Controversial research can put people on the defensive and may even lead to calls to censor findings that conflict with a particular ideological perspective. However, a pair of studies published in Psychological Science, by authors Cory J. Clark (University of Pennsylvania), Maja Graso (University of Groningen), Ilana Redstone (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign), and Philip E. Tetlock (University of Pennsylvania), suggest a tendency to overestimate the risk that research findings will fuel public support for harmful actions.  Harmful actions related to research findings, according ...

A new study by University of Arizona Cancer Center researchers piloted a unique outreach strategy to foster dialogue between basic scientists and community members to demystify basic science research and facilitate culturally tailored approaches to address health disparities of vulnerable communities. The paper, published in the journal Cancer Causes and Control, analyzes the processes, experiences and lessons learned during the establishment of the Research Outreach for Southern Arizona, or ROSA, program. “Basic science research is critical ...

(Toronto, August 18, 2023) JMIR Publications is happy to announce that JMIR AI has been accepted and indexed with the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). The DOAJ applies strict criteria to review and index Open Access journals, which include licensing and copyright criteria, quality control processes, journal website technical and usability setups, and editorial evaluation. JMIR AI (JMIR AI ISSN 2817-1705, Editors-in-Chief: Khaled El Emam, PhD and Bradley Malin, PhD) is a new journal (launched in 2022) focusing on the applications of AI in health settings. This includes contemporary developments as well as historical examples, with an emphasis on sound ...

At the outset of the COVID pandemic, men appeared to suffer higher rates of severe illness and death, leading researchers to suspect a link between androgen receptors—which bind to hormones like testosterone--and SARS-CoV-2 viral infection. This observation spurred Michigan Medicine researchers to look into a drug in development to treat prostate cancer called proxalutamide, which works by blocking an enzyme called TMPRSS2 (transmembrane protease, serine 2) that is regulated by androgen receptors, as a potential therapeutic for COVID. “We were already studying TMPRSS2 as part of the key gene driver ...

NYU Langone Health’s MCIT Department of Health Informatics, Institute for Innovation in Medical Education, and Institute for Excellence in Health Equity will hold the first Generative AI Prompt-A-Thon in Health Care on Aug 18. During the event, teams of clinicians, educators, and researchers will work together to find artificial intelligence (AI)-powered solutions to healthcare challenges using real-world, de-identified patient data. The event addresses large language models (LLMs) that predict likely options for the next word in any sentence, paragraph, or essay, based on how real people used words in context billions of times in documents on the internet. Also called ...

Archaeologists have long been drawing conclusions about how ancient tools were used by the people who crafted them based on written records and context clues. But with dietary practices, they have had to make assumptions about what was eaten and how it was prepared. A new study published in the journal iScience on August 18 analyzed protein residues from ancient cooking cauldrons and found that the people of Caucasus ate deer, sheep, goats, and members of the cow family during the Maykop period (3700–2900 BCE). “It’s really exciting to get an idea of what people were making ...

The US has committed to reaching net-zero emissions by 2050. To accomplish this goal, large cuts in emissions are necessary, especially in high-emission sectors like the building industry. In an article publishing on August 18 in the journal One Earth, a team of researchers use a computational model to analyze several scenarios of future building energy use in the US. They find that by tackling emissions on multiple fronts and placing focus on “demand-side measures” that affect how power is drawn from the ...

The summertime barbecue – an American tradition synonymous with celebrating freedom – may be tainted by a decidedly unfree market. A new Stanford study reveals how meat and dairy industry lobbying has influenced government regulations and funding to stifle competition from alternative meat products with smaller climate and environmental impacts. The analysis, published Aug. 18 in One Earth, compares innovations and policies related to plant-based meat alternatives and lab-grown meat in the U.S. and European Union. Its findings could help ensure ...

About The Study: The findings of this study that included 612 women suggest that adherence to preconception healthy dietary patterns before infertility treatment may be associated with a lower likelihood of pregnancy loss.  Authors: Jorge E. Chavarro, M.D., Sc.D., of the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston, 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/jamanetworkopen.2023.29982) Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including ...

About The Study: In a racially and ethnically diverse cohort of 34,000 adolescents, those from neighborhoods with extreme concentrations of racial and economic disadvantage were more likely to screen positive for depressive symptoms and suicidality at well-teen visits compared to their counterparts from the most racially and economically privileged neighborhoods.  Authors: Julia Acker, M.S., of the University of California, Berkeley, 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/jamanetworkopen.2023.29825) Editor’s ...

About The Study: Telemedicine was rapidly adopted in skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) in early 2020 but subsequently stabilized at a low use rate that was nonetheless higher than before 2020 in this study of more than 4.4 million residents at 15,000 SNFs. Higher telemedicine use in SNFs was associated with improved access to psychiatry visits in SNFs.   Authors: Michael L. Barnett, M.D., M.S., of the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston, 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/jamanetworkopen.2023.29895) Editor’s ...

An estimated 1 in 4 older Americans with dementia or mild cognitive impairment lives alone and is at risk of practices like unsafe driving, wandering outside the home, mixing up medications and failing to attend medical appointments.  In a study publishing in JAMA Network Open on Aug. 18, 2023, researchers led by UC San Francisco concluded that the United States health system is poorly equipped to serve patients living solo with cognitive decline, a group whose numbers are predicted to swell as the population ages.  For these patients, living alone ...

A study published in Engineering introduces a novel image-based visual servoing (IBVS) method for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to track dynamic targets in GPS-denied environments. Titled "Dynamic Target Tracking of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Under Unpredictable Disturbances," the research article presents a comprehensive approach that addresses the challenges of estimating target velocities, image depth estimation, and tracking stability in the presence of external disturbances. The proposed method utilizes a constructed virtual camera to derive simplified and decoupled image dynamics for underactuated UAVs. By considering ...

The Jovian system has greatly attracted the interest of human exploration because of the important scientific value. However, Jupiter and its 4 Galilean moons form a unique and complex multi-body dynamical environment that greatly challenges trajectory design and optimization. Moreover, the extremely strong radiation environment of Jupiter and the low available fuel of spacecraft further increase the difficulty of trajectory design. In order to satisfy the requirements of diverse missions of the Jovian system exploration, develop new mission concepts, and obtain higher merit with lower cost, a variety of theories and methodologies of ...

A research group led by Dr. Tomoaki Murakami from the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology has revealed that fibrinogen Aα-chain amyloidosis, a previously unreported disease in animals other than humans, is highly prevalent in Japanese squirrels (Sciurus lis). In this study, they compared the pathology with that of humans, and suggested the importance of Japanese squirrels in the comparative pathological analysis of fibrinogen Aα-chain amyloidosis. The researchers published their results on August 8th in the Journal of Pathology. Amyloidosis is a disease group in which amyloid, generated by misfolding ...

A new study highlights the potential of artificial DNA structures that, when fitted with antibodies, instruct the immune system to specifically target cancerous cells. Immunotherapy is viewed as an exceptionally promising weapon in the fight against cancer. In essence, the aim is to activate the body’s immune system in such a way that it identifies and destroys malignant cells. However, the destruction must be as effective and specific as possible, to avoid damaging healthy cells. A team of researchers from LMU, the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and Helmholtz Munich have now published a new study in Nature Nanotechnology in which they present ...

AUBURN, AL – In July, as many enjoyed the hot weather at Alabama's gulf coast beaches, in the Leach Science Center, Auburn University's Department of Physics hosted an engaging scientific event. For the first time since 2016, the southern USA was home to the “Hands-On Workshop on Computational Biophysics” with Auburn University, for the first time, as its esteemed host. Under the guidance of Prof. Rafael Bernardi from Auburn University's Department of Physics and Prof. Emad Tajkhorshid of the Beckman Institute at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the workshop showcased expertise from ...

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is a common condition that affects up to 30% of adults in the general population. It is characterized by the accumulation of fat in the liver. It is often associated with other conditions, such as obesity, type 2 diabetes, and metabolic syndrome. The new definition of metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD) was proposed in 2020. MAFLD is diagnosed based on hepatic steatosis (fatty liver) and at least one of three metabolic risk abnormalities: overweight/obesity, type 2 diabetes, or evidence of metabolic dysregulation. A recent meta-analysis led by Ming-Hua Zheng from the First Affiliated Hospital ...

Oak Brook, IL – The August 2023 issue of SLAS Technology, the open access journal emphasizing scientific and technical advances across the life sciences, is now available. Volume 28, Issue 4, contains a review from the literature and eight full-length articles covering nanodiamonds, automated buffer exchange, epidermal growth factor (EGF) and other laboratory automation-related research. From the Literature Life sciences discovery and technology highlights The authors examine several areas of research within the literature to highlight significant developments ...

What if we could identify the earliest warning signs of cardiovascular disease from a simple saliva sample? Scientists think they have found a way to do so. Gum inflammation leads to periodontitis, which is linked with cardiovascular disease. The team used a simple oral rinse to see if levels of white blood cells — an indicator of gum inflammation — in the saliva of healthy adults could be linked to warning signs for cardiovascular disease. They found that high levels correlated with compromised flow-mediated dilation, an early indicator of poor arterial health. “Even in young healthy adults, low levels of oral inflammatory load may have an impact on cardiovascular ...

Lead exposure has long been a known health risk, especially for young children. Research has found that even at low levels, chronic exposure to lead can cause damage to the brain and other organs and cause problems with cognitive and motor skills. In response, public health officials have determined that there is no safe exposure level and have made great efforts to eliminate lead-based paint and lead pipes in homes and phase out the use of leaded gasoline. But another possible source of lead exposure in children has been largely overlooked: secondhand ...

Researchers at Texas A&M University will spearhead a groundbreaking project to revolutionize medication administration for pediatric patients, thanks to an approximately $3 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This pioneering initiative explores using additive manufacturing, or 3D printing, to create customized tablets tailored to the unique needs of young children. The project is an interdisciplinary collaboration of experts from the College of Engineering, the College of Pharmacy and the School of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. Traditional manufacturing methods yield mass-produced medicinal tablets ...

Overview Assistant Professor Yuya Hosoda of the Center for IT-Based Education (CITE), Toyohashi University of Technology developed a method for estimating the pitch of vocal cord vibrations of humans from call audio. In this method, the pitch is estimated by integrating the feature quantities extracted from the amplitude and phase spectra of speech on the complex plane. Through experiments, we have demonstrated that the proposed method is not only efficient for call audios whose frequency band is restricted by communication standards, but also works robustly in an environment with background ...

Niigata, Japan – our movements are controlled by multiple neural pathways that connect the brain and spinal cord. In particular, neurons in the cerebral cortex send commands to the motor neurons in the spinal cord and then to the muscles, thus eliciting the required movement. However, this flow of neural information is compromised in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)—a widespread progressive neurodegenerative disease in which the muscles gradually atrophy, making movement and breathing difficult. Moreover, a protein called TDP-43 has been found to abnormally ...

A striking image of the invasive orange pore fungus (Favolaschia calocera), which highlights the potential threats the species may pose to Australian ecosystems, has won the third BMC Ecology and Evolution image competition. The competition showcases the wonder of the natural world — both past and present — and celebrates those working to understand it. The winning images are open access and freely available for use under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CCBY) license.  The overall winning image depicts bright ...