While the lithium-ion batteries in disposable electronic cigarettes are discarded after a single use, they can continue to perform at high capacity for hundreds of cycles, according to a study published December 12 in the journal Joule. The analysis, conducted by scientists from University College London (UCL) and the University of Oxford and supported by The Faraday Institution, highlights a growing environmental threat from these increasingly popular vape pens, which are not designed to be recharged. “The surprise for us were the results that pointed toward just how long these batteries could potentially cycle,” says ...

About The Study: In a multicenter observational cohort, a composite adverse pregnancy outcome (small-for-gestational-age birth, medically indicated preterm birth, stillbirth, or hypertensive disorders of pregnancy) was more frequent in pregnant individuals with cannabis exposure ascertained by a urine drug assay compared with unexposed individuals. The risk for an adverse outcome was higher among those who continued to use cannabis beyond the first trimester.  Authors: Torri Metz, M.D., M.S., of University of Utah ...

About The Study: Using metformin plus insulin to treat preexisting type 2 or gestational diabetes diagnosed early in pregnancy did not reduce a composite neonatal adverse outcome in a randomized clinical trial of 794 pregnant adults. The effect of reduction in odds of a large-for-gestational-age infant observed after adding metformin to insulin warrants further investigation.  Authors: Kim A. Boggess, M.D., of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is the corresponding author. To access the embargoed ...

About The Study: The findings of this study suggest that persistent COVID-19 symptoms and, to a lesser extent, previous severe COVID-19 were associated with increased odds of pandemic-related economic hardship in a cohort of U.S. families. The economic consequences of COVID-19 varied according to socioeconomic status; families with lower income before the pandemic were more vulnerable to employment disruptions and earnings losses associated with an adult family member’s COVID-19 illness. Authors: Nicole L. Hair, Ph.D., of the University of South Carolina Arnold School of Public Health in Columbia, is the corresponding author. To access the embargoed ...

About The Study: This study found differential benefits associated with a percutaneous coronary intervention–capable facility (PCI-CF) opening based on patient race and community segregation. Black patients in integrated communities demonstrated the greatest benefits across all outcomes, including a five times greater likelihood of receiving same-day PCI after a PCI-CF opening compared with white patients in segregated communities. Authors: Renee Y. Hsia, M.D., M.Sc., of the University of California, San Francisco, 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.2023.47311) Editor’s ...

Research from Tokyo Medical and Dental University (TDMU) warns that rates of urgent dialysis and death are on the rise over the last decade in people hospitalized for acute high blood pressure.   Tokyo, Japan – High blood pressure is called the silent killer because symptoms can remain hidden until a medical crisis strikes. You might think hypertension is no longer serious because blood pressure medication is widely available, but newly reported trends in people with dangerously high blood pressure ...

Researchers have come one step closer to answering why, in some patients, a type of lymphoma changes from indolent to aggressive, and in particular they are closer to identifying which patients are at high risk of this change happening. Part of the answer lies in the protein expression in the tumour, explains Associate Professor Maja Ludvigsen from the Department of Clinical Medicine at Aarhus University. Maja is one of the authors of a new study on the subject, which has just been published in the scientific journal Blood Advances. Follicular ...

INDIANAPOLIS – There have been few studies of LGBTQ+ older adults residing in nursing homes. A new article from faculty of Regenstrief Institute and Indiana University explores care of the growing number of LGBTQ+ older adults living in these facilities. The paper highlights the experiences and needs of this population, outlines best facility practices and presents valuable resources for culturally appropriate and inclusive care. Social isolation, limited community supports, dementia, decreased functional abilities, economic ...

BINGHAMTON, N.Y. -- By studying how spider silk responds to sound, researchers at Binghamton University, State University of New York have developed a patent for a brand-new microphone technology. Using biomimicry as a model, Binghamton University Distinguished Professor of Engineering Ron Miles worked with then-doctoral student and current Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering Jian Zhou to patent a bio-inspired flow microphone — the very patent that has now been commercialized by the Canadian venture firm TandemLaunch and its spin-off company Soundskrit, which has also recently ...

Anesthesiologist and global health expert Dr. Gunisha Kaur and her research team recently won a prestigious National Academy of Medicine (NAM) Catalyst Prize. The Catalyst Awards are a branch of the Healthy Longevity Global Competition that seeks to expand the human healthspan—usually defined as how many healthy years a person lives—by rewarding cutting-edge ideas to improve the physical, mental, or social wellbeing and health of people as they age. Up to 20 awards are being given this year to United States-based innovators, out of 1,100 applications received from organizations focused on “science, medicine, ...

Our reading skills, and understanding of a text, depend on several factors. “These include decoding texts, learning the letters of the alphabet, and knowing the different words and how they sound. However, vocabulary is also important,” says Professor Hermundur Sigmundsson at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) Department of Psychology. He is behind a special edition of Frontiers in Psychology together with Professors Heikki Lyytinen from the University of Jyväskylä and Elena L. Grigorenko from the University of Houston. Most people can learn how ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — When it comes to greenhouse gases, methane is one the biggest contributors. Not only is it massively abundant — it’s about 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide at trapping heat in the atmosphere. That makes tracking methane emissions critically important, and nowhere more so than in the Arctic, which is now the fastest warming part of the globe. A new study conducted at Brown University helps shed light on the actual atmospheric methane emissions from Arctic ...

Two-thirds of patients discontinued their medication, switched to a different medication class or intensified their treatment Discontinuation was higher (50%) among GLP-1 RA drugs, which are linked to gastrointestinal side effects Findings could have implications for patients taking GLP-1 RAs to treat obesity First large U.S. study to show such high discontinuation rates CHICAGO --- Most patients with Type 2 diabetes will end up needing to add a second-line medication after metformin — the go-to primary drug for glucose management — ...

Waltham — December 7, 2023 —   At discharge from the hospital, Black Medicare beneficiaries are less likely to be referred for home health care (HHC), compared to white patients reports a survey study in Medical Care. The journal is published in the Lippincott portfolio by Wolters Kluwer.  The disparity in referral for HHC among Black Medicare patients appears greatest among those with low "readiness for discharge" scores, according to the new research, led by Olga Yakusheva, PhD, of University of Michigan School of Nursing and School of Public Health.  Does ...

BOSTON, December 12, 2023 — NEJM Group, publisher of the New England Journal of Medicine, today announced the launch of its newest title, NEJM AI, a peer-reviewed, monthly journal dedicated to the latest research and application of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning in medicine. In addition to original research articles, the journal publishes reviews, policy perspectives and educational material for clinicians, scientists, health care leaders, policy makers, regulators, and executives with pharmaceutical, device-manufacturing and technology companies. Benchmark data sets and protocols are ...

In addition to being one of the largest, most diverse metropolitan areas in the world with a population of 6.1 million, South Florida hosts more than 9.7 million acres of farmland with a revenue of more than $7 billion in recent years. However, climate change, extreme weather events, poor soils, pests and disease, and workforce shortages present unique challenges in this region. To address a critical need to train a diverse workforce with new sets of tools and skills to confront these emerging challenges, ...

The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), Canada’s largest mental health teaching hospital in the country is pleased to announce that it has entered into a partnership with the Tanenbaum Open Science Institute (TOSI) at McGill University’s The Neuro, joining a growing alliance Canadian institutions changing research practices in neuroscience. This important endeavour is supported by a $1M commitment from the Tanenbaum Open Science Institute and an equivalent commitment by CAMH. As part of its commitment to Open Science, CAMH is formally adopting a set of Open Science Principles to foster collaboration and the sharing of mental health ...

PHILADELPHIA— For thousands of people around the world waiting for a kidney, paired exchange serves as a beacon of hope. One person's willingness to undergo the act of Kidney Paired Donation (KPD) often sets in motion a chain of beautiful and selfless acts, where individuals give and receive the chance for a better life. After completing its 100th KPD transplant in a 12 month period, the Penn Transplant Institute now holds the world-wide record for the most KPD transplants in a year. More than 90,000 people in the United States are waiting to receive a kidney transplant, with average waits to receive a kidney from a deceased donor ...

University of Virginia School of Medicine researchers have created an “atlas of atherosclerosis” that reveals, at the level of individual cells, critical processes responsible for forming the harmful plaque buildup that causes heart attacks, strokes and coronary artery disease.  Atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries, affects half of Americans between ages 45 and 84, and many don’t even know it, the National Institutes of Health reports. Over time, fatty plaques build up inside the arteries, where they can slow blood flow. When they break loose, they can be deadly, triggering strokes and heart attacks. Doctors ...

In a Perspective, researchers call for equity in cannabis research as the field rapidly expands. When marijuana was illegal across the United States, enforcement and penalties were disproportionately heaped upon communities of color. Today, cannabis remains federally illegal and unequal enforcement continues, while profits from the “green rush” of state legalization are in many cases flowing to wealthy white men. Renée Martin-Willett and an interdisciplinary team of colleagues propose a way forward for cannabis research that acknowledges this history of discrimination and misuse of institutional power and embraces ...

During the all-out invasion of Ukraine, Russia has deliberately chosen civilian targets, such as apartment buildings, presumably with the goal of deterring Ukrainian resistance. But does such terror deter or, in contrast, motivate resistance among ordinary Ukrainians? Henrikas Bartusevičius and colleagues conducted two-wave probability surveys in Ukraine in March and April 2022, with approximately 1,000 and 800 respondents in the first and second waves, respectively. Surveys were conducted online by a local survey agency, Info Sapiens.  Respondents reported the frequency of ...

When a severe drought hit California in 1977, the state ordered citizens to drastically reduce domestic water usage. Water restrictions put in place occurred after a heady mix of prosperity and radical urban planning had resulted in the construction of more than 150,000 private swimming pools in California in the 1960s. The result was a ubiquitous new landscape feature: empty concrete pools. Ulf Büntgen and colleagues document how this novel geographic resource inspired surfers to develop professional vertical skateboarding in Los Angeles and environs. Other causal factors included the development of polyurethane ...

Why did professional skateboarding arise in southern California in the 1970s? Was it a coincidence, or was it a perfect storm of multiple factors? It’s fairly well-known that a drought in southern California in the mid-1970s led to a ban on filling backyard swimming pools, and these empty pools became playgrounds for freestyle skateboarders in the greater Los Angeles area. But a new cross-disciplinary study from the University of Cambridge shows that beyond the drought, it was the entanglement of environmental, economic and technological factors that led to the explosive rise of professional skateboarding culture in the 1970s. The authors say that professional ...

It may soon be time to wake up and smell the lab-grown coffee made from cultured plant cells. But it’s not clear whether drinks from this product replicate coffee beans’ complex flavors. Now, a study in ACS’ Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry found that some of the comforting aromas and tastes of a conventional cup of coffee could be reproduced by roasting and brewing coffee cell cultures. Coffee is one of the most popular beverages worldwide. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 23 billion pounds of beans are expected to be produced during the 2023­­–24 growing ...

In a Perspective, a biophysical chemist, Kenneth J. Breslauer, and his brother, a political scientist, George W. Breslauer, explore the parallelisms between the concept of stability as it is used in their respective fields. The workings of a cell or molecule are generally understood to be reducible to physics, but social and political events are thought to be structured by human agency and a generous helping of chance. However, both molecular systems and socio-political organizations can be said to exhibit stability, instability, or so-called “metastability,” a state of precarious and kinetic stability. For example, a chemical system can be metastable when molecules ...