While it’s known that sleep plays a crucial role in strengthening memory, scientists are still trying to decode how this process plays out in the brain overnight.  New research led by scientists at UCLA Health and Tel Aviv University provides the first physiological evidence from inside the human brain supporting the dominant scientific theory on how the brain consolidates memory during sleep. Further, the researchers found that targeted deep-brain stimulation during a critical time in the sleep cycle appeared to improve memory consolidation.  The research, published June 1 in Nature Neuroscience, ...

Children and young people naturally spend a large amount of their time at school, college or in other educational settings. Whilst most children with JIA are able to access education, many require adaptations or specific support to enable them to fully engage in learning. But families of children with JIA report lack of awareness and understanding, and believe that schools need special resources to be able to support these children and young people. In the UK, Juvenile Arthritis Research (JAR) has developed a toolkit to allow teachers and school staff to confidently support children with JIA, and the initial rollout was assessed ...

Janus kinase inhibitors (JAKi) and biologics are the cornerstone of modern treatment for rheumatoid arthritis (RA). But there have been concerns over long-term side effects. New data from a national healthcare database offer reassuring findings for overall cancers and cardiovascular disease (CVD). Patients with inflammatory rheumatic diseases have an increased risk of CVD compared to the general population.1 In acknowledgement of this, EULAR – the European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology – has published recommendations for cardiovascular risk management ...

Anxiety and depression are the mental health issues most commonly associated with inflammatory arthritis, and it is well-established that there is a link between mental health issues and poor health outcomes.2 The EULAR recommendations emphasize the need to assess mental health regularly;1 however, little is known about the association between self-management and mental health in people with inflammatory arthritis. At the 2023 EULAR congress, Vestergaard and colleagues report on their cross-sectional study in Denmark. This included 42,407 adult patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), psoriatic arthritis (PsA), or spondylarthritis (axSpA). The aim was to find ...

In this work, data from the UK Biobank were used to investigate the association of both individual and combined healthy lifestyle factors with the risk of all-cause and cause-specific mortality among 104,142 people with osteoarthritis. The researchers gave each person a score for their lifestyle, based on their body mass index (BMI) and self-reported diet, sleep duration, physical activity, sedentary time, social connection, smoking, and alcohol drinking – all factors thought to be associated with health. Overall, there were 9,915 deaths recorded after the first 2 years’ ...

Over the period 2018 – 2023, EULAR, the leading organisation in RMDs, has grown substantially and has been professionalised in every aspect. For example, EULAR has increased its impact on RMDs through the development of new services provided by the EULAR Research Centre (ERC). Despite the disruption of routine procedures brought about by the pandemic, EULAR overcame the substantial associated challenges, providing continued access to education and networking for the RMD community. “We have made tremendous progress by setting up two virtual congresses and one fully hybrid congress, and we have ...

The European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology (EULAR) is proud to announce the launch of RheumaFacts, an innovative and unique resource of facts and figures related to rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases (RMDs) across Europe. Strategically developed to support EULAR’s mission of reducing the impact of RMDs on individuals and society, RheumaFacts will serve as a powerful tool to provide healthcare professionals, researchers, policymakers, and patients with data-driven insights on the status of rheumatologic care across EULAR’s ...

The European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology (EULAR) has announced the launch of the EULAR Impact of RMDs Survey, an online questionnaire targeted directly at RMD patients. The data collected through this survey will be an important resource for researchers, healthcare professionals, and patients alike, providing a comprehensive database of patient-reported outcomes on their healthcare situation, and how the illness affects their social and occupational lives. By collecting and analysing data from a large number of patients with RMDs on a recurring basis, the survey will provide valuable insights into the burden of disease and help improve the overall care for people living with ...

Rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases (RMDs) include over 200 diseases that affect over 120 million Europeans of all ages. Aside from the significant direct impact RMDs have on patients, many of them also pose a further significant risk to the population by virtue of accelerating many comorbidities if the RMD is not treated appropriately. The most significant comorbidities of inflammatory RMDs include cardiovascular disease, lung disease, cancers, gastrointestinal disease, and mental health disorders.[1] Many of these comorbidities are prioritised by the EU as key non-communicable ...

LOS ANGELES – June 1, 2023 – Stand Up To Cancer® (SU2C) and Pancreatic Cancer North America (PCNA) today announced that PCNA will contribute $1.5 million to SU2C in support of critically needed research focused on pancreatic cancer, which has the highest mortality rate of all major cancers.      One of the projects supported by PCNA will include a correlative study that analyzes data from a previous Phase 1 clinical trial conducted by a Research Team funded through the SU2C Convergence program and led by researchers at Memorial ...

The University of California San Diego’s vision is to be a student-centered, research-focused, service-oriented public university. There are countless examples across campus of the ways these three pillars are upheld, but it is unique to find all three incorporated at once. Now a new book on algae-based biodegradable plastics showcases student research and the monumental potential it has to change consumerism on a global scale. Statistics on the environmental damage of plastics are stark: in 2018, U.S. landfills received 27 million tons of plastic (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency); ...

Five leading cancer research organizations in the United States are jointly announcing the start of patient enrollment in Molecular Analysis for Combination Therapy Choice (ComboMATCH), a unique, precision medicine initiative to test new combinations of cancer drugs guided by tumor biology. The Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology, Children's Oncology Group, ECOG-ACRIN Cancer Research Group, NRG Oncology, and SWOG Cancer Research Network plan to conduct many early-phase treatment trials through this platform in collaboration with the National Cancer Institute (NCI) National Clinical Trials Network (NCTN). NCI is part of ...

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, is a fatal motor neuron disease that causes people to gradually lose control of their muscles. There is no cure, and current treatments focus on reducing symptoms and providing supportive care. Reporting June 1 in the journal Cell Stem Cell, researchers from Japan show in an early clinical trial that the Parkinson’s disease drug ropinirole is safe to use in ALS patients and delayed disease progression by 27.9 weeks on average. Some patients were more responsive to ropinirole treatment than others, and the researchers ...

University of Washington researchers have discovered they can detect atomic "breathing," or the mechanical vibration between two layers of atoms, by observing the type of light those atoms emitted when stimulated by a laser. The sound of this atomic "breath" could help researchers encode and transmit quantum information.  The researchers also developed a device that could serve as a new type of building block for quantum technologies, which are widely anticipated to have many future applications in fields such as computing, ...

Philadelphia, June 1, 2023 – Researchers from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) recently discovered that extremely thorough “deep sequencing” of the genome in tissue samples and cell-free DNA of patients with potentially life-threatening vascular anomalies captured several genetic variants related to disease that were not captured with conventional genetic sequencing methods. More than 60% of patients saw an improvement in their condition after being placed on targeted therapies related to these newly found genetic variants. The findings were published today in the journal Nature Medicine. Vascular ...

A tiny Central American country is charting a path to slowing climate change, while boosting the economy and making communities safer. A new Stanford-led study quantifies the value of Belize’s coastal mangrove forests in terms of how much carbon they can hold, the value they can add to tourism and fisheries, and the protection they can provide against coastal storms and other risks. Importantly, the findings, published June 1 in Nature Ecology and Evolution, have already provided a basis for Belize’s commitment to protect or restore additional mangrove forests totaling an area about the size ...

About The Study: In this study using smart thermometers to measure within-household transmission at a national scale, researchers discerned an important role for children in the spread of viral infection within households during the COVID-19 pandemic, heightened when schools were in session, supporting a role for school attendance in COVID-19 spread.  Authors: Kenneth D. Mandl, M.D., M.P.H., of Boston Children’s Hospital, is the corresponding author.  To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/  (doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.16190) Editor’s ...

About The Study: The use of race-neutral reference equations to interpret pulmonary function tests resulted in a significant increase in the number of Black individuals with respiratory impairments along with a significant increase in the severity of the identified impairments. More work is needed to quantify the effect these reference equations would have on diagnosis, referral, and treatment patterns.  Authors: Alexander T. Moffett, M.D., of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, is the corresponding author.  To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website ...

About The Study: The efficacy and safety observed in this randomized clinical trial suggest that low-dose atropine may provide a treatment option for childhood myopia progression. Authors: Karla Zadnik, O.D., Ph.D., of the Ohio State University College of Optometry in Columbus, is the corresponding author. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/  (doi:10.1001/jamaophthalmol.2023.2097) Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial ...

The accuracy of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) screening for prostate cancer can be improved by accounting for genetic factors that cause changes in PSA levels that are not associated with cancer, according to a multi-center study led by UC San Francisco and Stanford University. In a study publishing June 1, 2023 in Nature Medicine, UCSF researchers and their collaborators conducted a large genome-wide association study of PSA in more than 95,000 men without diagnosed prostate cancer, which identified over 80 novel PSA-associated variants. They set ...

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has launched a large precision medicine cancer initiative to test the effectiveness of treating adults and children with new drug combinations that target specific tumor alterations. Known as the Combination Therapy Platform Trial with Molecular Analysis for Therapy Choice (ComboMATCH), the initiative is the largest of its kind to test combinations of cancer drugs guided by tumor biology. The endeavor aims to identify promising treatments that can advance to larger, more definitive clinical ...

Image To prevent a global health crisis, scientists around the world are searching for ways to fight bacteria that can evade the current arsenal of antibiotics.   A promising target for new and improved antibiotics are riboswitches, small stretches of RNA that regulate a process necessary for the production of proteins by the bacterial cell. Riboswitches are found almost exclusively in bacteria and could be targeted with antibiotics so that animals or humans are unaffected. With a full understanding of how riboswitches work, researchers may be able to develop drugs that disrupt the cellular machinery ...

Thursday 1st June: Dr Philip Cardiff, Associate Professor at University College Dublin's School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, has received a European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator grant of €2 million for his 5-year project XenoSim. With the support of this award, Dr Cardiff will develop advanced computational techniques that can provide unprecedented insights into the cutting-edge realm of pig-to-human heart transplants ERC Consolidator Grants are awarded to help excellent scientists, ...

Brussels, 1 June 2023 – Today, the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) is excited to share the publication of the first consensus paper by the SISAQOL-IMI Consortium1. The paper provides an overview of the stakeholders’ views on the need for SISAQOL-IMI and the agreed priority set of patient-reported outcome (PRO) objectives that the Consortium will produce international consensus-based recommendations on. The Setting International Standards in Analysing ...

New Curtin University research has identified the most carbon-rich soils in Australia are in areas that are most threatened by human activities and climate change, including Eucalypt and mangrove forests, and woodland and grassland areas that cover large parts of the country’s interior. Lead researcher Dr Lewis Walden from Curtin’s Soil & Landscape Science in the School of Molecular and Life Sciences said the findings highlighted the need to protect key terrestrial and coastal marine ecosystems, which play an important contributing role in national strategies to mitigate climate change. “Using multiscale machine ...