A study presents evidence that mitochondrial fragmentation is a proximal mechanism underlying ventilator-induced diaphragm dysfunction (VIDD)—and identifies a possible therapeutic to limit diaphragm atrophy during a stay in intensive care. Previous research has established that many of the cellular pathways responsible for VIDD are kicked off by oxidative stress stemming from diaphragm inactivity. Stefan Matecki and colleagues studied the molecular causes of this oxidative stress in mice. Just six hours on mechanical ventilation was enough to increase expression of dynamin-related protein 1 (DRP1), which is involved in mitochondrial ...

The “hygiene hypothesis” posits that allergic asthma can be triggered by a childhood environment that is too clean and sterile. One studied mechanism underlying this relationship is the influence of microbial lipopolysaccharides (LPS), which train the immune system. In the absence of LPS, Toll-like receptors in the human body will become more sensitive, which can lead to an exaggerated allergic response to triggers such as house dust mites. Mingliang Fang and colleagues explored how the environmental pollutant bisphenol ...

Losing summer snow patches may hit mountain goats hard, according to a study that suggests that goats seek out snow to avoid biting insects. Many cold-adapted species take advantage of patches of snow that linger through the summer, as corridors for travel, sources of drinking water, zones for cooling off, or places to play. As the climate changes, many species will have reduced access to snow patches. Forest Hayes and Joel Berger explored what this lack of summer snow might mean for mountain goats (Oreamnos americanus) in Glacier National Park, which has lost 85% of its glaciers since 1850. The team studied goats in the park—along with another population 1,000 ...

Obesity is a growing health problem that disproportionately affects people and communities with a low socio-economic position in Europe. Thanks to a Horizon grant worth more than 10 million euros, Jeroen Lakerveld, epidemiologist at Amsterdam UMC, is now set to lead a European consortium in better identifying the causes of obesity and designing guidelines to tackle the problem.     "Social and cultural factors play a role in our lifestyle behaviours but so do our genes and the environment in which we live and work. Residents of neighbourhoods are not equally exposed to unhealthy factors: ...

PULLMAN, Wash. – Invoking a sense of guilt—a common tool used by advertisers, fundraisers and overbearing parents everywhere—can backfire if it explicitly holds a person responsible for another’s suffering, a meta-analysis of studies revealed. While guilt is widely used to try and persuade people to act, research has been mixed on its effectiveness in spurring behavior change. This analysis, published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, found that overall guilt had only a small persuasive effect, which is in line with previous research. However, researchers uncovered that guilt worked better ...

Researchers have found that previous studies analyzing the genomes of people with European ancestry may have reported inaccurate results by not fully accounting for population structure. By considering mixed genetic lineages, researchers at the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health, demonstrated that previously inferred links between a genomic variant that helps digest lactose and traits such as a person’s height and cholesterol level may not be valid. The study, published in Nature Communications, shows that people with European ancestry, who were previously treated as a genetically homogenous group in large-scale genetic ...

More than 150 million women worldwide use oral contraceptives. Combined OCs (COCs), made up of synthetic hormones, are the most common type. Sex hormones are known to modulate the brain network involved in fear processes. Now a team of researchers in Canada has investigated current and lasting effects of COC use, as well as the role of body-produced and synthetic sex hormones on fear-related brain regions, the neural circuitry via which fear is processed in the brain. “In our study, we show that healthy women currently using COCs had a thinner ventromedial prefrontal cortex than men,” said Alexandra Brouillard, ...

Global warming caused by climate change could exacerbate the burden of inpatient mortality from respiratory diseases during the warm season. This is the main conclusion of a study led by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), a centre supported by the "la Caixa" Foundation, and published in The Lancet Regional Health - Europe. The results could help health facilities adapt to climate change. The research team analysed the association between ambient temperature and in-hospital mortality from respiratory diseases in the provinces of Madrid and Barcelona between 2006 and 2019. ...

Reading, writing and sharing poetry can help people cope with loneliness or isolation and reduce feelings of anxiety and depression, a new study shows. Research by the University of Plymouth and Nottingham Trent University, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, found that many people who took to sharing, discussing and writing poetry as a means to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic experienced “demonstrable positive impact on their wellbeing”. The findings are based on a survey of 400 people which showed that poetry helped those experiencing common mental health symptoms as well as those suffering from grief. It was carried out with registered users of the ...

UNDER STRICT EMBARGO UNTIL 19:01 (US ET) ON MONDAY 6TH NOVEMBER 2023 / 00:01AM (UK TIME) ON TUESDAY 7TH NOVEMBER 2023   Over 100 letters sent to French sailors by their fiancées, wives, parents and siblings – but never delivered – have been opened and studied for the first time since they were written in 1757-8. The messages offer extremely rare and moving insights into the loves, lives and family quarrels of everyone from elderly peasants to wealthy officer’s wives. The messages were seized by Britain’s Royal Navy during the Seven Years’ War, taken to the Admiralty in London ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – A new targeted drug, studied by researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James), may  offer  a new treatment option for patients with blood cancers, including chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and Non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) whose disease has stopped responding to standard treatments. In the first clinical trial of this drug in humans, nemtabrutinib ...

With its notoriously hot and humid climate and robust industrial environment, Houston is one of the most ozone-polluted cities in the United States. Now, a University of Houston research team is integrating the power of machine learning (ML) with innovative analysis techniques to pinpoint the city’s air pollution sources more accurately. While the ozone layer in the stratosphere protects the Earth, and us, from the harmful rays of the sun, it’s also a major pollutant that can be harmful to human health when it’s closer to the ground. Long-term exposure to surface ozone can cause difficulty breathing, worsen asthma and increase the ...

New Haven, Conn. — The mystery of Ezekiel’s Wheel — the extinct sea creature, not the Biblical vision — may have taken its final turn, thanks to Yale paleontologists. In so doing, the researchers have also finally put a scientific name to the favorite fossil of a beloved amateur fossil hunter. Samuel J. Ciurca Jr., who died in 2021, was a curatorial affiliate of the Yale Peabody Museum for many years. He collected tens of thousands of fossils, primarily from the Silurian rocks of upstate New York and southern Ontario, Canada. He donated more than 11,000 ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. – A new study at the University of Missouri — in partnership with Harvard-Smithsonian researchers — shows that when colleges host ‘STEM Career Days,’ the students who attend are far more likely to pursue a career in a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) related field. The findings not only highlight the benefits of college recruiters introducing high school students to STEM-related opportunities, but they can also help increase and diversify ...

NEW ORLEANS, La. – Chevron and Ochsner Health continue to offer their Lung Cancer Awareness, Education and Prevention Program for a third consecutive year thanks to a $50,000 donation from Chevron. The program will be offered in Jefferson Parish for the first time and continue to reach community members in St. Tammany, East Baton Rouge, West Baton Rouge, Ascension, St. Charles, Terrebonne, and Lafourche parishes. Ochsner Health and Chevron formed a key partnership for the Lung Cancer Awareness, Education and Prevention Program to improve lung health and overall wellness. ...

Embargoed for release until 5:00 p.m. ET on Monday 6 November 2023 Annals of Internal Medicine Tip Sheet @Annalsofim Below please find summaries of new articles that will be published in the next issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. The summaries are not intended to substitute for the full articles as a source of information. This information is under strict embargo and by taking it into possession, media representatives are committing to the terms of the embargo not only on their own behalf, but also on behalf of the organization they represent. ---------------------------- 1. Patients more likely to lose weight if physicians offer advice using optimistic tone   Abstract: ...

Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering, in collaboration with the National Energy Technology Laboratory, are among 11 projects in eight states selected to receive a combined $36 million to accelerate the development of marine carbon dioxide removal (mCDR) capture and storage technologies.   The funding from the U.S. Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) is part of the ARPA-E Sensing Exports of Anthropogenic Carbon Through Ocean ...

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Yabing Chen, Ph.D., has been awarded two National Institutes of Health grants totaling more than $5 million to further her research into vascular diseases ranging from hardening of the arteries to dementia. Vacuolar calcification, which leads to the hardening of blood vessels and increased vascular stiffness, is a hallmark of the aging process in the cardiovascular system. As early as the mid-1600s, physician Thomas Sydenham noted that “a man is as old as his arteries.” Chen expands that to include two different disease processes. “I like ...

Maternal mortality in the U.S. is on the rise and more than half of maternal deaths occur in the postpartum year. A study by Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health and the School of Social Work provides insights into the challenges that birthing people face in the year after birth - both medical and social - which could be drivers of postpartum morbidity and mortality. The study is the first large scale and representative survey of postpartum health ever conducted in the U.S. The findings ...

BOSTON – The alarming increase in firearm injuries to children and adolescents in the United States has taken an enormous mental and behavioral health toll on victims, survivors, and their families, with ripple effects on the economy and health care spending, researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Harvard Medical School (HMS) have found. In a study published in the November Issue Health Affairs, the team cited the substantial opportunities for improvements in clinical practice for survivors of gun violence and their family members, such as improved screening for mental and behavioral health needs, as well as enhanced educational programs for the ...

Since 2020, firearms have been the number one cause of death among children and teens in the United States, surpassing even car accidents, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In 2022 more than 4,500 young people died from firearm injuries. In addition to those who die, thousands more young people survive firearm injuries each year. The harm from these injuries reverberates for months and years, with ripple effects on parents and siblings, according to the findings of a new study published Nov. 6 in the November issue of Health Affairs. “The unspeakable ...

A nationwide Medicare program that aims to improve health care and reduce costs by linking health-care reimbursements to health quality and cost outcomes resulted in no improvements in mental health care, according to a study by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and the Yale School of Public Health. The study, which looked at a nationally representative sample of Medicare beneficiaries from 2016 to 2019, found no differences in mental health between Medicare beneficiaries who received their ...

Toronto, ON – A new study published in the journal Substance Use and Misuse finds that while user-generated content and advertising content related to illegal muscle-building drugs is prohibited across all social media platforms, legal muscle-building dietary supplements faced few restrictions. “These findings are concerning given that the use of muscle-building dietary supplements can have negative social and behavioral effects, which adolescents and young adults may be particularly susceptible to,” says lead author Kyle T. Ganson, PhD, MSW, assistant professor at the University of Toronto’s Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work. “There ...

The Society for Neuroscience and ARTECHOUSE are proud to present an adaptation of the immersive Life of a Neuron exhibition at American Possibilities: A White House Demo Day on November 7. White House Demo Day highlights more than 40 American innovations in science and technology, fueling our national potential and aspirations. These advances, supported by federal funding, aim to improve American lives and shape our collective future. The Life of a Neuron exhibition showcases how NIH-funded basic research, ...

During his long career, Oran Young has been a strong promoter of geopolitical attention to the Arctic. He is a leader in studies of international governance and environmental institutions, and the world's foremost expert on these themes in the Arctic. As a political scientist and environmental researcher, he is recognized for his interdisciplinary research on international institution building, resource management and the human dimension of climate change in the Arctic. – Being selected to receive the 2024 Mohn Prize is an exceptional honour. For me, it’s the capstone of 50 years of active engagement in Arctic affairs, Oran Young says. The Rector ...