The neutrino and its antimatter cousin, the antineutrino, are the tiniest subatomic particles known to science. These particles are byproducts of nuclear reactions within stars (including our sun), supernovae, black holes and human-made nuclear reactors. They also result from radioactive decay processes deep within the Earth, where radioactive heat and the heat left over from the planet's formation fuels plate tectonics, volcanoes and Earth's magnetic field. Now, a team of geologists and physicists has generated the world's first global map of antineutrino emissions. ...

A new study has found that the occurrence of advanced forms of a diabetic eye disease remains low among children living with diabetes, regardless of how long they have had the disease or their ability to keep blood sugar levels controlled. Researchers are therefore recommending that most children with type 1 diabetes delay annual diabetic retinopathy screenings until age 15, or 5 years after their diabetes diagnosis, whichever occurs later. Their findings were published online today in Ophthalmology, the journal of the American Academy of Ophthalmology. It is well established ...

A bacterium engineered to produce different pigments in response to varying levels of a micronutrient in blood samples could give health officials an inexpensive way to detect nutritional deficiencies in resource-limited areas of the world. This "bacterial litmus test," which currently measures levels of zinc, would require no electrical equipment and make results visible as simple color changes. More than a billion people worldwide may be at risk for adequate zinc intake, but measuring zinc levels in blood samples currently requires sophisticated testing equipment not ...

In the "NeverEnding Story", Bastian feels so involved in the narration that he experiences the same emotions as the characters (and in the end he really enters the book). What happens to the main character of Micheal Ende's book is exactly what happens to each of us when we read a novel or a short story: we literally replicate the physiological processes and emotions of the characters described in the text. Francesco Foroni, research scientist at the International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA) of Trieste, already demonstrated this phenomenon a few years ago in a study ...

PULLMAN, Wash.--Washington State University researchers have found that the timing of an animal's sleep can be just as important as how much sleeps it gets. Ilia Karatsoreos, an assistant professor in WSU's Department of Integrative Physiology and Neuroscience, shifted mice from their usual cycle of sleeping and waking and saw that, while they got enough sleep, it was of poorer quality. The animals also had a disrupted immune response, leaving them more open to illness. Most sleep research focuses on the effects of sleep deprivation or the overall amount of sleep an animal ...

A multi-disciplinary group of European researchers spanning natural science, socio-economics and law have joined forces to assess the current landscape of deep-sea research and investment in Europe. Once considered remote and inaccessible, commercial interest to exploit the deep sea (1) is rising due to economic drivers and technology developments. However, exploitation activities in the deep sea remain highly contentious, particularly regarding the potential risks and environmental impacts associated with such activities. A consultation of deep-sea stakeholders spanning ...

New research from LSTM has revealed precisely how insecticide-treated bed nets are so effective against malaria mosquitoes. Communities in the poorest countries are the most vulnerable to malaria and 90% of all malaria deaths occur in Africa. Safe, simple and affordable, long-lasting insecticidal bed nets (LLINs) are very effective in preventing malaria and have played a major part in reducing malaria deaths in Africa by over 50% since 2000 (WHO). However, as very little is known about how mosquitoes interact with nets or how LLINs do their job so effectively, how they ...

Researchers at University of La Rioja (Spain) have developed a new method to eliminate artificial satellites in Highly Elliptical Orbits when they finish their mission. The methodology, which allows for a reduction of both cost and risk, has been tested with the European Space Agency INTEGRAL mission, which will re-enter into the Earth's atmosphere in order to disintegrate in 2029. The problem of space debris is one of the main challenges that aerospace engineers have to face, due to the danger it poses to satellites. In this context, members of the Scientific Computing ...

BEIJING, CHINA (1 September 2015)--At a time when the price of mutton is climbing and wool crashing, a groundbreaking new study has used advanced genetic sequencing technology to rewrite the history of sheep breeding and trading along the ancient Silk Road--insights that can help contemporary herders in developing countries preserve or recover valuable traits crucial to their food and economic security. The new findings regarding one of the first animals ever domesticated will be published in the October print edition of the journal Molecular Biology and Evolution. They ...

DENVER (Sept. 1, 2015) - While many planners focus on the threat of natural disasters to major metropolises around the world, a new study from the University of Colorado Denver shows smaller cities are often even less equipped to handle such catastrophes. "Small cities are often far away from where decisions get made and struggle to insert themselves into the agenda of decision-making bodies," said study author Andrew Rumbach, PhD, an assistant professor at the CU Denver College of Architecture and Planning, a major center of timely, topical and relevant research. "When ...

The unique properties found in the stunning iridescent wings of a tropical blue butterfly could hold the key to developing new highly selective gas detection sensors. Pioneering new research by a team of international scientists, including researchers from the University of Exeter, has replicated the surface chemistry found in the iridescent scales of the Morpho butterfly to create an innovative gas sensor. The ground-breaking findings could help inspire new designs for sensors that could be used in a range of sectors, including medical diagnostics, industry, and the ...

A team of researchers led by scientists at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency published a new map Sept. 1 that characterizes the Earth's radioactivity and offers new and potential future applications for basic science research and nonproliferation efforts. The Antineutrino Global Map 2015, or AGM2015, is an unprecedented experimentally-informed model of the Earth's natural and manmade antineutrino flux. The map uses open-source geophysical data sets and publicly available international antineutrino detection observational data to depict varying levels of radioactivity ...

London, UK - 1 Sept 2015: Most patients with a cardiac resynchronisation therapy (CRT) pacemaker would not benefit from the addition of a defibrillator, according to results from the CeRtiTuDe cohort study presented for the first time today at ESC Congress1 and published in European Heart Journal.2 "The choice between CRT with (CRT-D) or without (CRT-P) a defibrillator remains a contentious issue," said Professor Jean-Yves Le Heuzey, cardiologist at Georges Pompidou Hospital, René Descartes University in Paris, France. "No randomised clinical trial has been conducted ...

GREAT NECK, NY - A large, ambitious contrast of blood-thinning medications used during cardiac stent placement suggests that a very expensive drug offers no clear safety benefits over a much more affordable option, according to a prominent North Shore-LIJ researcher and cardiologist. An insightful editorial in the Online First New England Journal of Medicine on Sept. 1 by Peter Berger, M.D., Senior Vice President for Clinical Research at the North Shore-LIJ Health System, addresses the controversial comparison of the blood thinners heparin and bivalirudin (known commercially ...

London, UK (September 1, 2015) - Women leaving work to raise children have to redefine who they are, a study from the SAGE journal Human Relations finds. After exiting professional and managerial occupations, mothers are engaged in an ongoing mother/professional identity struggle, argue the researchers Shireen Kanji and Emma Cahusac. The process through which the mothers' choice is constructed as 'right' does not occur before their exit from work but manifests itself afterwards and intensifies over time, the study reveals. "Analysis of mothers' sense making reveals how ...

London, UK - 1 Sept 2015: Carbonated beverages are associated with out-of-hospital cardiac arrests of cardiac origin, according to results from the All-Japan Utstein Registry presented for the first time today at ESC Congress.1 The study in nearly 800 000 patients suggests that limiting consumption of carbonated beverages may be beneficial for health. "Some epidemiologic studies have shown a positive correlation between the consumption of soft drinks and the incidence of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and stroke, while other reports have demonstrated that the intake of ...

More than half the world's population now lives in cities. As numbers continue to swell, decision-makers across the globe grapple with how best to accommodate growing resident numbers while maintaining healthy urban ecosystems. Previous research has demonstrated that urban green spaces and trees yield far-reaching benefits to humans, from increased happiness and health to absorbing surface water run-off and storing carbon. Researchers have long debated whether it is better to build compact developments with large parks or nature reserves, as often found in Europe and Japan, ...

A new development in engineering chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells, called affinity tuning, can make the CAR T cells spare normal cells and better recognize and attack cancer cells, which may help lower the toxicity associated with this type of immunotherapy when used against solid tumors, according to a preclinical study. Many solid cancers have high levels of certain proteins such as ErbB2 and EGFR, which make them suitable targets for anticancer therapies. However, such proteins are also present at low levels in normal cells. Because of this, CAR T cells ...

Engineering chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells to lower their affinity for the protein epithelial growth factor receptor (EGFR) made the cells preferentially recognize and eliminate tumor cells that have high amounts of EGFR while sparing normal cells that have lower amounts of the protein, according to a preclinical study. CAR T cells that are currently being tested to treat B-cell malignancies target a specific protein present on leukemia and lymphoma, but these immune cells cannot distinguish cancer cells from normal cells, explained Cooper. Even though such ...

In recent years, an effort has been underway to redefine malnutrition in pediatric patients to include both the acute clinical population and the more traditional ambulatory populations. Identifying and treating malnutrition in pediatric patients is important from an acute standpoint and to ensure that children have enough nutrition to reach optimal final height and development. Pediatric malnutrition in the clinical setting was recently defined by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and A.S.P.E.N. as "an imbalance between nutrient requirements and intake that results ...

ANN ARBOR--Daily marijuana use among the nation's college students is on the rise, surpassing daily cigarette smoking for the first time in 2014. A series of national surveys of U.S. college students, as part of the University of Michigan's Monitoring the Future study, shows that marijuana use has been growing slowly on the nation's campuses since 2006. Daily or near-daily marijuana use was reported by 5.9 percent of college students in 2014--the highest rate since 1980, the first year that complete college data were available in the study. This rate of use is up ...

The fossil of a previously unknown species of 'sea scorpion', measuring over 1.5 meters long, has been discovered in Iowa, USA, and described in the open access journal BMC Evolutionary Biology. Dating back 460 million years, it is the oldest known species of eurypterid (sea scorpion) - extinct monster-like predators that swam the seas in ancient times and are related to modern arachnids. The authors named the new species Pentecopterus decorahensis after the 'penteconter' - an ancient Greek warship that the species resembles in outline and parallels in its predatory ...

Many of the most memorable stories in the history of science revolve around the conscious realization of an idea - the "Eureka!" moment. But what triggers these moments? Is there always some serendipitous event preceding a sudden epiphany, such as when Isaac Newton famously figured out gravity when he saw a falling apple? Writing in September's Physics World, Vitor Cardoso talks about how these questions led him on a quest of discovery through the web-based project The Birth of an Idea, which he co-founded with artist Ana Souse Carvalho. "Ana and I had been talking ...

Women living in poor areas in the UK are almost twice as likely to develop clinical anxiety as women in richer areas. However, whether men lived in poorer or richer areas made no difference to their levels of generalised anxiety disorder (GAD). These are amongst the main findings of a major survey on how socio-economic factors affect mental health in the UK. Generalised anxiety disorder is one of the most common mental health conditions in modern society, but little objective work has taken place to show the factors in society which can lead to the development of anxiety. ...

How do you convince someone with schizophrenia or other psychotic disorders that they are ill if they don't want to believe it? If you don't recognize that you are ill, you may resist treatment, but is there something which causes this lack of awareness? Awareness of illness, also known as 'insight', is a serious problem in the treatment of psychotic patients. Now work being presented at the ECNP Congress in Amsterdam investigates whether concentrations of a marker of brain cell dysfunction are associated with impaired insight. Past studies have indicated that an area ...