Fractures in the vertebrae of the spine and calcification in a blood vessel called the abdominal aorta can both be visualized through the same spinal imaging test. A new study published in the Journal of Bone and Mineral Research that included 5,365 older men indicates that each of these measures are linked with a higher risk of developing hip and other fractures. Investigators found that including both measures compared with including only abdominal aortic calcification or only vertebral fractures improved the ability to predict which men were most likely to experience a hip or other fracture in the future. "Both abdominal aortic calcification ...

While play and playfulness have been studied well in children, their structure and consequences are understudied in adults. A new article published in Social and Personality Psychology Compass highlights available research on this topic and also examines why playfulness is important in romantic relationships. The authors note that playfulness encourages the experience of positive emotions and might relate to potential biological processes--such as the activation of hormones and certain brain circuits. It also influences how people communicate and interact with each other, for example by helping to deal with stress, and solving interpersonal tension. These can all impact relationship ...

Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), which involves passing electricity through the brain, remains a controversial psychiatric treatment for depression and other conditions because it can cause side effects such as memory loss and is ineffective for many patients. A recent study published in Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice has examined how ECT is currently administered and monitored throughout England. The study was based on data provided by 37 National Health Service Trusts' responses to requests under the Freedom of Information Act. The audit found that the dwindling use of ECT in England has levelled off at about 2,500 people per year. Most recipients are women and over 60 years old. Only one Trust could report ...

Scientists at UC San Francisco have detected 109 chemicals in a study of pregnant women, including 55 chemicals never before reported in people and 42 "mystery chemicals," whose sources and uses are unknown. The chemicals most likely come from consumer products or other industrial sources. They were found both in the blood of pregnant women, as well as their newborn children, suggesting they are traveling through the mother's placenta. The study will be published March 17, 2021, in Environmental Science & Technology. "These chemicals have probably been in people for quite some time, but our technology is ...

CLEVELAND, Ohio (March 17, 2021)--As women age, they are more likely to wake up in the middle of the night to pass urine. The loss of estrogen during the menopause transition accelerates this problem, which is known as nocturia. A new study evaluated the effectiveness of different hormone therapies in managing the frequency of nocturia. Study results are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The North American Menopause Society (NAMS). The loss of estrogen during menopause has been shown to create bladder dysfunction, sleep disorders, hot flashes, and alterations ...

According to a study conducted at the University of Helsinki, a raw diet from the late stages of suckling to roughly two months of age may reduce the prevalence of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in dogs later in life. In addition, a raw diet administered subsequently up to six months was found to have a positive effect. At the same time, the study indicates that feeding dry food to puppies early on in their lives can increase the incidence of IBD later in life. In addition to the diet, the maternal history of IBD as well as the dog's gender and age were associated ...

A recent study, affiliated with UNIST has unveiled a novel system, capable of producing hydrogen and electricity quickly and effectively while eliminating carbon dioxide (CO?) emissions significantly. Published in the January 2021 issue of Nano Energy, this breakthrough has been carried out by Professor GunTae Kim and his research team in the School of Energy and Chemical Engineering at UNIST. In this study, the research team succeeded in developing a membrane-free aqueous metal-CO? battery. Unlike the existing aqueous metal-CO? systems, the new battery is not only easier to manufacture, but also allows continuous operation with one type of electrolyte. The research team designed ...

Philadelphia, March 17, 2021 - As high school athletes return to practice and games for a variety of sports, the threat of concussions remains. A new study from researchers at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) used head impact sensors in four different sports and studied male and female athletes to determine which of these sports put students at the highest risk for head impacts that could lead to concussions. The findings were published online by the Orthopaedic Journal of Sports Medicine. "Adolescents are particularly vulnerable to concussion because they frequently participate in sporting and recreational activities and have slower recovery periods compared to adults," said Kristy Arbogast, PhD, senior ...

It's a fact - humans love sugar. For those of us who also like to watch our calories, sugar substitutes can help. Some zero-calorie or low-calorie sweeteners have attracted bad reputations for containing unnatural ingredients. But there are also natural sweeteners derived from plants, like stevia. Stevia is hundreds of times sweeter than sugar, and it has no calories. The global stevia market is now worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The sweetener is derived from the leaves of the plant Stevia rebaudiana, a native of Paraguay and Brazil. The leaves make chemicals similar enough to sugar to trick the tongue. ...

SPOKANE, Wash. - COVID-19 has created new problems for pregnant women in the United States, a group that already faced the highest maternal mortality rate in the developed world even before the pandemic. One of their biggest concerns is their baby contracting the disease, according to a Washington State University study published recently in the journal BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth. Some women expressed fears that simply going to the hospital to deliver would cause them to get the virus and then be forced to isolate from their newborn. "Pregnant women are really stressed about contracting COVID-19," ...

Subsidising low carbon emission meals could encourage more people to choose them, according to new research. The study, led by Queen Mary University of London, investigated the impact of different interventions on encouraging people to select low carbon emission menu options in a simulated lunchtime canteen environment. This included the use of carbon taxes and subsidies, traffic light labelling (TLL) and social norms, where more sustainable options were highlighted as the most popular menu items. Carbon taxes and either behavioral intervention - TLL or social norms - had a limited effect on shifting behaviours towards meal choices with lower carbon footprints. However, when all these interventions were combined with subsidies, where the ...

The critically endangered regent honeyeater is losing its "song culture" due to the bird's rapidly declining population, according to new research from The Australian National University (ANU). Just like humans learning to speak, many birds learn to sing by associating with older birds of the same species. They risk losing this skill if adults become too rare. And if they don't learn to sing a sexy enough song, their chances of mating are reduced. "If endangered birds are unable to learn how to sing correctly, it seriously impacts their ability to communicate," lead author Dr Ross Crates said. "It ...

Machine learning can be used to comb through online reviews of substance use treatment facilities to home in on qualities that are important to patients but remain hard to capture via formal means, such as surveys, researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania show. The researchers found that professionalism and staff dedication to patients were two of the top qualities that could be attributed to either a negative or positive review of the facility. Findings from this study were published today in the Journal of General Internal Medicine. "Searching ...

GAINESVILLE, Fla. --- In a genetic surprise, ancient DNA shows the closest family members of an extinct bird known as the Haitian cave-rail are not in the Americas, but Africa and the South Pacific, uncovering an unexpected link between Caribbean bird life and the Old World. Like many animals unique to the Caribbean, cave-rails became extinct soon after people settled the islands. The last of three known West Indian species of cave-rails - flightless, chicken-sized birds - vanished within the past 1,000 years. Florida Museum of Natural History researchers sought to resolve the group's long-debated ancestry by analyzing DNA from a fossil toe bone ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 16, 2021) - Over the course of Earth's history, several mass extinction events have destroyed ecosystems, including one that famously wiped out the dinosaurs. But none were as devastating as "The Great Dying," which took place 252 million years ago during the end of the Permian period. A new study, published today in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, shows in detail how life recovered in comparison to two smaller extinction events. The international study team--composed of researchers from the China University of Geosciences, the California Academy of Sciences, the University of Bristol, ...

(Vienna, March 17, 2021) When complex systems double in size, many of their parts do not. Characteristically, some aspects will grow by only about 80 percent, others by about 120 percent. The astonishing uniformity of these two growth rates is known as "scaling laws." Scaling laws are observed everywhere in the world, from biology to physical systems. They also apply to cities. Yet, while a multitude of examples show their presence, reasons for their emergence are still a matter of debate. A new publication in the Journal of The Royal Society Interface now provides a simple explanation for urban scaling laws: Carlos Molinero and Stefan Thurner of the Complexity Science Hub Vienna (CSH) derive them from the geometry of a city. Scaling laws in ...

The UK variant of SARS-CoV-2 spread rapidly in care homes in England in November and December last year, broadly reflecting its spread in the general population, according to a study by UCL researchers. The study, published as a letter in the New England Journal of Medicine, looked at positive PCR tests of care home staff and residents between October and December. It found that, among the samples it had access to, the proportion of infections caused by the new variant rose from 12% in the week beginning 23 November to 60% of positive cases just two weeks later, in the week beginning 7 December. In the south east of England, where the variant was most dominant, the proportion increased from 55% to 80% over the same period. In London, where the variant spread fastest, ...

Washington, DC, March 16, 2021 - A study in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (JAACAP), published by Elsevier, reports on the young adult assessment of the now 20-year longitudinal Boricua Youth Study (BYS), a large cohort that brings much needed insight about development and mental health of children from diverse ethnic background growing up in disadvantaged contexts. The present article, with its companion report on prevalence of conditions and associated factors, provides an update on the study's fourth wave, which follows-up two probability-based population samples of children of Puerto Rican heritage. ...

Certain brightly colored coral species dotting the seafloor may appear indistinguishable to many divers and snorkelers, but Florida State University researchers have found that these genetically diverse marine invertebrates vary in their response to ocean warming, a finding that has implications for the long-term health of coral reefs. The researchers used molecular genetics to differentiate among corals that look nearly identical and to understand which species best coped with thermal stress. Their research was published in the journal Ecology. "Being able to recognize the differences among these coral species that cannot be identified in the field -- which are known as 'cryptic species' -- will help us understand new ways ...

The electron is one of the fundamental particles in nature we read about in school. Its behavior holds clues to new ways to store digital data. In a study published in Nano Letters, physicists from Michigan Technological University explore alternative materials to improve capacity and shrink the size of digital data storage technologies. Ranjit Pati, professor of physics at Michigan Tech, led the study and explains the physics behind his team's new nanowire design. "Thanks to a property called spin, electrons behave like tiny magnets," Pati said. "Similar to how a bar magnet's magnetization is dipolar, pointing from south to north, ...

The Volcano Alert Level (VAL) system, standardized by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) in 2006, is meant to save lives and keep citizens living in the shadow of an active volcano informed of their current level of risk. A new study published in Risk Analysis suggests that, when an alert remains elevated at any level above "normal" due to a period of volcanic unrest, it can cause a decline in the region's housing prices and other economic indicators. Because of this, the authors argue that federal policymakers may need to account for the effects of prolonged volcanic unrest -- not just destructive eruptions -- in the provision of disaster relief funding. A team of geoscientists and statistical experts examined the historical relationship ...

As researchers push the boundaries of battery design, seeking to pack ever greater amounts of power and energy into a given amount of space or weight, one of the more promising technologies being studied is lithium-ion batteries that use a solid electrolyte material between the two electrodes, rather than the typical liquid. But such batteries have been plagued by a tendency for branch-like projections of metal called dendrites to form on one of the electrodes, eventually bridging the electrolyte and shorting out the battery cell. Now, researchers at MIT and elsewhere have found ...

Even though a fruit fly doesn't have ears, it can hear with its antennae. In a END ...

The first known study to explore optimal outpatient exam scheduling given the flexibility of inpatient exams has resulted in shorter wait times for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) patients at END ...

FINDINGS A new UCLA study shows that while men and women who have high muscle mass are less likely to die from heart disease, it also appears that women who have higher levels of body fat -- regardless of their muscle mass -- have a greater degree of protection than women with less fat. The researchers analyzed national health survey data collected over a 15-year period and found that heart disease-related death in women with high muscle mass and high body fat was 42% lower than in a comparison group of women with low muscle mass and low body fat. However, women who had high muscle mass and low ...