Michelle Kidder, a senior R&D staff scientist at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has received the American Chemical Society’s Energy and Fuels Division’s Mid-Career Award for sustained and distinguished contributions to the field of energy and fuel chemistry. She was recognized for her scientific community service, leadership and contributions. Her research focuses on novel material development, methods and advanced characterizations for the separation and reaction chemistry of renewable energy resources including lignin and carbon dioxide.   Kidder, ...

Subho Mukherjee, an R&D associate in the Vehicle Power Electronics Research group at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been elevated to the grade of senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, or IEEE. Senior IEEE members have made significant contributions to the profession and worked in the engineering field for 10 years or more. As an electrical engineer, Mukherjee focuses on wireless power charging and developing wide bandgap semiconductor-based ...

Researchers from the Cluster of Excellence Centre for the Advanced Study of Collective Behaviour (CASCB) and the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior have converted a former barn into a cutting-edge technology lab for complex behavioral analysis. In it, they can now study the intricate behaviour of animal groups. The barn also served as a prototype for the largest swarm behaviour lab at the University of Konstanz: the Imaging Hangar. A major limitation in behavioural research is that scientists can either study animals under highly-controlled, yet often unrealistically simplified and ...

When fighting disease, our immune cells need to reach their target quickly. Researchers at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) now discovered that immune cells actively generate their own guidance system to navigate through complex environments. This challenges earlier notions about these movements. The researchers’ findings, published in the journal Science Immunology, enhance our knowledge of the immune system and offer potential new approaches to improve human immune ...

Scientists at CeMM, Max Perutz Labs, and St. Anna Children’s Cancer Research Institute in Vienna have achieved a significant advancement in the research of rare immune system disorders. Through a network-based approach, they have reclassified approximately 200 rare diseases. Initial comparisons with clinical data already demonstrate how this can enhance the prediction of treatment efficacy. Moreover, the study reveals for the first time the strong similarities between the molecular mechanisms of rare diseases and ...

Increased withdrawals of groundwater resources are accelerating groundwater depletion rates in India, a groundwater depletion hotspot, a new study finds. The study, published today in the journal Science Advances, is led by University of Oklahoma Department of Geography and Environmental Sustainability assistant professor Nishan Bhattarai. Bhattarai and his collaborators found that under a business-as-usual scenario of groundwater use for irrigation, warming may triple the groundwater depletion rates. Approximately 60% of India’s irrigated agriculture depends on the threatened groundwater. The results of the study indicate that adaptation ...

EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE AT 2 P.M. ET FRIDAY, SEPT. 1, 2023 Photos ANN ARBOR—A new University of Michigan-led study finds that farmers in India have adapted to warming temperatures by intensifying the withdrawal of groundwater used for irrigation. If the trend continues, the rate of groundwater loss could triple by 2080, further threatening India's food and water security. Reduced water availability in India due to groundwater depletion and climate change could threaten the livelihoods of more than one-third of the country's 1.4 billion ...

SAN ANTONIO (Sept. 1, 2023) — What initiates chemical intolerance (CI)? In a newly released survey of thousands of U.S. adults, respondents most frequently cited exposures to biological sources, such as mold and algae “blooms,” and/or fossil fuels, their combustion products and synthetic chemical derivatives such as pesticides, plastics and persistent organic pollutants.  It's an issue in the news, as toxic mold spawned by the moisture left behind by flood waters from Hurricane ...

East Hanover, NJ – September 1, 2023 – Labor Day weekend brings more good news for people with disabilities, with record-breaking highs for labor force participation and employment-to-population ratio, according to today’s National Trends in Disability Employment – semi-monthly update (nTIDE), issued by Kessler Foundation and the University of New Hampshire’s Institute on Disability (UNH-IOD). In comparison, both indicators declined slightly for people without disabilities.  Month-to-Month nTIDE Numbers (comparing July 2023 to August 2023) Based on data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Jobs Report released ...

New Haven, Conn. — Health benefits that have resulted from reductions in fine particulate air pollution aren’t distributed equally among populations in the U.S., a new Yale-led study finds. Racial and ethnic minorities — and Black people in particular — still experience disproportionately high rates of cardiovascular disease-related deaths caused by exposure to fine particulate matter, according to the research. The findings were published Aug. 31 in Nature Human Behavior. Fine particulate matter, also known as PM2.5, consists of particles or droplets smaller than 2.5 micrometers in diameter, or ...

People without a secure job contract can reduce their risk of premature death by 20 per cent if they gain permanent employment, a study from Karolinska Institutet published in The Journal of Epidemiology and Community reports. According to the researchers, the results indicate that job security on the Swedish labour market needs to improve. Precarious employment is a term that is used to describe jobs with short contracts (e.g. temping), low wages and a lack of influence and rights, all of which lead to a working life without predictability and security. In the present study, the researchers have examined how this affects the risk of death. “This is ...

University of Alaska Fairbanks scientists will make several trips to Greenland over two years to study how meltwater and the ocean affect glacial ice loss.  The four-year research project, funded by a $565,000 National Science Foundation grant, will create a traveling museum exhibit about the drivers of Arctic climate change. The exhibit will appear first at the University of Alaska Museum of the North, likely in 2026. Ice loss from the polar ice sheets is the largest anticipated contributor to global mean-sea-level rise in the coming century. Scientists need to better understand glacier behavior to improve predictions of sea-level rise. At the study’s conclusion, ...

When the COVID-19 pandemic swept into New Mexico in the spring of 2020, seriously ill patients from all over the state were brought to The University of New Mexico Hospital in Albuquerque, where many wound up in intensive care, breathing with the help of ventilators. Early on, researchers from the UNM Center for Global Health launched a study of hospitalized patients to gauge the severity of symptoms from the infection, gathering data on 475 patients from April 2020 through December 2021. In paper published this week in PNAS Nexus, ...

New research by an international team of scientists explains what’s behind a stalled trend in Arctic Ocean sea ice loss since 2007. The findings indicate that stronger declines in sea ice will occur when an atmospheric feature known as the Arctic dipole reverses itself in its recurring cycle. The many environmental responses to the Arctic dipole are described in a paper published online today in the journal Science. This analysis helps explain how North Atlantic water influences Arctic Ocean climate. Scientists call it Atlantification. The research is led by professor Igor Polyakov of the University of Alaska Fairbanks College of ...

In a groundbreaking study published in Volume 17 of the journal Environmental Science and Ecotechnology, researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences introduced a landscape-oriented framework to assess ecological stability in China's Qingzang Plateau (QP). The QP demonstrated a medium-high stability level with minimal changes in recent years. Ecological stability involves understanding changes in ecosystem components over time, with two major concepts explored: systems close to equilibrium and non-equilibrium behavior. Despite lacking a consensus on the definition of "ecological stability", stability indices ...

New research from Lancaster University Management School (LUMS) unveils the extent of sustained exploitation within many Chinese families that have a clear preference for sons over daughters – and why daughters can stay ‘trapped’ in this situation throughout their lives. The new study explores Chinese families that have a strong preference for sons, where daughters are expected to make substantial financial or labour contributions to their parents before and after marriage– often to subsidise the schooling and living ...

Results of a multicenter phase II clinical trial led by the University of Chicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center show that adding an immunomodulatory agent to treatment with the targeted tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) cediranib did not make a difference in outcomes for treating patients with an advanced form of thyroid cancer that develops from thyroid follicular cells called differentiated thyroid cancer (DTC). The findings were published in Annals of Oncology on May 13, 2023. Most patients with DTC receive successful treatment. But a small group develops cancer that recurs or spreads to other parts of the body, making it hard to treat with traditional methods like ...

BOSTON – New research from Boston Medical Center found that providing pragmatic support, specifically rapid access to antiretroviral therapy, pharmacotherapy for opioid use disorder, and strengths-based case management, improved treatment outcomes for people with HIV who inject drugs in St. Petersburg, Russia. Published in The Lancet HIV, researchers from the Linking Infectious and Narcology Care – Part II (LINC-II) trial highlight that the odds of achieving viral load suppression at 12 months are 3 times higher for participants randomized to the intervention group. Russia ...

A study led by researchers at the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center sheds new light on why tumors that have spread to the brain from other parts of the body respond to immunotherapy while glioblastoma, an aggressive cancer that originates in the brain, does not. In people with tumors that originated in other parts of the body but spread to the brain, treatment with a type of immunotherapy called immune checkpoint blockade appears to elicit a significant increase in both active and exhausted T cells — signs that the T cells have been triggered to fight the cancer. The ...

Red blood cells exposed to oxygen deficiency protect against myocardial infarction, according to a new KI study published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. The study also shows that the protective effect is enhanced by a nitrate-rich vegetable diet. Red blood cells carry oxygen from the lungs to all of the body’s cells and carbon dioxide back to the lungs. A new study, conducted at Karolinska Institutet in collaboration with Karolinska University Hospital, now shows that red blood cells have an intrinsic function of protecting against ...

UMC Utrecht will lead an international consortium that will try to answer a key question that’s in the mind of many pediatricians, infectiologists, pulmonologists and other health professionals: “Why are children that had an RSV infection in early childhood at increased risk of developing asthma later in life?” The project - which will run for five years - is funded by a HORIZON HLTH 2023 grant from the European Commission of € 7 million. Chronic respiratory tract diseases such as asthma and COPD ...

Dozens of European cities could reach net zero carbon emissions over the next 10 years by incorporating nature into their infrastructure, according to a new study. Published recently in the journal, Nature Climate Change, the analysis shows the ways cities can orchestrate a wide range of green solutions like parks, streetscaping and roof gardens to not only capture carbon emissions, but help reduce them. The study was undertaken by researchers from Sweden, the U.S. and China. It recommends the most effective approaches for natural carbon sequestration in 54 cities in the EU. And it shows how blending these steps with other climate ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – As global ice dams begin to weaken due to warming temperatures, a new study suggests that prior attempts to evaluate the mass of the huge floating ice shelves that line the Antarctic ice sheet may have overestimated their thickness. The research, recently published in the Journal of Glaciology, is the first large-scale study of its kind to compare ice shelf thickness data from ice-penetrating radar measurements to thickness data estimated from contemporary surface elevation measurements. By juxtaposing vast datasets of 20 of the 300 ...

We are constantly exposed to phthalates in our environment through plastic products such as storage containers, medical devices, packages, fabrics, and toys. Specifically, di-isononyl phthalate is inevitably becoming a part of our lives. Unfortunately, the impact of DiNP on the establishment and maintenance of pregnancy is largely unknown. In a new study, researchers used mice to understand how DiNP affects pregnancy. “Although we finally recognize that environmental chemicals impact women's health, most studies have focused on men’s reproductive health and very few studies have looked at how these chemicals affect women,” said Jodi Flaws (EIRH co-leader/MME), ...

A program designed to ensure fairness and that people living in the most disadvantaged U.S. neighborhoods would be offered a scarce, potentially life-saving medication proved feasible in a large health system. The approach can improve equity in receipt of the drug by people disproportionately affected by disease, according to a new analysis published today in JAMA Health Forum by University of Pittsburgh and UPMC scientist-clinicians. However, the study revealed that more work needs to be done in building trust with and improving the ability to contact Black patients to ensure they ultimately receive scarce medications and other health care resources ...