The extension was associated with a monthly fall in the rate of heart attacks, with older people and men benefitting the most from the move. Second-hand smoke exposure is responsible for 1.3 million annual deaths around the globe, many of which are caused by heart attacks, note the researchers.  But the existing evidence on the health benefits of comprehensive smoke-free laws, which many countries (67 since 2003) have implemented, is largely confined to indoor smoking bans rather than those for housing estates and outdoor spaces, they say.  In 2013 Singapore extended smoke-free legislation ...

Relationship patterns among flightless stick insects suggest that birds disperse the eggs after eating gravid females. Lab experiments previously suggested the possibility, but a new genetic analysis of natural populations in Japan by Kobe University researchers now supports the idea. Most species of stick insects are flightless, yet they are distributed over wide distances and across geographical features that would impede the expansion of flightless animals. This has caused researchers to speculate that their eggs might be dispersed by birds feeding on gravid females, much in the same way as many plant species rely on birds eating their seeds together ...

An international research team led by Prof. ZHANG Huaqiao from the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (NIGPAS) has reported the discovery of extraordinary early Cambrian (ca. 535 million years ago, or Ma) microfossils preserving the introvert musculature of cycloneuralians, a group of animals that include roundworms, horsehair worms, mud dragons, and many other creatures. The discovery added fleshy insights into early Cambrian cycloneuralians, which are closely related to arthropods, the most successful animals on Earth. The ...

Zinc is an important element that is found widely in biological systems, is cheap to manufacture relative to other metals, and has low toxicity. However, unlike other similar metals that exhibit a variety of vibrant colors in metal complexes, seeing different colors for zinc materials was not thought possible. In a study published recently in Angewandte Chemie International Edition, researchers from the Institute of Industrial Science, The University of Tokyo, have synthesized a complex with two zinc ions that does exhibit color—greatly expanding the ...

(Wednesday, 11 October 2023, Berlin, Germany) Non-melanoma skin cancer (NMSC) is causing a greater number of global deaths than melanoma, the more serious form of skin cancer, a new study presented today at the European Academy of Dermatology and Venerology (EADV) Congress 2023 has found.1,2 Researchers also believe that NMSC is underreported and that the true impact of this disease may be even higher than estimated.3 Professor Thierry Passeron, lead author of the study, explains, “Although NMSC is less likely to be fatal than melanoma skin cancer, its prevalence is strikingly higher. In 2020, NMSC accounted for 78% of ...

Fat tissue, for as much as it’s been vilified, is an incredibly complex and essential bodily organ involved in energy storage and hormone production, among other functions. Yet, modern lifestyles have led to a worldwide epidemic of obesity, and a corresponding increase in related conditions like type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Researchers are attempting to uncover the basics of how fat tissue is structured and, specifically, inflammation associated with obesity, in the hopes of unlocking the connection between the accumulation of fat and poor health outcomes. A new study from Lindsey Muir, Ph.D., Ph.D.-candidate Cooper Stansbury, and their colleagues ...

LAWRENCE — Bringing an idea from a lab to patients and consumers can be a complicated and intimidating process involving patents, governmental regulations, product development, business structuring, hiring issues and many more complex considerations. Now, a $3 million initiative based at the University of Kansas will empower biomedical researchers in public universities and colleges across several Plains states to carry their innovations to the marketplace. The effort involves both a private firm based at KU Innovation Park, Continuum Educational Technologies PBC, and KU researchers working under a new $3 million grant from ...

New Haven, Conn. — Immune cells play a key role during pregnancy, adjusting immune system response in a way that enables the fetus to develop while also protecting the parent and fetus from outside assaults like viruses. In a new study, Yale researchers found that a particular protein found throughout the body plays a major role in this important immune system modulation, affecting placental health early in pregnancy. The findings, they say, could lead to new treatments for reproductive conditions in the future. The study, led by Yale School of Medicine’s Reshef Tal, was published Oct. 10 in the journal JCI Insight. A human fetus contains ...

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell researchers have developed a new optimization tool to estimate motion throughout an input video, which has potential applications in video editing and generative AI video creation. The tool, called OmniMotion, is described in a paper, “Tracking Everything, Everywhere, All at Once,” presented at the International Conference on Computer Vision, Oct. 2-6 in Paris. “There are these two dominant paradigms in motion estimation – optical flow, which is dense but short range, and feature tracking, which is sparse but long range,” said Noah ...

BOSTON – When cancer screening in a patient reveals an abnormal test result, prompt follow-up is critical so that further tests can be conducted, and if needed, treatment can be initiated as soon as possible. Numerous barriers to such follow-up exist, however. A recent clinical trial led by investigators at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), a founding member of Mass General Brigham (MGB), has demonstrated promising results for a multilevel intervention including an automated reminder in patients’ electronic health records (EHRs) and patient outreach efforts to improve the rates of ...

Scientists at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine have discovered a tuberculosis (TB) vaccination strategy that could prevent the leading cause of death among people worldwide living with HIV. The results, published this week in Nature Microbiology, showed that, when given intravenously, the only commercially available vaccine against TB successfully and safely prevents lung infection in monkeys infected with the simian, or primate, form of HIV, called SIV. This is despite the vaccine being contraindicated for people living with HIV. “What is really exciting about this study is that, for ...

The Milky Way is often depicted as a flat, spinning disk of dust, gas, and stars. But if you could zoom out and take an edge-on photo, it actually has a distinctive warp — as if you tried to twist and bend a vinyl LP. Though scientists have long known through observational data that the Milky Way is warped and its edges are flared like a skirt, no one could explain why. Now, Harvard astronomers at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard and Smithsonian (CfA) have performed the first ...

One produces richly detailed interpretations of Black America’s past and present, the other pathbreaking technologies that further understanding of gene expression. Today, two professors in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences were named as recipients of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s 2023 “genius grant.” Imani Perry, the Henry A. Morss Jr. and Elisabeth W. Morss Professor of Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality and of African and African American Studies, is a multidisciplinary thinker recognized for her fresh insights on the resilience and beauty of Black American cultural expressions. Jason ...

People who carry three gene variants that have bene inherited from Neanderthals are more sensitive to some types of pain, according to a new study co-led by UCL researchers. The findings, published in Communications Biology, are the latest findings to show how past interbreeding with Neanderthals has influenced the genetics of modern humans. The researchers found that people carrying three so-called Neanderthal variants in the gene SCN9A, which is implicated in sensory neurons, are more sensitive to pain from skin pricking after prior exposure to mustard oil. Previous research ...

LAWRENCE — Hurricanes, floods, heat waves and other disasters are striking the United States with increased severity and frequency, and since 2000 the Federal Disaster Mitigation Act has required states and local jurisdictions to have plans in place to reduce damages from such events. A new study from the University of Kansas has found little improvement over time to these plans, in spite of regularly required updates. Plans to mitigate risk from natural hazards hold the potential to help states and local communities proactively steer development into safer areas and reduce exposure of existing housing, businesses, roads and other vital assets. ...

SAN ANTONIO — October 10, 2023 —Southwest Research Institute’s Dr. Simone Marchi collaborated on a new study finding the first geophysically plausible scenario to explain the abundance of certain precious metals — including gold and platinum — in the Earth’s mantle. Based on the simulations, or model, scientists found that impact-driven mixing of mantle materials scenario that could prevent the metals from completely sinking into the Earth’s core. Early in its evolution, about 4.5 billion years ago, Earth sustained an impact with a Mars-sized planet, and the Moon formed from the resulting debris ejected ...

Fragile X syndrome, the most common form of inherited intellectual disability, may be unfolding in brain cells even before birth, despite typically going undiagnosed until age 3 or later. A new study published today in the journal Neuron by researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison showed that FMRP, a protein deficient in individuals with fragile X syndrome, has a role in the function of mitochondria, part of a cell that produces energy, during prenatal development. Their results fundamentally change how scientists understand the developmental origins of fragile ...

In 2015, the United Nations created the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to achieve by 2030. With only seven years to go, the world is not on track to meet the goal of eliminating child marriage and other forms of violence against women and girls.  Child marriage has been linked with negative reproductive and mental health outcomes.  Although there have been some improvements around the world toward the UN goal, progress towards reducing child marriage has been uneven and stagnant, particularly in fragile states where ...

DENVER — Clinicians and researchers at National Jewish Health studied COVID vaccine effectiveness in patients with underlying lung conditions such as asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and interstitial lung disease (ILD). Findings show that nearly half of respiratory patients have lower vaccine-specific antibody, B cell, and T cell responses compared to healthy individuals. Decreased immunity to the vaccine suggests that patients with underlying lung conditions may be less protected against COVID-19. Understanding why they aren’t responding can give doctors a chance to treat patients differently. “Most ...

Humans can make abstract choices independent of motor actions, but in lab tasks, choices are typically reported with an associated action; this study shows that the human brain encodes perceptual choices independently of the specific motor actions used to implement them, even if such abstraction is not required by the task context. ##### In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Biology: http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3002324 Article Title: Abstract perceptual choice signals during action-linked decisions in the human brain Author Countries: Germany Funding: ...

BATON ROUGE – Five Pennington Biomedical Research Center faculty members and one adjunct professor rank among the most cited researchers in the world, according to the Google Scholar Citations database. The database shows 5,882 scholars across the world have an h-index at or above 100. The h-index is a gauge of productivity and the impact of published papers. The index takes into account the researcher’s total number of papers and how many times each was cited by other scholars. An h-index over 100 means that at least ...

In a University of Massachusetts Amherst study recently published in PLOS ONE, researchers explored and described gender differences in HIV-related stigma and social support among people living with HIV (PLHIV) experiencing food insecurity in the Dominican Republic. “Men’s experience of stigma were subtler and women described outright rejection and instances of physical violence, including intimate partner violence,” says lead author and postdoctoral researcher Alane Celeste-Villalvir. For people living with HIV, stigma associated with the disease continues to be a significant ...

Over the past 15 years, the Chinese government has made significant efforts to promote innovation-driven growth through industrial policy and corporate subsidies. In a new study, researchers examined government subsidies to businesses in China to determine whether they are making firms more productive. The study found that China’s rising wave of subsidizing businesses has had limited effect on promoting the firms’ productivity. The study, by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) and ShanghaiTech University, appears in the Journal of Comparative Economics. “Many countries have criticized China ...

In September 2023, extreme rains struck South Africa’s Western Cape province, flooding villages and leaving a trail of destruction. The catastrophic devastation is just one recent example in a string of extreme weather events that are growing more common around the world. Fueled by rising sea surface temperatures from global warming, torrential storms are increasing both in frequency and magnitude. Concurrently, global warming is also producing the opposite effect in other instances, as a mega-drought recently threatened the water supply of Cape Town in southwestern Africa to the point where residents were at risk of running out of water. This one-two punch of weather extremes ...

INDIANAPOLIS— The Indiana University Melvin and Bren Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center was awarded a prestigious grant to train the next generation of cancer drug discovery and development researchers. Known as a T32 grant, the five-year, $794,000 National Cancer Institute award will establish the Pediatric and Adult Translational Cancer Drug Discovery and Development Training Program (PACT-D3). The award supports three graduate fellows annually, with the cancer center adding to the grant to support an additional two students. “This training ...