Athletes may have more than twice the risk of irregular heart rhythm Younger athletes are at greater risk of atrial fibrillation than older athletes, say researchers Athletes appear to be almost two and half times more likely than non-athletes to experience irregular heart rhythms (atrial fibrillation), suggests new research published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. In addition, those athletes involved in mixed sports such as football, rugby or netball appear to have the highest risk when compared with athletes taking part in endurance sports such as Nordic skiing, orienteering or rowing. Previous ...

The burden of hospital admission rates due to heart attacks (myocardial infarctions) in England rose between 2012 and 2016, despite decades of falling rates, suggests new research published in the Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health. Researchers also found that after 2010-2011, rates increased in most age groups and young women aged 35 to 49 and even younger men aged 15 to 34 were the groups that showed the sharpest increases in hospitalisation rates for heart attacks in the last five years of the study. Death rates from coronary heart disease and heart attacks have been declining in England and other countries since the 1980s. Despite this, coronary heart disease is still a large cause of ...

A greater proportion of men than women exhibit bullying behaviours during medical training and academic practice, and only a minority of victims report their experiences, suggests new research published in the online journal BMJ Open. Previous studies have reported that bullying is common in medicine with likely impacts on mental health, professional interactions, and career advancement. Surveys from the UK's NHS have reported 55% of staff experienced bullying and around a third were doctors in training. The prevalence of academic bullying within medical ...

Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is a medically safe mental health intervention, according to a new study led by CAMH researcher Dr. Tyler Kaster as part of his doctoral studies at ICES and the University of Toronto. The study was published today in the journal The Lancet Psychiatry, and is among the largest and most comprehensive to compare the safety of ECT with standard treatment amongst individuals with depression. Multiple studies over a period of decades have confirmed the effectiveness of ECT as a mental health intervention for people with treatment-resistant depression. Up to 80 per cent of people with severe depression who receive ECT achieve remission. However, despite this success rate, only one per cent of people with severe depression ever ...

A single tree along a city street or in a backyard can provide measurable cooling benefits, according to a new study from American University. The research shows that "distributed" trees, those that are stand-alone and scattered throughout urban neighborhoods, can help to reduce evening heat. The research suggests that planting individual trees can be a strategy to mitigate urban heat, particularly in areas where land for parks can be scarce. "There are plenty of good reasons to plant trees, but our study shows we shouldn't underestimate the role that individual trees can play in mitigating heat in urban areas," said Michael ...

Highlights Patients with kidney failure did not report better experience with care from more frequent face-to-face visits with kidney specialists at dialysis facilities. In fact, more frequent visits were linked with slightly lower patient-reported experiences with kidney-related care. Washington, DC (July 12, 2021) -- In a recent analysis, more frequent kidney specialists' visits to clinics where patients with kidney failure undergo outpatient hemodialysis were not associated with more favorable patient-reported experiences with care. In fact, more frequent visits were associated with slightly lower patient-reported experiences. The findings will appear in an upcoming ...

Scientists have discovered a novel way to classify magnetized plasmas that could possibly lead to advances in harvesting on Earth the fusion energy that powers the sun and stars. The discovery by theorists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) found that a magnetized plasma has 10 unique phases and the transitions between them might hold rich implications for practical development. The spatial boundaries, or transitions, between different phases will support localized wave excitations, the researchers found. "These findings could lead to possible applications of these exotic excitations ...

Emotions towards and cultural importance of large carnivores are better predictors of the acceptance of management strategies by local communities than the extent of livestock depredation. This is the result of a new interdisciplinary investigation led by scientists from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW). They conducted 100 questionnaires with Maasai pastoralists in Ngorongoro Conservation Area, Tanzania, focusing on three large carnivore species (spotted hyenas, lions and leopards) and three management strategies (no action, relocation and lethal control). An emphasis on socio-cultural variables is key to ...

One of the most significant challenges in the global R&D effort towards better energy technologies -- efficient and accurate material simulation -- may be one step closer to being solved, based on new techniques released by UK-based quantum software startup Phasecraft. The new peer-reviewed study in the Physical Review B journal from the American Physical Society sets out a novel technique for modelling fermionic particles -- like electrons -- which significantly reduces the quantum hardware resources needed to perform simulations. Phasecraft's Joel Klassen, who co-led the study, explained, "One of the most exciting potential applications for quantum computing ...

LOWELL, Mass. - Researchers led by a UMass Lowell environmental science professor say mercury measurements in a Massachusetts forest indicate the toxic element is deposited in forests across the globe in much greater quantities than previously understood. The team's results underscore concern for the health and well-being of people, wildlife and waterways, according to Prof. Daniel Obrist, as mercury accumulating in forests ultimately runs off into streams and rivers, ending up in lakes and oceans. Mercury is a highly toxic pollutant that threatens fish, birds, mammals and humans. Hundreds of tons of it are ...

PITTSBURGH, July 12, 2021 - States that legalize recreational marijuana experience a short-term decline in opioid-related emergency department visits, particularly among 25- to 44-year-olds and men, according to an analysis led by the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health. Published today in the journal Health Economics, the study shows that even after the temporary decline wears off, recreational cannabis laws are not associated with increases in opioid-related emergency department visits. "This isn't trivial--a decline in opioid-related emergency department visits, even if only for six months, is a welcome public health development," said lead author Coleman Drake, Ph.D., assistant professor ...

MINNEAPOLIS - The American Academy of Neurology (AAN), the world's largest association of neurologists with more than 36,000 members, is issuing ethical guidance for neurologists and neuroscience professionals who care for people with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias. The new position statement is published in the July 12, 2021 online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. This update to the 1996 AAN position statement was developed by the Ethics, Law, and Humanities Committee, a joint committee of the American Academy of Neurology, American Neurological Association and Child Neurology Society. "Dementia care and scientific understanding have advanced considerably, including greater recognition of non-Alzheimer's dementias and advances ...

The Black Lives Matter movement has brought increasing attention to disparities in how police officers treat Black and white Americans. Now, research published by the American Psychological Association finds that disparity may exist even in subtle differences in officers' tone of voice when they address Black and white drivers during routine traffic stops. In the study, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, researchers gathered short audio excerpts from police body camera footage and found that when officers spoke to Black men at traffic stops, their tone of voice conveyed less warmth, respect and ease than when they spoke to white men. The researchers also found that these subtle negative interactions ...

INFORMS Journal Management Science Study Key Takeaways: Lack of direct airline routes limit the flexibility of organ transplantation policies. A new airline route can increase the number of kidneys shared between different regions by more than 7% while also decreasing the organ discard rate. An increase in the quantity of kidneys does not come with a decrease in kidney quality. CATONSVILLE, MD, July 12, 2021 - It's a supply and demand problem, it's a transportation problem, it's a donor problem - and that just scratches the surface. According ...

[Points] 319 Tb/s long-haul transmission of wideband (>120 nm) S, C and L-bands signal using 552 PDM-16QAM, wavelength-division multiplexed channels in a 4-core optical fiber Long-distance transmission over 3,001 km enabled by adoption of both erbium and thulium doped-fiber amplifiers and distributed Raman amplification Demonstration shows potential of SDM fibers with standard-cladding diameter and compatibility with existing cabling technologies for near-term adoption of high-throughput SDM fiber systems [Abstract] Researchers from the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT, President: TOKUDA ...

When we think about singularities, we tend to think of massive black holes in faraway galaxies or a distant future with runaway AI, but singularities are all around us. Singularities are simply a place where certain parameters are undefined. The North and South Pole, for example, are what's known as coordinate singularities because they don't have a defined longitude. Optical singularities typically occur when the phase of light with a specific wavelength, or color, is undefined. These regions appear completely dark. Today, some optical singularities, including ...

Los Alamos, N.M., July 12, 2021--For the first time, the long-theorized neutron-clustering effect in nuclear reactors has been demonstrated, which could improve reactor safety and create more accurate simulations, according to a new study recently published in the journal Nature Communications Physics. "The neutron-clustering phenomenon had been theorized for years, but it had never been analyzed in a working reactor," said Nicholas Thompson, an engineer with the Los Alamos Advanced Nuclear Technology Group. "The findings indicate that, as neutrons fission and create more neutrons, some go on to form large lineages of clusters while others quickly die off, resulting in so-called 'power tilts,' ...

(Boston)--Despite the availability of numerous effective birth control methods, more than 40 percent of pregnancies worldwide are unintended. In addition to contributing significantly to population growth, unintended pregnancies can have pronounced adverse effects on maternal physical, mental and economic wellbeing. Researchers from Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) and ZabBio (San Diego, CA) have developed an anti-sperm monoclonal antibody, the Human Contraception Antibody (HCA), which they found to be safe and possess potent sperm agglutination (clumping) and immobilization activity in laboratory tests. "HCA appears to be suitable for contraceptive use and could be administered vaginally in a dissolvable film for a ...

A research team from the University of Göttingen and the University of British Columbia (Canada) has investigated how people in five different countries react to various usages of genome editing in agriculture. The researchers looked at which uses are accepted and how the risks and benefits of the new breeding technologies are rated by people. The results show only minor differences between the countries studied - Germany, Italy, Canada, Austria and the USA. In all countries, making changes to the genome is more likely to be deemed acceptable when used in crops rather than in livestock. The study was published in Agriculture and Human Values. Relatively new breeding technologies, such as CRISPR gene editing, have enabled a range of new opportunities for plant and animal breeding. ...

The sensory cells in the inner ear and the touch receptors in the skin actually have a lot in common, according to a new study from the USC Stem Cell laboratory of Neil Segil published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences (PNAS). "There are striking similarities in the development of two types of specialized sensory cells: the so-called 'hair cells' that receive sound vibrations in the inner ear, and the Merkel cells that sense light touch at the surface of the skin," said Segil, who is a Professor in the Department of Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, and the USC Tina and Rick Caruso Department of Otolaryngology ...

The Lucinidae family, lucinids for short, comprises approximately 500 living species of bivalves. They are at least 400 million years old, according to fossil records, and have managed to colonize a wide variety of habitats, from beautiful beaches to the abyssal depths untouched by the sun over a kilometer below the sea surface. Their ability to thrive in a wide variety of habitats is made possible by their 'partner in crime', a sulfur-oxidizing bacterial symbiont that utilizes hydrogen sulfide, better known as 'rotten egg gas', as an energy source to power primary production. This process is not unlike photosynthesis used by plants, yet not dependent on sunlight, ...

BOSTON - By implementing a long-term, prospective approach to the development of celiac disease, a collaborative group of researchers has identified substantial microbial changes in the intestines of at-risk infants before disease onset. Using advanced genomic sequencing techniques, MassGeneral Hospital for Children (MGHfC) researchers, along with colleagues from institutions in Italy and the University of Maryland, College Park, uncovered distinct preclinical alterations in several species, pathways and metabolites in children who developed celiac disease compared to at-risk children who did not develop celiac disease. As part of the MGHfC Celiac Disease, Genomic, Microbiome and Metabolomic (CDGEMM) Study, researchers ...

Communities trying to fight sea-level rise could inadvertently make flooding worse for their neighbors, according to a new study from the END ...

Better treatments of HER2-positive breast cancer are closer at hand, thanks to new research by a team led by Université de Montréal professor Jean-François Côté at the cytoskeleton organization and cell-migration research unit of the UdeM-affiliated Montreal Clinical Research Institute. Published in PNAS, the journal of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the new research by Marie-Anne Goyette, a doctoral student in Côté's laboratory, reveals a highly promising therapeutic target to counter the HER2-positive breast cancer. In HER2-positive breast cancer, a gene called HER2 is expressed that promotes an aggressive form of the disease. Affecting 20 per cent of ...

ITHACA, N.Y. - Traces of the gas phosphine point to volcanic activity on Venus, according to new research from Cornell University. Last autumn, scientists revealed that phosphine was found in trace amounts in the planet's upper atmosphere. That discovery promised the slim possibility that phosphine serves as a biological signature for the hot, toxic planet. Now Cornell scientists say the chemical fingerprint support a different and important scientific find: a geological signature, showing evidence of explosive volcanoes on the mysterious planet. "The phosphine is not telling us about the biology ...