There are no substitutes for native vegetation, but replacing large areas of monoculture with diversified crops in places where agricultural activities are widespread can have beneficial effects on the mammals that still inhabit the region. This is one of the conclusions of a study conducted by researchers at the University of São Paulo (USP) supported by FAPESP. They focused on the northeast of São Paulo state, where the predominant biome is the Cerrado (Brazilian savanna). The region is one of the nation’s agribusiness centers. An article on the study is published in the Journal of Applied Ecology. The study showed that ...

Semiconductors are ubiquitous in modern technology, working to either enable or prevent the flow of electricity. In order to understand the potential of two-dimensional semiconductors for future computer and photovoltaic technologies, researchers from the Universities of Göttingen, Marburg and Cambridge investigated the bond that builds between the electrons and holes contained in these materials. By using a special method to break up the bond between electrons and holes, they were able to gain a ...

“This paper presents the rationale for adding five already approved and marketed generic drugs from general medical practice to the current standard current first line chemotherapy for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC).”   BUFFALO, NY- February 9, 2024 – A new research perspective was published in Oncoscience (Volume 11) on February 7, 2024, entitled, “IPIAD- an augmentation regimen added to standard treatment of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma using already-marketed repurposed drugs irbesartan, pyrimethamine, itraconazole, azithromycin, and dapsone.” In this new paper, researcher Richard E. Kast from IIAIGC Study Center presents the ...

SAN ANTONIO, Feb. 9, 2024 – The UT Health San Antonio School of Dentistry has opened a special-care dental clinic, the first of its kind in an academic setting in South Texas that will serve people of all ages with intellectual, developmental, cognitive or physical disabilities. With spacious, specially designed treatment rooms featuring adjustable sound and lighting and even a “Zen Den” multi-sensory room to help reduce anxiety, the Phil and Karen Hunke Special Care Clinic occupies approximately ...

MIT engineers have developed a small ultrasound sticker that can monitor the stiffness of organs deep inside the body. The sticker, about the size of a postage stamp, can be worn on the skin and is designed to pick up on signs of disease, such as liver and kidney failure and the progression of solid tumors.  In an open-access study that will appear in Science Advances, the team reports that the sensor can send sound waves through the skin and into the body, where the waves reflect off internal organs and back out to the sticker. The pattern of the reflected waves can be read as ...

New Haven, Conn. — A Yale-led research team has picked a side in the “Snowball Earth” debate over the possible cause of planet-wide deep freeze events that occurred in the distant past. According to a new study, these so-called “Snowball” Earth periods, in which the planet’s surface was covered in ice for thousands or even millions of years, could have been triggered abruptly by large asteroids that slammed into the Earth. The findings, detailed in the journal Science Advances, may answer a question ...

Researchers have developed a sensor made from ‘frozen smoke’ that uses artificial intelligence techniques to detect formaldehyde in real time at concentrations as low as eight parts per billion, far beyond the sensitivity of most indoor air quality sensors. The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, developed sensors made from highly porous materials known as aerogels. By precisely engineering the shape of the holes in the aerogels, the sensors were able to detect the fingerprint of formaldehyde, a common indoor air pollutant, at room temperature. The proof-of-concept sensors, which require minimal power, could be adapted to detect ...

CLEVELAND—University Hospitals (UH) Brain Health & Memory Center is now treating patients with LEQEMBI® (lecanemab), a Food and Drug Administration-approved medication for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. “Those with Alzheimer’s disease often have an abnormal buildup of plaques in their brain that contain a protein called beta-amyloid,” said Charles J. Duffy, MD, PhD, neurologist and Director of the Brain Health & Memory Center within the UH Neurological Institute. “Lecanemab ...

Using single photons as qubits has become a prominent strategy in quantum information technology. Accurately determining the number of photons is crucial in various quantum systems, including quantum computation, quantum communication, and quantum metrology. Photon-number-resolving detectors (PNRDs) play a vital role in achieving this accuracy and have two main performance indicators: resolving fidelity, which measures the probability of accurately recording the number of incident photons, and dynamic range, which describes the maximum resolvable photon number. Superconducting nanostrip single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) are considered the leading ...

DURHAM, N.C. -- It might look like a comet or a shooting star, but this time-lapse video is actually a tiny plant root, not much thicker than a human hair, magnified hundreds of times as it grows under the microscope. Researchers at Duke University have been making such movies by peering at stem cells near the root’s tip and taking snapshots as they divide and multiply over time, using a technique called light sheet microscopy. The work offers more than a front row seat to the drama of growing roots. By watching how the cells divide in response to certain chemical signals, the team is finding new clues to how stem cells choose one ...

LEXINGTON, Ky. (Feb. 8, 2024) — A researcher in the University of Kentucky College of Nursing has been selected as a scholar for the Environmental Health Research Institute for Nurse and Clinician Scientists (EHRI-NCS). EHRI-NCS is a year-long flipped classroom, train-the-trainer and mentorship program aimed at developing a new era of environmental health nursing science. It’s led by Castner Incorporated, a health research company, in partnership with Emory University, Washington State University and University of Alabama in Huntsville. Stacy Stanifer, Ph.D., an advanced practice registered nurse and an assistant professor of nursing, was selected to participate. ...

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – UNC School of Medicine researcher Sarah Cohen, PhD, and Ian Windham, a former PhD student from the Cohen lab, have made a new discovery about apolipoprotein E (APOE) – the biggest genetic risk factor for late-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Older people who inherited a genetic variant called APOE4 from their parents have a two- or three-times greater risk of developing the late-onset neurodegenerative disease. If researchers can better understand how APOE4 is affecting brain cells, it may help them design effective therapeutics and target the mechanisms causing the enhanced disease risk. Cohen and Windham performed an exceptionally ...

In the treatment of aggressive lymphomas and blood cancer (leukaemia), so-called chimeric antigen receptor T cells (CAR T cells) are increasingly being used. For this therapy, immune cells are taken from patients and programmed by means of genetic engineering to detect proteins on the malignant tumour cells. Back in the body, the CAR T cells then fight the cancer cells. Due to some heavy side effects, this therapy requires extreme caution and long hospital stays. Scientists at University Hospital Cologne are therefore researching ...

Acting on a proposal from the Institut Pasteur President Yasmine Belkaid, the Institut Pasteur Board of Governors appointed Mariana Mesel-Lemoine as Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion on Wednesday February 7, 2024. This appointment marks a significant milestone in the history of the Institut Pasteur, and it is the first French research institute to establish a position of this kind at such a senior and strategic level. Mariana Mesel-Lemoine will report directly to the President. Her mission will be to propose policy and strategy priorities related to diversity, equity and inclusion for the "Pasteur 2030" Strategic Plan, to oversee ...

About The Study: In hospitals participating in Get With The Guidelines–Stroke, earlier anticoagulation reversal was associated with improved survival for patients with intracerebral hemorrhage. These findings support intensive efforts to accelerate evaluation and treatment for patients with this devastating form of stroke. Authors: Kevin N. Sheth, M.D., of the Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut, is the corresponding author. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this ...

Sleep apnea is prevalent among cardio-oncology patients who are at higher risk for congestive heart failure from cancer therapy, according to a new study being presented at the American College of Cardiology (ACC) Advancing the Cardiovascular Care of the Oncology Patient course. Sleep apnea is a disorder of altered breathing while asleep with two types, obstructive (OSA) or central (CSA). Both can be treated to alleviate symptoms and improve cardiovascular outcomes. This study pertains to obstructive sleep apnea. A well-established screening tool for detecting sleep apnea is the STOP-BANG questionnaire utilizing eight questions using ...

Since December 2019, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has posed a worldwide threat. The emergence of the BA.2.86 variant, a subvariant of Omicron, has raised significant concerns due to its substantial number of mutations. Discovered in August 2023, this variant differs markedly from other existing types such as Omicron XBB (including EG.5.1 and HK.3).  Compared with XBB and BA.2, BA.2.86 exhibits more than 30 mutations in its spike protein, contributing to its ability to effectively evade the immune system’s defenses. Over ...

Sensory feedback is important for amputees to be able to explore and interact with their environment. Now, researchers have developed a device that allows amputees to sense and respond to temperature by delivering thermal information from the prosthesis’ fingertip to the amputee’s residual limb. The “MiniTouch” device, presented February 9 in the journal Med, uses off-the-shelf electronics, can be integrated into commercially available prosthetic limbs, and does not require surgery. Using the thermally sensitive prosthetic hand, ...

Pisa, 9 February 2024. “When one of the researchers placed the sensor on his own body, I could feel the warmth of another person with my phantom hand. it was a very strong emotion for me, it was like reactivating a connection with someone”.   Thanks to a sensorised prosthetic hand that provides realistic and real-time thermal feedback, Fabrizio, a 57-year-old man from Pistoia with a transradial (wrist) amputation, was able to discriminate between and manually sort objects of different temperatures or materials and ...

The past year has seen major advances in Large Language Models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT. The ability of these models to interpret and produce human text sources (and other sequence data) has implications for people in many areas of human activity. A new perspective paper in the journal Neuron argues that like many professionals, neuroscientists can either benefit from partnering with these powerful tools or risk being left behind.   In their previous studies, the authors showed that important preconditions are met to develop LLMs that can interpret and analyze neuroscientific data like ChatGPT interprets language. These AI models can be built for many different types ...

About The Study: This study including 202,000 veterans with COVID-19 and 202,000 matched uninfected veterans found that outpatient use increased significantly in the month after infection, then attenuated but remained greater than the uninfected cohorts’ use through 12 months, which suggests that there are sustained impacts of COVID-19 infection. Authors: Matthew L. Maciejewski, Ph.D., of the Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System in Durham, North Carolina, is the corresponding author.  To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media ...

About The Study: The findings of this study including 133 adults with severe obesity suggest that bariatric surgery was associated with health benefits two years after surgery. Bariatric surgery was associated with improved cognition and general health and changed blood vessel efficiency and cortical thickness of the temporal cortex. These results may improve treatment options for patients with obesity and dementia. Authors: Amanda J. Kiliaan, Ph.D., of the Radboud University Medical Center, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition, ...

A technique can determine for the first time how frequently, and exactly where, a molecular event called “backtracking” occurs throughout the genetic material (genome) of any species, a new study shows. Published online February 9 in Molecular Cell, the study results support the theory that backtracking represents a widespread form of gene regulation, which influences thousands of human genes, including many involved in basic life processes like cell division and development in the womb. Led by researchers from NYU Grossman School of Medicine, the work revolves around genes, the stretches ...

BOSTON, MA — A new study led by researchers at the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute has found that reducing out-of-pocket costs for patients with diabetes, especially those considered low income, can be one step toward improving health outcomes. The study, “Acute Diabetes Complications After Transition to a Value-Based Medication Benefit,” was published in the February 9 edition of JAMA Health Forum. Treatment with antidiabetic agents, antihypertensives, and lipid-lowering ...

An international research project led by the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) delves into the next generation of seasonal thermal energy storage systems. The "INTERSTORES" project is investigating optimal ways to construct new types of storage systems and integrate them into energy systems. The collaboration between science and industry will receive nearly eleven million euros as part of "Horizon Europe", with around 1.5 million euros going to MLU. The aim is to improve the ...