Ann Arbor, MI, July 8, 2015 - Nearly 800,000 people in the U.S. suffer a stroke each year. Stroke is responsible for one out of every 19 deaths in the U.S. and it is a leading cause of disability. A new study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that secondhand smoke (SHS) increases the risk of stroke by about 30 percent for nonsmokers. Using data from the Reasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke (REGARDS) study, a national, population-based, longitudinal study investigating cardiovascular disease events and mortality endpoints ...

New York, 9 July - Investing up to 3.5% of a nation's GDP in science, technology and innovation - including basic science and education - is a key benchmark for advancing sustainable development effectively, leading experts say. In papers released July 9 in New York, international scientists advising UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon say closing the gap between developed and developing countries depends on first closing international science, technology and innovation (STI) investment gaps. According to the UN SG's 26-member Scientific Advisory Board: "While a target ...

Scientific journals should insist on more robust experimental processes, say biologists after reviewing nearly 900,000 experiments. The team found that non-blind experiments - that is, where scientists knew which samples they were recording - averaged a 27 per cent stronger result than blind trials. However their review suggests that less than one in four experiments used blind data recording. "We found that non-blind papers tended to exaggerate differences between the experimental group and the control group," said lead researcher Dr Luke Holman, from the Research ...

Long-time smokers and past smokers now have a more accurate way of detecting whether or not they have lung cancer thanks to a comprehensive lung cancer screening program that uses CT scan technology at Intermountain Medical Center in Salt Lake City. The program is based on the findings of the National Lung Screening Trial, a study that compared CT scans and standard chest X-rays in detecting lung cancer. CT scans use X-rays to obtain a multiple-image scan of the entire chest, while a standard chest X-ray produces a single image of the whole chest. Results from the study ...

An international team of researchers has discovered how legumes are able to tell helpful and harmful invading bacteria apart. The research has implications for improving the understanding of how other plants, animals and humans interact with bacteria in their environment and defend themselves against hostile infections. These findings can have profound implications for both agricultural research and medical science. Their study, which changes the understanding of carbohydrates as signal molecules, is newly published in the leading international journal Nature. Legumes ...

ORLANDO, FL - An athlete's use of silicone ankle sleeves (SAS) and lace-up ankle braces (LAB) during sports participation can improve neuromuscular control, according to research presented today at the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine's (AOSSM) Annual Meeting in Orlando, FL. "Athletes often use prophylactic sleeves or braces, and this study used markerless motion analysis to determine whether these support aids are beneficial," said lead author Seth L. Sherman, MD, from the University of Missouri - Columbia Department of Orthopaedic Surgery. The study ...

ORLANDO, FL - Surgeons making reconstruction choices for an injured ACL can consider both bone-tendon-bone grafts and hamstring autografts as equally viable options in regards to healing, as reported in research today at the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine's (AOSSM) Annual Meeting in Orlando, FL. "We compared the graft-tunnel motion of patients receiving either kind of graft, and noted both groups had similar graft motion at six weeks and one year from surgery, both ranged between 1-2 mm," commented Justin W. Arner, MD, from the University of Pittsburgh ...

A new study by UCLA scientists adds to the understanding of the genetic architecture of schizophrenia. Past research has shown the impact of commonly occurring genetic variants on a person's risk of developing schizophrenia. This new study focused instead on rare coding mutations that affect protein function. It found that patients with schizophrenia have a higher-than-normal share of these mutations. "While we cannot point to specific mutations that play a causal role in schizophrenia, we show that schizophrenia patients collectively have more of these mutations than ...

More than a third of overweight or obese teenagers don't see themselves as being too heavy and think their weight is about right, according to a Cancer Research UK study published today in the International Journal of Obesity. The study* used data from around 5,000 13-15-year-olds who were asked about their weight and if they thought they were too heavy, about right or too light. Researchers then checked their answers against their Body Mass Index (BMI)** -- to see whether the reality matched the teenagers' perceptions of themselves. Almost three-quarters (73 per ...

Public attitudes towards mental illness and levels of healthcare spending may explain the huge variation in antidepressant use across Europe, according to a new study by researchers from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King's College London. The study, published today in the British Journal of Psychiatry, found that antidepressants were prescribed more often and used more regularly in countries with higher levels of healthcare spending. In addition, beliefs that people with a mental illness are 'dangerous' were associated with higher ...

The UK government's investments in private hospital chains in developing countries, in the form of 'beyond aid' approaches, could actually be hindering inclusive development and need greater scrutiny, argue experts in The BMJ this week. 'Beyond aid' policies aim to address underlying causes of poverty, and focus on the use of loans and equity investments to support the growth of private companies. As part of this strategy, tens of millions of pounds have been committed by the Department for International Development's investment arm, CDC Group, to private hospitals and ...

CHICAGO --- A phase II clinical trial led by Northwestern Medicine investigators shows that a new psoriasis drug called guselkumab has greater efficacy than the current standard of care for the chronic skin condition. In the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, investigators compared guselkumab to adalimumab, the most common medication currently used to treat psoriasis. "Research like this study is leading to a series of new medications that promise high levels of response for an increasing number of patients," said first author Kenneth Gordon, ...

The cost of having a baby can vary by almost $10,000 depending on which hospital is chosen, Yale School of Medicine researchers have found in a study published in the July issue of the journal Health Affairs. Childbirth is the leading cause of hospital admission in the United States, but there has been little research on the cost of delivery in hospitals across the country. To seek some answers, the Yale research team, led by Xiao Xu, assistant professor in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences at Yale School of Medicine, studied data from the ...

MIAMI - New research on tropical coral reef ecosystems showed that releasing larvae more often is beneficial for a species' network. The study on reproductive strategies is critical to assess the conservation of coral reef ecosystems worldwide. Researchers from the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science used a computer model developed by UM Rosenstiel School scientist Claire Paris, known as the Connectivity Modeling System to track larval movements of three distinct reef species - the Carribean sea plume (Anthiellogorgia elisebeathae), ...

Cancer cells defy the rules by which normal cells abide. They can divide without cease, invade distant tissues and consume glucose at abnormal rates. Now a study by University of Pennsylvania researchers implicates defects in mitochondria, the energy-production centers of cells, as playing a key role in the transition from normal to cancerous. When the Penn scientists disrupted a key component of mitochondria, otherwise normal cells took on characteristics of cancerous tumor cells. The research is published in the journal Oncogene and was led by members of the lab of ...

Boulder, Colo., USA - Submarine landslides, also known as mass transport deposits (MTDs), are common in marine environments and pose risks to coastal communities and offshore infrastructure. This new 332-point database presented by Lorena Moscardelli and Lesli Wood is drawn from studies of multiple MTDs around the world. Understanding these MTDS, they write, will help determine the extent of ancient submarine landslides and contribute to the development geo-models for forecasting future submarine slides. FEATURED ARTICLE Morphometry of mass transport deposits as a predictive ...

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Southern Californians and writers love to blame the hot, dry Santa Ana winds for tense, ugly moods, and the winds have long been associated with destructive wildfires. Now, a new study finds that on occasion, the winds have an accomplice with respect to fires, at least: Natural atmospheric events known as stratospheric intrusions, which bring extremely dry air from the upper atmosphere down to the surface, adding to the fire danger effects of the Santa Anas, and exacerbating some air pollution episodes. The findings suggest that forecast models with ...

AROUND half of all breast cancer patients could one day benefit from having the cheap and widely-available female hormone progesterone added to their treatment, according to Cancer Research UK funded research published in Nature today (Thursday)*. Tumours fuelled by the female hormone oestrogen are treated with drugs like tamoxifen to block oestrogen receptors, which cause cancer cells to grow. Women whose tumours have progesterone receptors as well are known to have a better outlook. But for decades scientists have been unable to pinpoint why. Scientists at Cancer ...

From a Glacier's Perspective Big Four glacier & ice caves, WA: a short future? Early summer melting led to the collapse of Washington ice caves, the death of one person, and the injury of five others. Mauri Pelto asks questions about the future of Washington's Big Four glacier on his blog From a Glacier's Perspective. Eos.org Learning geoscience by doing geoscience A pilot project helps teachers bring scientific practice into the classroom. New research papers Response of the Amazon carbon balance to the 2010 drought derived with CarbonTracker South America, ...

Researchers have developed a new approach for better integrating medical devices with biological systems. The researchers, led by Bozhi Tian, assistant professor in chemistry at the University of Chicago, have developed the first skeleton-like silicon spicules ever prepared via chemical processes. "Using bone formation as a guide, the Tian group has developed a synthetic material from silicon that shows potential for improving interaction between soft tissue and hard materials," said Joe Akkara, a program director in the National Science Foundation materials research ...

Tropical Depression 4E formed in the Eastern Pacific and crossed the 140 West longitude line as of the 0300 UTC time, which brought it into the Central Pacific Ocean. NOAA's GOES-West satellite captured an infrared image of the depression at 0900 UTC (5 a.m. EDT) on July 8 that showed the large storm in the Central Pacific. At 8 p.m. PDT/11 p.m. EDT on July 7, (0300 UTC on July 8), the center of newly formed Tropical Depression Four-E was located near latitude 15.4 North, longitude 140.2 West. The depression was moving toward the west-northwest near 17 mph (28 kph) and ...

Rice University researchers have built a simulation to show how cancerous tumors manipulate blood-vessel growth for their own benefit. Like all cells, those in tumors need access to the body's fine network of blood vessels to bring them oxygen and carry away waste. Tumors have learned to game the process called angiogenesis in which new vessels sprout from existing ones, like branches from a tree. But some details have been hidden until now. The ability to stop tumors through anti-angiogenesis is one goal of cancer therapy. The new work by scientists at Rice's Center ...

July 8, 2015 - A recent CDC report calls into question the widely reported belief that Black fathers are more absent in their children's lives than White fathers - showing that while more Black fathers live apart from their children, they are just as involved with their children as members of other racial groups in the same living situations. So why is it that messages about Black absentee fathers, such as Obama's 2008 Father's Day address, are so pervasive in society? A new paper, published today in Social Psychological and Personality Science, suggests that such messages ...

CAMBRIDGE, Mass--When you spill a bit of water onto a tabletop, the puddle spreads -- and then stops, leaving a well-defined area of water with a sharp boundary. There's just one problem: The formulas scientists use to describe such a fluid flow say that the water should just keep spreading endlessly. Everyone knows that's not the case -- but why? This mystery has now been solved by researchers at MIT -- and while this phenomenon might seem trivial, the finding's ramifications could be significant: Understanding such flowing fluids is essential for processes from the ...

CHICAGO (July 8, 2015): Work hour restrictions for resident physicians, revised nationally four years ago largely to protect patients against physician trainees' fatigue-related errors, have not had the desired effect of lowering postoperative complication rates in several common surgical specialties, according to new study results. The study was published as an "article in press" on the Journal of the American College of Surgeons website in advance of print publication later this year. There was no significant difference in measured surgical patient outcomes between ...