WASHINGTON, D.C., (April 30, 2021) - New study results validate the effectiveness of the Medtronic Harmony™ transcatheter pulmonary valve (TPV) system for patients with congenital heart disease (CHD) and severe pulmonary regurgitation (PR). The Harmony TPV is designed to be a less invasive treatment option for patients with irregularity in their right ventricular outflow tract (RVOT) needing pulmonary valve placement to restore valve function. The results of this study are being presented as late-breaking clinical science today at the Society for Cardiovascular Angiography & Interventions (SCAI) 2021 Scientific Sessions. About 40,000 infants are born with CHD every year in the United States ...

DALLAS (SMU) - NASA has a long tradition of unexpected discoveries, and the space program's TESS mission is no different. SMU astrophysicist and her team have discovered a particularly bright gamma-ray burst using a NASA telescope designed to find exoplanets - those occurring outside our solar system - particularly those that might be able to support life. It's the first time a gamma-ray burst has been found this way. Gamma-ray bursts are the brightest explosions in the universe, typically associated with the collapse of a massive star and the birth of a black hole. They can produce as much radioactive energy as the sun will release during its entire 10-billion-year ...

From the Pacific Northwest to the Rocky Mountains, summers in the West are marked by wildfires and smoke. New research from the University of Utah ties the worsening trend of extreme poor air quality events in Western regions to wildfire activity, with growing trends of smoke impacting air quality clear into September. The work is published in Environmental Research Letters. "In a big picture sense, we can expect it to get worse," says Kai Wilmot, lead author of the study and doctoral student in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences. "We're going to see more fire area burned in the Western U.S. between now and in 2050. If we extrapolate our trends forward, it seems to indicate that a lot ...

Boston, MA (April 30, 2021) - Research presented today at the AATS 101st Annual Meeting, shows that the six year Integrated Cardiothoracic (CT I-6) residency continues to be the most challenging to match, while the pool of applicants has become more diverse. The study, which aimed to identify applicant characteristics associated with a successful match, used data from the National Residency Matching Program (NRMP), Electronic Residency Application Service (ERAS), and Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) for Thoracic Surgery, Orthopaedic Surgery, Neurological Surgery, Otolaryngology (ENT), Plastic Surgery, and Vascular Surgery for 2010-2020. Data compared number of applicants ...

What The Study Did: Changes in the demographic characteristics and clinical outcomes of pediatric emergency department visits for mental health conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic are described in this study. Authors: Polina Krass, M.D., of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, 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.2021.8533) Editor's Note: The article includes conflict of interest disclosures. Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, ...

What The Study Did: This simulation study estimates key populations and performance indicators along the COVID exposure notification chain of the SwissCOVID digital contact tracing app last year in Zurich, Switzerland. Authors: Viktor von Wyl, Ph.D., of the University of Zurich, 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.2021.8184) Editor's Note: The article includes conflict of interest and funding/support disclosures. Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, ...

What The Study Did: The association of the COVID-19 pandemic with general surgical residents' operative experience by postgraduate year and case type is examined in this study. Authors: Farin Amersi, M.D., of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, 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/jamasurg.2021.1978) Editor's Note: The article includes conflict of interest disclosures. Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, and funding and support. INFORMATION: Media advisory: The full study and commentary are linked to this news ...

Governments throughout the world have accelerated their ambitions towards effective climate change mitigation. What is clear, in this challenge of how to tackle the complex and global issue of climate change, is that there is no one technology or stakeholder that will drive the full and timely decarbonisation that the world and its citizens require. Therefore, as part of this global energy transition, there is an unprecedent increase in decarbonisation investments accompanied with new levels of accessibility to both energy systems and markets. So, a key research question is how best to understand and optimise the value proposition for different stakeholders. Due to the need to fast track decarbonisation and to ensure that ...

Through T cell engineering, researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University Massey Cancer Center show that it's possible to arrest tumor growth for a variety of cancers and squash the spread of cancer to other tissues. This research will be published in tomorrow's print edition of Cancer Research. The paper builds on decades of research by study co-senior author Paul B. Fisher, M.Ph., Ph.D., a member of Massey's Cancer Biology research program, who discovered a protein called IL-24 that attacks a variety of cancers in several different ways. In this latest study, Fisher teamed up with his colleague Xiang-Yang (Shawn) Wang, Ph.D., who co-leads the ...

Boulder, Colo., USA: GSA's dynamic online journal, Geosphere, posts articles online regularly. Locations and topics studied this month include the Central Anatolian Plateau; the Southern Rocky Mountain Volcanic Field; petrogenesis in the Grand Canyon; and the evolution of the Portland and Tualatin forearc basins, Oregon. A physical and chemical sedimentary record of Laramide tectonic shifts in the Cretaceous-Paleogene San Juan Basin, New Mexico, USA Kevin M. Hobbs; Peter J. Fawcett Abstract: Fluvial siliciclastic rocks bracketing the Cretaceous-Paleogene (K-Pg) boundary ...

The genome of single-celled plankton, known as dinoflagellates, is organized in an incredibly strange and unusual way, according to new research. The findings lay the groundwork for further investigation into these important marine organisms and dramatically expand our picture of what a eukaryotic genome can look like. Researchers from KAUST, the U.S. and Germany have investigated the genomic organization of the coral-symbiont dinoflagellate Symbiodinium microadriaticum. The S. microadriaticum genome had already been sequenced and assembled into segments known as scaffolds but lacked a chromosome-level assembly. The team used a technique known as Hi-C to detect interactions in the dinoflagellate's ...

WILMINGTON, Del. (April 30, 2021) - Social, economic, and demographic factors that can influence health did not affect families' acceptance of telehealth for their children's cardiac care during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a study presented at the Pediatric Academic Society 2021 Virtual Meeting. The study, by research team members at the Nemours Children's Health System, suggests that telehealth is a feasible tool for families regardless of household income, language, or insurance type. "When we saw that the use of telehealth would be necessary for maintaining children's cardiac care ...

Key takeaways The basis of the ACS Quality Verification Program rests on 12 standards; all of which are being reviewed in the medical literature to demonstrate evidence for the program. Five principles key in on the role of data surveillance, standardized process, and systems; all are interrelated. The most robust evidence has been identified around the standards for data and use of data. CHICAGO (April 30, 2021): Evidence from the medical literature that contributes to adopting a new practice into clinical care is integral for surgical quality improvement. Part II of ...

A single dose of vaccine boosts protection against SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus variants, but only in those with previous COVID-19, a study has found. In those who have not previously been infected and have so far only received one dose of vaccine the immune response to variants of concern may be insufficient. The findings, published today in the journal Science and led by researchers at Imperial College London, Queen Mary University of London and University College London, looked at immune responses in UK healthcare workers at Barts and Royal Free hospitals following their first dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.* They ...

WESTMINSTER, Colorado - April 30, 2021 - Palmer amaranth is a hard-to-control noxious weed that can significantly reduce crop yields. It was first introduced in Minnesota in 2016 through contaminated seed mixes used for conservation plantings. Fortunately, Minnesota regulators were prepared. They had already declared Palmer amaranth a prohibited noxious weed in 2015, and they quickly added the weed's seed to their prohibited list by emergency order. As a result, they were able to take prompt action to identify and eradicate newly emerged infestations. A research paper featured in the journal Weed Technology documents Minnesota's experiences, including the timeline ...

For many of us, adding salt to a meal is a perfectly normal thing to do. We don't really think about it. But actually, we should. As well as raising our blood pressure, too much salt can severely disrupt the energy balance in immune cells and stop them from working properly. Back in 2015, the research group led by Professor Dominik Müller of the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine in the Helmholtz Association (MDC) and the Experimental and Clinical Research Center (ECRC) found that elevated sodium concentrations in the blood affect both ...

The detection of the axion would mark a key episode in the history of science. This hypothetical particle could resolve two fundamental problems of Modern Physics at the same time: the problema of Charge and Parity in the strong interaction, and the mystery of dark matter. However, in spite of the high scientific interest in finding it, the search at high radio frequency -above 6 GHz- has been almost left aside for the lack of the high sensitivity technology which could be built at reasonable cost. Until now. The Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) will participate ...

A research team at the University of Cologne has discovered previously undescribed bacteria in amoebae that are related to Legionella and may even cause disease. The researchers from Professor Dr Michael Bonkowski's working group at the Institute of Zoology have named one of the newly discovered bacteria 'Pokemonas' because they live in spherical amoebae, comparable to Pokémon in the video game, which are caught in balls. The results of their research have been published in the journal Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology. Bacteria of the order Legionellales have long ...

Histology is the study of biological tissues at a microscopic level. Also called microscopic anatomy, histology is widely used to provide diagnosis of cancer and other diseases. For example, tissue samples obtained during surgery might help to determine whether further surgical action is needed, and further surgery may be avoided if a diagnosis can be rapidly obtained during an operation. Traditional methods in histopathology are generally limited to thin specimens and require chemical processing of the tissue to provide sufficiently high contrast for imaging, which slows the process. A recent advance in histopathology eliminates the ...

Humans have significantly altered biodiversity in all climate zones of the Earth. This has been shown by a study now published in Science. Led by Prof. Dr. Manuel Steinbauer at the University of Bayreuth, and Dr. Sandra Nogué at the University of Southampton, an international team has investigated how the flora on 27 islands in different regions has developed over the last 5,000 years. Almost everywhere, the arrival of humans has triggered a markedly accelerated change in species composition in previously pristine ecosystems. This dynamic was particularly pronounced on islands colonised in the last 1,500 years. The ...

(Boston)--Doctors treating babies born with Turner syndrome need to look for heart rhythm abnormalities, in addition to the usual heart problems of high blood pressure or left-sided structural heart defects, according to Meena Bolourchi, MD, assistant professor of pediatrics at Boston University School of Medicine. Turner syndrome occurs in one out of 2,500 live female births and is caused by the complete or partial absence of one X chromosome. Compared to the general population, females with Turner syndrome have a three times higher risk of early death from cardiovascular disease. In the general newborn population, cardiac arrhythmias occur in approximately 24.4 per 100,000 live births and may occur with or without congenital heart disease. The most ...

"Feel-good films" are usually dismissed by film critics as being sentimental and without intellectual merit. But their popularity with audiences, who seek them out precisely because of their "feel-good" qualities, tells a more favorable story. Now, for the first time, this popular movie genre has been examined scientifically. A new study from the Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics investigates which feel-good films are considered by viewers to be prototypical and which factors constitute their feel-good effect. Around 450 participants from Germany, Austria, and the German-speaking regions of Belgium and Switzerland took part in the study. Their responses point to romantic comedies as having a particularly high potential for emotional uplift. The ...

Immunotherapy is a type of anti-tumor treatment and has shown great clinical success against a wide variety of malignancies in recent years. Poly(I : C), a TLR3 agonist, is the most potent type I interferon (IFN) inducer. Poly(I : C) not only directly induces tumorous apoptosis, but also stimulates tumor cells to secrete immune factors. However, the immune response rate induced by Poly(I : C) remains low in several types of malignancies and higher doses are often required to achieve the desired effect. However, poly(I : C) is highly toxic and thus only a very narrow therapeutic window is available, which greatly limits clinical application of Poly(I : C)-based treatments. Photodynamics therapy (PDT) is a promising anti-tumor treatment ...

Many industrial processes emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Unfortunately, however, current electrochemical separation methods are expensive and consume large amounts of power. They also require expensive and rare metals as catalysts. A study in the journal Angewandte Chemie describes a new aerogel electrocatalyst formed from an inexpensive metal alloy, which enables highly efficient electrochemical conversion of carbon dioxide. The main product is formic acid, which is a nontoxic basic chemical. Capturing and chemically fixing carbon dioxide from industrial processes would be a huge step towards carbon neutrality. To prevent the ...

Researchers in the Nanoscience Center of University of Jyvaskyla, in Finland and in the Guadalajara University in Mexico developed a method that allows for simulation and visualization of magnetic-field-induced electron currents inside gold nanoparticles. The method facilitates accurate analysis of magnetic field effects inside complex nanostructures in nuclear magnetic resonance measurements and establishes quantitative criteria for aromaticity of nanoparticles. The work was published 30.4.2021 as an Open Access article in Nature Communications. According to the classical electromagnetism, a charged particle moving in an external magnetic field experiences a force that makes the particle's path circular. This basic law of physics is used, e.g., in designing cyclotrons ...