Alexandria, VA - As this summer's blockbuster movie season gets underway, EARTH Magazine asks an important question: In movies, "are geologists portrayed as heroes or villains?" The topic of how geologists are portrayed in film has been oft-debated around a campfire, or over a frosty beverage at the end of a day of fieldwork, but now four scientists bring some serious analysis to the subject in the June issue feature, "Rock Stars - Geologists on the Silver Screen." The authors - all geologists in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden ...

Hercules, CA -- May 29, 2015 -- Researchers at Harvard Medical School and the Digital Biology Center at Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc. have developed a rapid, scalable, and cost-effective method for chromosomal phasing that provides researchers with a new method to determine if genetic variants are linked on the same chromosome. Using Bio-Rad's Droplet Digital PCR (ddPCRTM) technology, the Drop-Phase method can rapidly determine the chromosomal phase of allelic markers hundreds of kilobases apart. This ability may provide new insights into the cause, penetrance, and severity ...

In a report of a proof-of-principle study of patients with colon and other cancers for whom standard therapies failed, researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center say that mistakes in so-called mismatch repair genes, first identified by Johns Hopkins and other scientists two decades ago, may accurately predict who will respond to certain immunotherapy drugs known as PD-1 inhibitors. Such drugs aim to disarm systems developed by cancer cells to evade detection and destruction by immune system cells. Results of the trial with pembrolizumab, marketed as Keytruda, ...

The recent floods in Texas have caused some of the worst flooding since Hurricane Ike in 2008, causing the rainiest month in the state's history. What lessons have been learned from Ike's devastation of the Galveston and Houston area, and how have they helped in the prediction of future such storms? Researchers at the Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin have been studying computational models and simulations of hurricanes like Ike in order to predict the consequences of such natural disasters and better prepare ...

PHOENIX -- If you are over age 75, and taking an anticoagulant, the old standard may be the gold standard, Mayo Clinic researchers and collaborators have determined. In a study released online in April in the BMJ, a team of researchers from Mayo Clinic, and other collaborators, showed that for older patients, particularly individuals greater than 75 years of age, the risk of gastrointestinal (GI) bleeding is 3 to 5 times higher when taking newer anticoagulant medications dabigatran or rivaroxaban compared to when using warfarin. One of the most common reasons people ...

At a traditional stone-laying ceremony outside La Serena, Chile on April 14th, construction officially began of the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). This ambitious international astrophysics project is slated to start scanning the heavens in 2022. When it does, LSST should open up the "dark universe" of dark matter and dark energy--the unseen substance and force, respectively, composing 95 percent of the universe's mass and energy--as never before. On April 2, 2015, the Director of LSST, Steven Kahn, along with astrophysicist Sarah Bridle and theoretical physicist ...

The study, published May 29 in the open access Nature Publishing Group journal Scientific Reports, reveals a direct link between the main culprit of Alzheimer's disease and memory loss. Alzheimer's disease is characterized by the formation of amyloid plaques in the brain tissue. These amyloid plaques are made up of an insoluble protein, 'Amyloid-beta' (Abeta), which forms small structures called 'oligomers' that are important in the disease progression. Although these proteins are known to be involved in Alzheimer's, little is understood about how they lead to memory ...

Stanford University scientists have created a new carbon material that significantly boosts the performance of energy-storage technologies. Their results are featured on the cover of the journal ACS Central Science. "We have developed a 'designer carbon' that is both versatile and controllable," said Zhenan Bao, the senior author of the study and a professor of chemical engineering at Stanford. "Our study shows that this material has exceptional energy-storage capacity, enabling unprecedented performance in lithium-sulfur batteries and supercapacitors." According to ...

One of the main health targets proposed by the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) is to reduce by one-third premature mortality from non-communicable diseases such as cancer, stroke and dementia. The goals for 2016-2030 define premature mortality as deaths occurring among people aged 69 years old or younger. The proposed SDG target sends an unambiguous statement to UN member states that health provision for younger groups must be prioritised at the expense of people aged 70 or more, according to the international group of signatories of the letter published in The ...

May 29, 2015 - Researchers are exploring new approaches to designing prosthetic hands capable of providing "sensory feedback." Advances toward developing prostheses with a sense of touch are presented in a special topic article in the June issue of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery®, the official medical journal of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS). Emerging sensory feedback techniques will provide some sensation and enable more natural, intuitive use of hand prostheses, according to the review by ASPS Member Surgeon Paul S. Cederna, MD, of University ...

May 29, 2015 - As in adults, migraine surgery is effective for selected adolescent patients with severe migraine headaches that don't respond to standard treatments, reports a study in the June issue of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery®, the official medical journal of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS). ASPS Member Surgeon Bahman Guyuron, MD, Emeritus professor of plastic surgery at Case School of Medicine, Cleveland, and colleagues report good outcomes in an initial experience with migraine surgery in younger patients. They write, "Our data demonstrate ...

May 29, 2015 - People with dementia and other forms of cognitive impairment (CI) have altered responses to pain, with many conditions associated with increased pain sensitivity, concludes a research review in PAIN®, the official publication of the International Association for the Study of Pain. The journal is published by Wolters Kluwer. The available evidence questions the previous notion that people with CI have reduced pain sensitivity to pain. Rather, "It appears that those with widespread brain atrophy or neural degeneration...all show increased pain responses ...

The 54-question Trauma Symptoms Checklist for Children (TSCC) has been used for decades to test how trauma affects youth in hopes of developing the best treatment and support possible. But interpreting the results can be labor intensive and difficult because the work is done manually and involves a complex matrix from which to draw conclusions. Now, a Case Western Reserve University social work research team, led by Fredrick Butcher, PhD, a research associate at the Semi J. and Ruth W. Begun Center for Violence Prevention Research and Education, has proposed and tested ...

(WASHINGTON, May 29, 2015) - A new report demonstrates that clinical and genetic factors affecting dose requirements for warfarin vary by race. The study, published online today in Blood, the Journal of the American Society of Hematology (ASH), proposes race-specific equations to help clinicians better calculate warfarin dosage. Warfarin is the most widely used blood thinning medication, or anticoagulant, prescribed to prevent stroke and to treat blood clots. Determining the optimal warfarin dose to prevent clots while avoiding dangerous bleeding is difficult. To ensure ...

Cosmetics is an important industry worldwide and has attained high levels of sophistication. There are over 10,000 components that can be used to make cosmetics; so it is essential to monitor these components to guarantee consumer safety. Regulation 1223/2009 approved by the European Union in 2009 established a list of components that guarantee consumer safety as well as certain conditions for using these components, such as maximum concentration and what type of products they can be used in. In his Ph.D. thesis, the researcher Josu López of the Department of Applied ...

Singapore -- Scientists from A*STAR's Bioinformatics Institute (BII) have developed an analytical model and computational tool to rapidly and accurately predict the occurrence and locations of R-loop Forming Sequences (RLFSs) in any genome or artificial nucleic acid sequences. R-loops, which are three-stranded RNA and DNA hybrid structures, can be crucial to many normal biological processes and have also been associated with triggering mutations, DNA breaks and diseases. These hybrid structures provide intriguing possibilities for use as novel targets for diagnostics and ...

CLEVELAND: Researchers from University Hospitals Case Medical Center Seidman Cancer Center and Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine will present data from several new studies, including a study evaluating a potential novel combination treatment for cancer patients with advanced solid tumors and a first-of-its-kind analysis of gene mutations in small cell lung cancer (SCLC), at the 51st American Society for Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting in Chicago. Jennifer Eads, MD, oncologist at UH Seidman Cancer Center, will present data from a Phase 1 clinical ...

Simple measures of kidney function and damage may be just as good at predicting who is at risk for heart failure and death from heart attack and stroke as traditional tests of cholesterol levels and blood pressure, new Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health-led research suggests. Publishing in the Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology on May 29, the researchers say their data may help physicians make better decisions about whether patients need lifestyle modifications such as better diets and more exercise or treatments such as statins, medication widely used for ...

The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology is pleased to announce that the following paper will be published to coincide with presentation at the 52nd ERA-EDTA Congress, taking place in London, UK, May 28 - 31, 2015. Estimated glomerular filtration rate and albuminuria for prediction of cardiovascular outcomes: a collaborative meta-analysis, Coresh et al The usefulness of estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR, a test used to check how well the kidneys are filtering blood) and albuminuria (excess protein levels in the urine, which can be a sign of kidney damage) for prediction ...

.tg {border-collapse:collapse;border-spacing:0;} .tg td{font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;padding:10px 5px;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;overflow:hidden;word-break:normal;} .tg th{font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-weight:normal;padding:10px 5px;border-style:solid;border-width:1px;overflow:hidden;word-break:normal;} SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, May 29, 2015 - Myriad Genetics, Inc. (NASDAQ: MYGN) today announced new clinical studies on its myChoice HRD companion diagnostic test at the 2015 American Society of Clinical Oncology annual ...

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, May 29, 2015 - Myriad Genetics, Inc. (NASDAQ: MYGN) today announced it will highlight several new clinical studies on its myRisk Hereditary Cancer molecular diagnostic test at the 2015 American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting being held in Chicago, Ill. The myRisk Hereditary Cancer test assesses 25 genes for mutations associated with eight hereditary cancers. Finding deleterious mutations in these genes can help patients with cancer receive appropriate medical care and reduce the risk of second cancers, while patients without cancer ...

Super-sharp observations with the telescope Alma have revealed what seems to be a gigantic flare on the surface of Mira, one of the closest and most famous red giant stars in the sky. Activity like this in red giants - similar to what we see in the Sun - comes as a surprise to astronomers. The discovery could help explain how winds from giant stars make their contribution to our galaxy's ecosystem. New observations with Alma have given astronomers their sharpest ever view of the famous double star Mira. The images clearly show the two stars in the system, Mira A and ...

In the first study of its kind, veterans and civilians with traumatic brain injury showed improved cognitive performance and psychological and neural health following strategy-based cognitive training. The Department of Defense-funded study, published this week in Neuropsychological Rehabilitation, was conducted by an interdisciplinary team of cognitive neuroscientists, rehabilitation specialists, and neuroimaging experts from the Center for BrainHealth at The University of Texas at Dallas. "Veterans and others who have sustained traumatic brain injuries often experience ...

Article Spotlight features summaries written in collaboration with authors of recently published articles by the Journals Program of the American Psychological Association. The articles are nominated by the editors as noteworthy to the scientific community. Mass shootings have a significant impact on our individual and collective psyche, especially when they happen at schools. Despite the fact that children die every day from gun violence, school shootings upset us in ways that are difficult to comprehend. In our minds, schools serve as safe havens for children. When ...

One recent spring day, John Durban, a NOAA Fisheries marine mammal biologist, stood on the California coast and launched an unmanned aerial vehicle into the air. The hexacopter--so called because it has six helicopter-type rotors--zipped over the ocean and hovered above a gray whale mother and her calf. The pair was migrating north from their calving grounds off Baja California, Mexico, to their summer feeding grounds in the Arctic. NOAA Fisheries scientists have stood at this point of land each year for the past 22 years, binoculars in hand, to estimate the number of ...