A new diagnostic method, namely spectral histopathology, facilitates marker-free detection of individual subtypes of lung cancers. It was developed by researchers at the PURE consortium at Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB). They have successfully applied it in collaboration with clinicians at the Ruhrlandklinik in Essen. It is an automatable imaging process which, by classifying specific forms of lung cancer, facilitates a prognosis regarding a tumour's aggressiveness. The team, headed by RUB Prof Dr Klaus Gerwert, compares the results of traditional diagnostic procedures ...

CLEMSON, S.C. -- In a groundbreaking achievement led by an international team that includes Clemson scientist Chris Saski, the intricately woven genetic makeup of Upland cotton has been decoded for the first time in the ancient plant's history. Saski participated in sequencing the genome, which is a crucial stepping-stone toward further advancements of understanding the inner workings of one of the most complex and treasured plants on the planet. The future implications of Saski's research in the short and long terms are both financial and holistic. Upland cotton, which ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. - Researchers at Oregon State University have invented a new technology that can increase the bandwidth of WiFi systems by 10 times, using LED lights to transmit information. The technology could be integrated with existing WiFi systems to reduce bandwidth problems in crowded locations, such as airport terminals or coffee shops, and in homes where several people have multiple WiFi devices. Experts say that recent advances in LED technology have made it possible to modulate the LED light more rapidly, opening the possibility of using light for wireless ...

NEW YORK (April 20, 2015) -- Genomic studies have illuminated the ways in which malfunctioning genes can drive cancer growth while stunting the therapeutic effects of chemotherapy and other treatments. But new findings from Weill Cornell Medical College investigators indicate that these genes are only partly to blame for why treatment that was at one point effective ultimately fails for about 40 percent of patients diagnosed with the most common form of non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. The study, published April 20 in Nature Communications, suggests that global changes in cancer ...

A rigorous analysis of antimalarial drug quality conducted in Cambodia and Tanzania found no evidence of fake medicines, according to new research published in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. But researchers warn that routine surveillance is crucial as poor quality medicines exist, leaving malaria patients at risk of dying and increasing the risk of drug resistance. Previous reports had suggested that up to one third of antimalarials could be fake. Researchers from the Artemisinin-based Combination Therapy (ACT) Consortium at the London School ...

Dispensing of prescription opioid pain relievers and prescription opioid overdoses both dropped substantially after abuse-deterrent extended-release oxycodone hydrochloride was introduced on the pharmaceutical market and the narcotic drug propoxyphene was withdrawn from the U.S. market in 2010, according to an article published online by JAMA Internal Medicine. The abuse-deterrent OxyContin formulation is resistant to crushing and dissolving, actions that have been used to bypass the extended-release mechanism to get a quicker and more intense high. Propoxyphene (also ...

Children whose families and pediatricians were most faithful to an obesity intervention program that included computerized clinical decision support for physicians and health coaching for families experienced the greatest improvements in body mass index (BMI), according to an article published online by JAMA Pediatrics. The prevalence of childhood obesity in the United States remains at historically high levels. Clinical approaches that are cost-effective and scalable for obesity reduction in children are a public health priority. However, interventions to improve BMI ...

(Boston) - Results of a new study led by Boston Medical Center (BMC) researchers, in collaboration with Harvard Medical School (HMS), indicate that the introduction of abuse-deterrent OxyContin, coupled with the removal of propoxyphene from the US prescription marketplace, may have played a role in decreasing opioid prescribing and overdoses. The findings, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, showed that these two changes led to a 19 percent drop in prescription opioid supply that was mirrored by a 20 percent drop in prescription opioid overdose between August 2010 and ...

Poor quality medicines are a real and urgent threat that could undermine decades of successful efforts to combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, according to the editors of a collection of journal articles published today. Scientists report up to 41 percent of specimens failed to meet quality standards in global studies of about 17,000 drug samples. Among the collection is an article describing the discovery of falsified and substandard malaria drugs that caused an estimated 122,350 deaths in African children in 2013. Other studies identified poor quality antibiotics, ...

Researchers from the University of Birmingham have identified an important new way in which our immune systems are regulated, and hope that understanding it will help tackle the debilitating effects of type 1 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and other serious diseases. The team discovered a novel pathway that regulates the movement of pathogenic immune cells from the blood into tissue during an inflammatory response. A healthy, efficient immune system ordinarily works to damp down inflammation and carefully regulate the magnitude of the response to infection and disease. ...

A University of Texas at Austin scientist, working with an international research team, has developed the most precise sequence map yet of U.S. cotton and will soon create an even more detailed map for navigating the complex cotton genome. The finding may help lead to an inexpensive version of American cotton that rivals the quality of luxurious Egyptian cotton and helps develop crops that use less water and fewer pesticides for a cotton that is easier on the skin and easier on the land. Z. Jeffrey Chen and his collaborators, Tianzhen Zhang and Wangzhen Guo at Nanjing ...

Using the latest genome sequencing techniques, a research team led by scientists from UC San Francisco (UCSF), Baylor College of Medicine, and Texas Children's Hospital has identified a new autoimmune syndrome characterized by a combination of severe lung disease and arthritis that currently has no therapy. The hereditary disorder, which appears in early childhood, had never been diagnosed as a single syndrome. The new research revealed that it is caused by mutations in a single gene that disrupt how proteins are shuttled around within cells. Patients with the newly ...

We often make quick strategic decisions to attack an opponent or defend our position, yet how we make them is not well understood. Now, researchers at the RIKEN Brain Science Institute in Japan have pinpointed specific brain regions related to this process by examining neural activity in people playing shogi, a Japanese form of chess. Published in Nature Neuroscience, the study shows that two different regions within the cingulate cortex--one toward the front of the brain and the other toward the back--separately encode the values of defensive and offensive strategies. Like ...

Large amounts of methane - whether as free gas or as solid gas hydrates - can be found in the sea floor along the ocean shores. When the hydrates dissolve or when the gas finds pathways in the sea floor to ascend, the methane can be released into the water and rise to the surface. Once emitted into the atmosphere, it acts as a very potent greenhouse gas twenty times stronger than carbon dioxide. Fortunately, marine bacteria exist that consume part of the methane before it reaches the water surface. Geomicrobiologists and oceanographers from Switzerland, Germany, Great Britain ...

New apps developed for children come online every day and many of them are marketed or labeled as "educational" - but how can we tell which of these thousands of apps will actually help children learn? A comprehensive new report published in Psychological Science in the Public Interest, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, integrates research from scientific disciplines like psychological science, linguistics, and neuroscience to provide an evidence-based guide that parents, educators, and app designers alike can use to evaluate the quality of so-called ...

HANOVER, N.H. - Although the media often portray the Arctic as a new "Great Game" ripe for conflict, a group of international Arctic experts co-chaired by Dartmouth College released recommendations today aimed at preserving the polar north as an area for political and military cooperation, sustainable development and scientific research. The report, which addresses the priorities of the Arctic Council, an intergovernmental forum of the eight nations that border the polar region, resulted from meetings at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, ...

Only three wolves seem to remain in Isle Royale National Park. Researchers from Michigan Technological University observed the wolves during their annual Winter Study, and the lone group, at an unprecedented low, is a sharp decline from nine wolves observed last winter. The study's report, released today, marks the project's 57th year of observing wolves and moose in Isle Royale. It is the longest running predator-prey study in the world. This year, along with the three resident wolves, scientists estimated 1,250 moose on the island and observed two visiting wolves, ...

Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators have found the probable mechanism underlying a previously described biomarker associated with the risk of developing serious diseases ranging from cancer to cardiovascular disease and the risk of serious complications. In a paper published in the American Journal of Hematology, the research team reports finding that higher levels of a measure routinely taken as part of the complete blood count - the extent of variation in the size of red blood cells - is caused by reduced clearance of aging cells from the bloodstream. Hundreds ...

When you take a medication for, say, high cholesterol, do you know that pill is really what the label says it is? Depending upon the type of medicine and where you live, the threat of falsified medications (also referred to as counterfeit, fraudulent, and substandard) can be quite real, yet the full scope and prevalence of the problem is poorly understood, say researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine in a new report published April 20 in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. Counterfeit medicines have traditionally been defined ...

DURHAM, N.C. -- While the female baboon's big red bottom may be an eyesore to some, it has an aphrodisiac effect on her mates. Biologists have long thought that baboon males prefer females with bigger backsides as the mark of a good mother, but new research suggests it isn't so simple. A study of wild baboons in southern Kenya reveals that the size of a female's swollen rump doesn't matter as much as previously thought. The study appears online in the journal Animal Behaviour. Baboons breed throughout the year, and mating occurs during times when a female's behind ...

ALEXANDRIA, VA, APRIL 20, 2015 - Higher-than-expected rates of pediatric cancers have been identified in the Miami metro area and an area west of the Everglades in a series of five statistical analyses conducted for Science and Public Policy, an open-access, online public-policy journal published by the American Statistical Association (ASA). In a review of the analyses for Science and Public Policy, Lance A. Waller, a biostatistics professor specializing in spatial epidemiology at Emory University in Atlanta, urges care in next steps, recommending that state and local ...

WASHINGTON, April 20, 2015 -- Wednesday, April 22 large-scale use of chemical weapons in warfare. Some of the best minds in chemistry at that time, including a Nobel Prize winner, used their knowledge of science to build humanity's new weapons of mass destruction. Reactions presents this sobering look at the chemistry behind the modern world's first chemical weapons. Check out the video here: http://youtu.be/e8W3dOURya0. Check out all of C&EN's great coverage of the 100th anniversary of chemical weapons at http://chemicalweapons.cenmag.org. INFORMATION:Subscribe to ...

PITTSBURGH--As people find ever more inventive uses for smartphones, touchscreens sometimes fall short as control surfaces. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and Disney Research have developed an inexpensive alternative - a toolbox of physical knobs, sliders and other mechanisms that can be readily added to any device. The researchers drew inspiration from wind instruments in devising these mechanisms, which they call Acoustruments. The idea is to use pluggable plastic tubes and other structures to connect the smartphone's speaker with its microphone. The device ...

ATLANTA -April 20, 2015- Despite strong evidence and guidelines supporting its use, post-surgical radiation therapy for prostate cancer patients at risk of recurrence is declining in the United States. The study, published online in the journal European Urology, finds fewer than 10 percent of patients at risk of recurrence received postoperative radiotherapy within six months of surgery in the U.S. Although radical prostatectomy (RP) is a common curative treatment for localized prostate cancer, about 30% of patients will develop biochemical recurrence after surgery, ...

The National Physical Laboratory (NPL), the UK's National Measurement Institute in collaboration with IBM and the University of Edinburgh, has used a new quantum model to reveal the molecular structure of water's liquid surface. The liquid-vapour interface of water is one of the most common of all heterogeneous (or non-uniform) environments. Understanding its molecular structure will provide insight into complex biochemical interactions underpinning many biological processes. But experimental measurements of the molecular structure of water's surface are challenging, ...