WASHINGTON—Pediatric endocrinologists are concerned for their safety and their ability to provide evidenced-based care to transgender and gender-diverse adolescents amid political divides over gender-affirming care, according to a new paper published in the Journal of the Endocrine Society. Pediatric endocrinologists specialize in the care of children and adolescents with disorders related to hormones and the glands that produce them, such as diabetes and disorders of growth, thyroid or puberty. Some pediatric endocrinologists also provide gender-affirming care as part of their medical practice. Among youth ages 13 to 17 in the United States, 1.4% identify as transgender, ...

Scientists are looking to plant tissues that are capable of motion to inspire the design and fabrication of artificial actuators. These bioinspired actuators hold significant potential in applications, such as soft robotics, prosthetics, and smart biomedical devices. A research team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences has published a perspective paper focusing specifically on the ways plants regulate their motion speed and how this might be applied with artificial actuators.   Their paper is published in the journal Nano Research on September 18.   These artificial actuators, that are responsive to humidity, solvents, heat, light, and electricity, ...

A research group from the Graduate School of Medicine and Research Institute of Environmental Medicine at Nagoya University reported that cholesterol accumulation in macrophages promotes liver fibrosis in the development of non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). Using a unique supramolecule, they removed cholesterol in a mouse model, stopping the development of the disease. As cholesterol crystals are also found in human patients, this suggests a potential treatment for the disease. Their findings were published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.     As the number of patients with ...

The rapid advancements in flexible electronic technology have led to the emergence of innovative devices such as foldable displays, wearables, e-skin, and medical devices. These breakthroughs have created a growing demand for flexible adhesives that can quickly recover their shape while effectively connecting various components in these devices. However, conventional pressure-sensitive adhesives (PSAs) often face challenges in achieving a balance between recovery capabilities and adhesive strength. In an extraordinary study conducted at UNIST, researchers have successfully synthesized new types of urethane-based crosslinkers that address this critical challenge. Led by Professor Dong Woog ...

The Resilience Justice Project (RJ Project) at the University of Louisville’s Brandeis School of Law has been awarded a one-year multi-institutional grant through a national competitive process to evaluate how climate adaptation planning can be more equitable for low-income communities in eight U.S. coastal areas. The RJ Project will use the $75,000 award from the National Sea Grant Law Center through NOAA’s National Coastal Resilience Fund to examine coastal urban adaptation in the eight cities: Boston, Cleveland, Miami, New Orleans, San Diego, Savannah, Seattle and Tampa. Principal ...

Technological progress can reduce the energy required to achieve the same ends, reducing the use of fossil fuels and the greenhouse gases associated with burning fossil fuels. But technological progress can also make production, consumption, and travel cheaper, stimulating demand and consequently increasing greenhouse gas emissions. Sai Liang and colleagues sought to explore this conundrum by building an environmentally extended general equilibrium model with heterogeneous agent and input-output network covering 141 nations and 65 sectors, ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – It turns out yogurt may have a previously unknown benefit: eliminating garlic odors. A new study conducted in a lab – with follow-up human breath tests being planned – showed that whole milk plain yogurt prevented almost all of the volatile compounds responsible for garlic’s pungent scent from escaping into the air. Researchers tested the garlic deodorizing capacity of yogurt and its individual components of water, fat and protein to see how each stood up to the stink. Both fat and protein were effective at trapping garlic odors, leading the scientists to suggest high-protein ...

Researchers led by Yuko Motizuki from the Astro-Glaciology Laboratory at the RIKEN Nishina Center in Japan have developed a new laser-based sampling system for studying the composition of ice cores taken from glaciers. The new system has a 3-mm depth-resolution—about 3 times smaller than what is currently available—meaning that it can detect temperature variations that occurred over much smaller periods of time in the past. The new laser melting sampler, or LMS, is expected to help reconstruct continuous annual temperature changes that occurred thousands to hundreds of thousands of years ago, which will ...

PULLMAN, Wash. -- Scientists have found a plant gene that drives the growth of root hairs, the tiny structures that help plants find water and nutrients in the soil. Identified by a team led by Washington State University researcher Karen Sanguinet, the gene, dubbed “BUZZ,” causes faster-growing, denser webs of roots and may also determine how plants find and use nitrates, a prime source of nitrogen essential to plant growth. Nitrates are also used in fertilizers that can pollute the environment as runoff, and this genetic discovery could ultimately help plant scientists find ways to grow crops more sustainably. “Nitrate ...

Research Highlights: Men exposed to stressful working conditions who also felt that they put forth high effort but received low reward had twice the risk of heart disease compared to men who were free of those psychosocial stressors. The impact of job strain and effort-reward imbalance combined was similar to the magnitude of the impact of obesity on the risk of coronary heart disease, in the study of nearly 6,500 white-collar workers in Canada.  Results on how work stress affects women’s heart health were inconclusive. Embargoed ...

How does pedagogical authority operate in the classroom? A team from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and the University of Teacher Education, State of Vaud (HEP Vaud) has produced one of the first in-depth field studies on this subject. By filming teachers in training over a period of several months, the researchers identified different ways of exercising teaching authority and assessed their effectiveness. They found that strategies based on double addressing - i.e. addressing several students or groups of students simultaneously, using two different communication channels - were particularly effective. These results ...

While both men and women have historically been accused of the malicious use of magic, only around 10–30% of suspected witches were men by the 16th and 17th centuries.*   This bias towards women is often attributed to misogyny as well as economic hard times. Now, a Cambridge historian has added another contributing factor to the mix.   Dr Philippa Carter argues that the types of employment open to women at the time came with a much higher risk of facing allegations of witchcraft, or maleficium. In a study published in the journal Gender & History, Carter uses the casebooks of Richard ...

The climate crisis is reaching unprecedented levels of urgency as global temperatures soar to record-breaking heights, with July 2023 marking another alarming milestone. United Nations Secretary-General  António Guterres  declared it a "disaster for the whole planet," emphasizing that the era of "global warming" has given way to an era of "global boiling." This alarming assessment is supported by recent findings from Professor Qingxiang Li 's team at the School of Atmospheric ...

ROCKVILLE, Md.—Even though epidemiological evidence has been controversial regarding the optimal timing of physical activity for weight management, the hours of 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. appear to be the most favorable time of day to enhance the association between daily moderate to vigorous physical activity and obesity, according to a new analysis published in Obesity, The Obesity Society’s (TOS) flagship journal. “Our study provided a novel tool to explore the diurnal pattern of physical activity and to investigate its impact on health outcomes,” said Tongyu Ma, PhD, assistant professor, Health Sciences Department, Franklin Pierce University, Rindge, ...

Korea Electrotechnology Research Institute (KERI) and Research Institutes of Sweden AB (RISE) have officially entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) aimed at enhancing collaborative research in the field of national strategic technologies. The signing ceremony took place at RISE in Stockholm, Sweden on Friday, September 15, 2023.   RISE, recognized as Europe’s largest state-owned research institute, is composed of 30 private and government-funded research institutes, along with more than 130 government-designated testing agencies. It also boasts a workforce ...

New Haven, Conn. — Yale researchers have shown that placental examination resulted in the accurate pathologic determination of more than 90% of previously unexplained pregnancy losses, a discovery that they say may inform pregnancy care going forward. The findings were reported Sept. 19 in the journal Reproductive Sciences. There are approximately 5 million pregnancies per year in the United States, with 1 million ending in miscarriage (a loss occurring prior to 20 weeks of gestation) and over 20,000 ending in stillbirth at or beyond 20 ...

The Vilsmeier reagent is necessary for producing a large range of pharmaceuticals, but its unstable nature and toxic precursor phosgene are challenges for its use. A new process that efficiently produces phosgene, the Vilsmeier reagent and the desired products in one flow is poised to make the industry greener and safer. For the production of many active pharmaceutical ingredients, a chemical called Vilsmeier reagent is necessary, but it is extremely unstable. That's why it is produced on-site and on-demand wherever possible. In addition, the currently used methods for producing the ...

People who use both cannabis and tobacco have significantly higher rates of depression and anxiety than those who use either substance alone or not at all, according to a new study by UC San Francisco researchers. The study, published Sept. 13, 2023 in the online journal PLOS ONE, comes amid expanding legalization of cannabis products, resulting in more dual use with tobacco nationwide. Earlier studies relied on data collected before the legalization trend, prompting the need for a new analysis. Understanding the association between the use of both drugs and mental health ...

A new study from the Texas A&M University School of Public Health suggests that vaping increases the risk of asthma in adolescents who have never smoked conventional tobacco products. Vaping, or the use of electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes), among adolescents has grown dramatically over the past several years. Although e-cigarettes have fewer toxins than regular cigarettes, they still contain a mixture of harmful chemicals and raise the risk of respiratory diseases. In this new study, which was published in Preventive Medicine, researchers analyzed data from a national survey of youth to ...

Researchers at Lund University are publishing their findings in the prestigious journal Nature Aging. The marker in question is called DOPA decarboxylase (DCC). In the current study, DCC was found to be elevated in individuals with Parkinson's disease as well as in people with other diseases that result in dopamine deficiency in the brain. However, the marker was normal in other brain diseases such as Alzheimer's disease. The researchers even noticed that DCC was elevated in individuals with Parkinson's many years before they developed any symptoms. ”We ...

Images EAST LANSING, Mich. – Michigan State University researchers received a $12 million, four-year federal grant from the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity, or IARPA, under its Biometric Recognition and Identification at Altitude and Range, or BRIAR, program. The IARPA BRIAR program is a 48-month effort to deliver end-to-end software systems capable of detecting individuals at severe imaging conditions, extracting biometric signatures from the whole-body (such as an individual’s gait and/or body shape) and face, and fusing biometric information for robust multi-modal matching. The MSU project ...

When it comes to weight loss, nuts can get a bad rap – while they’re high in protein, they’re also high in fats, and this often deters those looking to shed a few kilos. But new research from the University of South Australia shows that you can eat almonds and lose weight too.   In the largest study of its kind, researchers found that including almonds in an energy restricted diet not only helped people to lose weight, but also improved their cardiometabolic health.   Examining the effects of energy restricted diets supplemented with Californian almonds or with carbohydrate- rich snacks, researchers found that both diets ...

Barcelona, Spain: People who come to emergency departments with alcohol-related diseases or conditions are more likely to make return visits and to die in the following 20 years, than people who come to emergency departments for other reasons, according to new research. For many, this means they may die in their 40s or 50s.   Professor Drew Richardson told the European Emergency Medicine Congress that he and his colleagues had followed 194 patients who had alcohol-related diagnoses when they arrived in the emergency department of The Canberra Hospital ...

PITTSBURGH—Today, William Sanders, dean of the College of Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, participated in a briefing at the United Nations. He was joined by Carnegie Mellon University Africa student Choukouriyah Arinloye. The event, “Artificial Intelligence for Accelerating Progress on the Sustainable Development Goals: Addressing Society’s Greatest Challenges,” was held as part of the 78th United Nations General Assembly and was hosted by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The event ...

MIAMI, FLORIDA (Sept. 18, 2023) – Thoracic surgeons and researchers at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine found that increasing numbers of patients undergoing cancer-removal lung surgery by “anatomic lung resections” – lobectomies or segmentectomies – are able to go home safely and without complications one day after the operation, thanks to growing rates of robot-assisted surgeries and improvements in patient-centered care protocols. However, the research team found, patients of lower socioeconomic status were considerably ...