities but normally pass straight through Earth undetected. The neutrino-based image of the Milky Way is the first of its kind: a galactic portrait made with particles of matter rather than electromagnetic ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Scientists have found the secret to felines’ finesse at sniffing out food, friends and foes. A complex collection of tightly coiled bony airway structures gets the credit, according to the first detailed analysis of the domestic cat’s nasal airway. The researchers created a 3D computer model of the cat nose and simulated how an inhalation of air containing common cat food odors would flow through the coiled structures. They found that the air separates into two flow streams, one that is cleansed and humidified and another delivering the odorant quickly and efficiently to the system responsible for ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — A study led by Brown University researchers offers new insights into how water from melting ice could have played a recent role in the formation of ravine-like channels that cut down the sides of impact craters on Mars. The study, published in Science, focuses on Martian gullies, which look eerily similar to gullies that form on Earth in the Dry Valleys of Antarctica and are caused by water erosion from melting glaciers. The researchers, including Brown planetary scientist Jim Head, built a model that simulates a sweet spot for when conditions on Mars allow the planet to warm above freezing temperatures, ...

RIVERSIDE, Calif. -- Some molecules exist in two forms such that their structures and their mirror images are not superimposable, like our left and right hands. Called chirality, it is a property these molecules have due to their asymmetry. Chiral molecules tend to be optically active because of how they interact with light. Oftentimes, only one form of a chiral molecule exists in nature, for example, DNA. Interestingly, if a chiral molecule works well as a drug, its mirror image could be ineffective for therapy. In ...

For the first time, researchers have produced an image of the Milky Way using neutrinos, which were observed with the IceCube telescope in the Antarctic ice. The neutrino image suggests that cosmic ray interactions are more intense in the center of our galaxy than once thought. The results are published in an article in the journal Science. For ages, the view of our Milky Way galaxy has inspired awe, visible with the naked eye as a hazy band of stars that stretches across the sky. Now IceCube researchers are able to see the Milky Way using neutrinos – tiny, ghostlike ...

Performing cutting-edge science requires thinking outside the box and bringing together different scientific disciplines. Sometimes this even means being in the right place at the right time. For David Brückner, postdoctoral researcher and NOMIS fellow at ISTA, all the above-mentioned things came into effect as he attended an on-campus lecture by Professor Thomas Gregor from Princeton University. Inspired by the talk, Brückner reached out with an idea: to physically interpret the specific data sets Gregor presented. Now, the results of their collaboration are published ...

Alexandria, VA – The International Association for Dental, Oral, and Craniofacial Research (IADR) and the American Association for Dental, Oral, and Craniofacial Research (AADOCR) announced today the JDR Clinical & Translational Research (JDR CTR) has received its first Journal Impact Factor™. JDR CTR has earned a Journal Impact Factor of 3.0, with an Eigenfactor™ of 0.00148, an Immediacy Index of 0.5, and 786 total citations in 2022. This represents a significant achievement and a huge milestone in JDR CTR’s history, which was launched in 2016. “JDR CTR’s new Impact Factor marks the culmination of years of commitment ...

Alexandria, VA – The International Association for Dental, Oral, and Craniofacial Research and American Association for Dental, Oral, and Craniofacial Research announced the Journal of Dental Research (JDR) 2-Year Journal Impact Factor™ is now 7.6, ranking it #3 of 91 journals in the “Dentistry, Oral Surgery & Medicine” category. The JDR 5-year Journal Impact Factor™ is also 7.6, with an Immediacy Index of 1.1 and an article Influence score of 1.638. The JDR once again ranked #1 of 91 journals in total citations, with a total of 25,849 in 2022, and ranked #3 in Eigenfactor with a score of 0.01345. The 2-year Journal Impact Factor™ is defined ...

Galaxies are not scattered randomly across the universe. They gather together not only into clusters, but into vast interconnected filamentary structures with gigantic barren voids in between. This “cosmic web” started out tenuous and became more distinct over time as gravity drew matter together.   Astronomers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have discovered a thread-like arrangement of 10 galaxies that existed just 830 million years after the big bang. The 3 million light-year-long structure is anchored by a luminous quasar – a galaxy with an active, supermassive black hole at ...

DURHAM, N.C. – CRISPR gene editing is a breakthrough that has been used to treat diseases such as sickle cell anemia, leukemia and genetic disorders, but it has challenges that limit its broad utility.   Identifying the root of those issues led a research team at Duke Health to find an improved approach to gene editing that expands its functionality.   In work appearing online June 29 in the journal Cell Chemical Biology, the researchers lay out a new way to identify diverse CRISPR RNA variants that can specifically home in on challenging areas of DNA to target for editing. The new approach opens up more of the genome for editing, ...

Water fasts — where people consume nothing but water for several days — might help you lose weight, but it’s unclear how long you’ll keep it off, according to research from the University of Illinois Chicago. And the other metabolic benefits of water fasts, such as lower blood pressure and improved cholesterol, seem to disappear soon after the fast ends, the researchers found.  However, there do not appear to be any serious adverse effects for those who do a water fast or a similar kind of fast where people consume a very small number of calories a day, said Krista Varady, professor of kinesiology and nutrition, who led the research, ...

In light of climate change and the impending transition to clean energy, many long-standing programs to address energy insecurity need to be refreshed. A new paper published online in the journal Health Affairs provides growing documentation of the connections between energy insecurity and poor health. The paper, by Diana Hernandez, PhD, associate professor of sociomedical sciences at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, also offers an overview of current policy initiatives and discusses ways that current policies can be improved upon. The average U.S. household allocates 3.1 percent of its income to energy expenses but for low-income households, ...

Rockville, MD – The latest journal impact factors and rankings reflect the high-quality research that is published each year by the American Society for Nutrition (ASN).  Scopus recently ranked Advances in Nutrition the number one journal in the Nutrition and Dietetics field. The Society’s newest journal, Current Developments in Nutrition, surpassed expectations with an excellent inaugural impact factor of 4.8 confirming its promising future. “I am delighted to receive such a superb first impact factor,” stated Jack Odle, PhD, William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor at North Carolina State University and Editor-in-Chief of Current ...

Glenview, Illinois – The American College of Chest Physicians® (CHEST) recently released a new clinical guideline on antithrombotic therapy in arterial thrombosis andthromboembolism in COVID-19. Published in the journal CHEST®, the guideline contains 11 evidence-based recommendations to improve risk-evaluation and to assist in determining the course of treatment. While there are guidelines for the management of COVID-19-related coagulopathy for venous thromboembolism (VTE), a recent large cohort study showed ...

The College of Pharmacy at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center is now ranked No. 6 in annual research funding from the National Institutes of Health, according to a new listing published by the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy of its approximately 140 member institutions. “The ranking of No. 6 in NIH funding for federal fiscal year 2022 is external validation for the UTHSC College of Pharmacy’s standing as one of the leading institutions in research among the 142 U.S. pharmacy schools,” said Bernd Meibohm, ...

WASHINGTON — Researchers report a new single-photon Raman lidar system that operates underwater and can remotely distinguish various substances. They also show that the new system can detect the thickness of the oil underwater up to 12 m away, which could be useful for detecting oil spills. “Differentiating substances in water and detecting their distribution characteristics in the ocean are of great significance for marine monitoring and scientific research,” said research team leader Mingjia Shangguan from Xiamen University in China. “For instance, the remote sensing of underwater oil that we ...

Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers have developed a method to simplify one step of radioisotope production — and it’s faster and safer. ORNL produces several radionuclides from irradiated radium-226 targets, including actinium-227 and thorium-228, both used in cancer treatments. Continuously improving isotopes for human health is one of the lab’s missions. Currently, it takes workers two weeks to prepare radium-226 targets for irradiation in the High Flux Isotope Reactor. The targets are exposed to radiation throughout the process, which involves pressing radium carbonate aluminum composite into 10 pellets — one each day — and sealing ...

About The Study: This systematic review and meta-analysis including 41 studies and 7,800 participants found that psychosocial interventions were associated with decreased health care use in most health services and increased use of outpatient care. The greatest health care decrease was among caregivers and individuals with mental illnesses and in interventions delivered 1-on-1 by health professionals.  Authors: Neta HaGani, M.S.W., of the University of Sydney in Sydney, Australia, is the corresponding author.  To ...