Being the center of attention can have its drawbacks. For female chimpanzees, being around too many rowdy males is disadvantageous when foraging for food, an effect that can ultimately interfere with her reproductive ability. These are some of the findings of an 11-year-long study of wild East African chimpanzees in Uganda, led by Melissa Emery Thompson of the University of New Mexico in the US. It is published in Springer's journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology. Female chimpanzees have an exceedingly slow reproductive schedule, and only give birth every five to ...

New Rochelle, NY, October 7, 2014—Low sexual desire is common among both pre- and post-menopausal women. It can cause personal distress, harm relationships, and have a negative impact on body image and self confidence. Yet few women seek medical care for this condition, and the reasons are explored in a timely article in Journal of Women's Health, a peer-reviewed publication from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available free on the Journal of Women's Health website at http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/jwh.2014.4743 until November 7, ...

Winston-Salem, N.C. – Sept. Oct. 7, 2014 – Children who start toilet training before age 2 have a three times higher risk of developing daytime wetting problems later, according to new research at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center. "Parents who train their children early to meet preschool deadlines, to save landfills from diapers or because they think toddlers are easier to train should know there can be serious repercussions," says lead author Steve Hodges, M.D., an associate professor of pediatric urology at Wake Forest Baptist. The study, reported ...

ROSEMONT, Ill.—Physical therapy after total hip (THR) or total knee replacement (TKR) surgery is standard care for all patients. A new study, appearing in the October 1 issue of the Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery (JBJS), also found that physical therapy before joint replacement surgery, or "prehabilitation," can diminish the need for postoperative care by nearly 30 percent, saving an average of $1,215 per patient in skilled nursing facility, home health agency or other postoperative care. Approximately 50 million U.S. adults have physician-diagnosed arthritis. ...

San Francisco, CA, October 7, 2014 – Liquid laundry and dishwasher detergent pods are an emerging source of chemical exposure in children. When squeezed or bitten into, these pods can burst and send detergent into the mouth, nose, and eyes. A new report published in the current issue of the Journal of the American Association for Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus (AAPOS) cautions that these products should be kept away from children because the bursting detergent pods can cause significant corneal injury. Detergent pods may offer a simpler way to do laundry, ...

Studying rats as model subjects, scientists found that adolescents were at an increased risk of suffering negative health effects from sugar-sweetened beverage consumption. Adolescent rats that freely consumed large quantities of liquid solutions containing sugar or high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) in concentrations comparable to popular sugar-sweetened beverages experienced memory problems and brain inflammation, and became pre-diabetic, according to a new study from USC. Neither adult rats fed the sugary drinks nor adolescent rats who did not consume sugar had the same ...

Research on zoantharians, a group of animals related to corals and anemones, by researchers James Reimer of the University of the Ryukyus in Okinawa, Japan, Angelo Poliseno of Universita Politecnica delle Marche in Italy, and Bert Hoeksema from Naturalis Biodiversity Center, Netherlands, has demonstrated how little we know about marine diversity in the so-called "center of marine biodiversity" located in the central Indo-Pacific Ocean. The study was published in the open access journal ZooKeys. The researchers utilized previously collected specimens from Indonesia, ...

Philadelphia, PA, October 6, 2014 – Sandwiches make up a substantial part of the American diet and are a significant contributor to daily energy and sodium intake. By closely analyzing data from the federal nationwide dietary intake survey known as "What We Eat in America NHANES 2009-2010," a team of Department of Agriculture (USDA) researchers found that on any given day 49 percent of U.S. adults eat at least one sandwich, and sandwiches account for one-fifth of total daily sodium intake. The study was conducted by USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS) investigators ...

Infrared satellite imagery from NASA's Aqua satellite shows what looks like an arm from Tropical Storm Simon's northern quadrant, reaching over Baja California to mainland Mexico. Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center noted that Simon is just an "arm's reach" to the southern U.S. and expect rainfall and rough surf to affect that area of the country. On Oct. 6 at 0347 UTC (Oct. 5 at 11:47 p.m. EDT) the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder called AIRS that flies aboard NASA's Aqua satellite captured cloud top temperature data on Simon. On band of thunderstorms wrapping into ...

Over the weekend of Oct. 5 and 6, Typhoon Phanfone's center made landfall just south of Tokyo and passed over the city before exiting back into the Northwestern Pacific Ocean. NASA's Aqua satellite captured a picture of the typhoon as Tokyo braced for its large eye. On its way to mainland Japan, Phanfone struck Kadena Air Base on the island of Okinawa. According to the website for U.S. Air Force Kadena Air Base, "One Airman is confirmed deceased and two more are missing after they were washed out to sea from the northwest coast of Okinawa at about 3:45 p.m. Oct. 5. An ...

Typhoon Vongfong has exited the Mariana Islands. Now, as the island of Iwo To begins recovery from Typhoon Phanfone, NASA's Aqua satellite is eyeing Typhoon Vongfong over 1,000 miles south of Iwo To. Although Vongfong is expected to turn north toward Iwo To, it is forecast to stay west of the island on its track. On Oct. 6 at 0347 UTC (Oct. 5 at 11:47 p.m. EDT) the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder called AIRS that flies aboard NASA's Aqua satellite captured cloud top temperature data on Vongfong. AIRS data showed strongest thunderstorms within the typhoon circled the center ...

The XMASS collaboration, led by Yoichiro Suzuki at the Kavli IPMU, has reported its latest results on the search for warm dark matter. Their results rule out the possibility that super-weakly interacting massive bosonic particles (bosonic super-WIMPs) constitute all dark matter in the universe. This result was published in the September 19th issue of the Physical Review Letters as an Editors' Suggestion. The universe is considered to be filled with dark matter, which cannot be observed by ordinary light. Although much evidence supports the existence of dark matter, it ...

Researchers at UC San Francisco have found that a nurse-led intervention program designed to reduce readmissions among ethnically and linguistically diverse older patients did not improve 30-day hospital readmission rates. Their findings suggest hospitals evaluate such programs before implementing or continuing. Their study is in the Oct. 7 issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. "The lack of effect in this population, which was well connected to primary care, suggests reducing readmissions is challenging," said co-lead author L. Elizabeth Goldman, MD, MCR, associate ...

Native American ancestry is associated with a lower asthma risk, but African ancestry is associated with a higher risk, according to the largest-ever study of how genetic variation influences asthma risk in Latinos, in whom both African and Native American ancestry is common. The study, led by UC San Francisco researchers, was published online October 6, 2014 in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. Although differences in the environments in which people live often are suspected when asthma risks among populations differ, the new findings illustrate the importance ...

Walter and Eliza Hall Institute scientists have discovered a small molecule that blocks a form of cell death that triggers inflammation, opening the door for potential new treatments for inflammatory disease such as rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn's disease and psoriasis. The researchers made the discovery while investigating how a protein called MLKL kills cells in a process known as necroptosis. Their findings were published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Necroptosis is a recently discovered cell death pathway linked to immune disorders. ...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 7, 2014 — Organic chemistry: It's among the most feared courses undergraduate science students take. Whether you call it "orgo" or "o-chem," it has reduced many hopeful scholars to tears. One professor thinks he has a solution. William Dichtel, Ph.D., of Cornell University shares his thoughts on making organic chemistry classes more interesting and relevant to students in the newest episode of Prized Science from the American Chemical Society. Watch the interview at http://youtu.be/A6j1qAOOeHs. Subscribe to the ACS channel at http://bit.ly/ACSYoutube ...

Based on current scientific literature, gastrostomy tube (G-tube) placement or other long-term enteral access devices should be withheld or withdrawn in patients with advanced dementia or other near end-of-life conditions, according to a special report published today in the OnlineFirst version of Nutrition in Clinical Practice (NCP), the official journal of the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (A.S.P.E.N.). Written by the International Clinical Ethics Section of A.S.P.E.N., the report suggests that advanced dementia be seen by health care providers ...

Past research shows physical beauty can be detrimental to women applying for masculine jobs. But belles can put the brakes on discrimination by acknowledging their looks during an interview, according to a new study led by the University of Colorado Boulder. The paper, published in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, is the first to provide a method for curtailing such prejudice against attractive women. In the study, when an attractive woman applied for a job typically filled by men -- a construction job -- and said, "I know I don't look like your ...

This news release is available in German. Because of the deforestation of tropical rainforests in Brazil, significantly more carbon has been lost than was previously assumed. As scientists of the Hemholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ) write in the scientific journal Nature Communications, the effect of the degradation has been underestimated in fragmented forest areas, since it was hitherto not possible to calculate the loss of the biomass at the forest edges and the higher emission of carbon dioxide. The UFZ scientists have now closed this knowledge gap. ...

If a scientist has a good reputation among his colleagues, other scientists are more likely to cite his publications. According to a study, reputation is crucial for the impact of publications. Author reputation is key in driving a paper's citation count early in its life cycle, before a tipping point, after which reputation has much less influence compared to the paper's citation count, says Aalto University Professor Santo Fortunato, pointing out that this is a key finding of the study. Quality – not quantity – of publications build authors' reputation As ...

The results of a four-year international study of 2060 cardiac arrest cases across 15 hospitals published and available now on ScienceDirect. The study concludes: The themes relating to the experience of death appear far broader than what has been understood so far, or what has been described as so called near-death experiences. In some cases of cardiac arrest, memories of visual awareness compatible with so called out-of-body experiences may correspond with actual events. A higher proportion of people may have vivid death experiences, but do not recall them due ...

A new study suggests that drops of fuel spilled at gas stations — which occur frequently with fill-ups — could cumulatively be causing long-term environmental damage to soil and groundwater in residential areas in close proximity to the stations. Few studies have considered the potential environmental impact of routine gasoline spills and instead have focused on problems associated with large-scale leaks. Researchers with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, publishing online Sept. 19 in the Journal of Contaminant Hydrology, developed a mathematical ...

Washington, DC—A researcher who found that testosterone raised the risk of prostate tumors and exacerbated the effects of carcinogenic chemical exposure in rats is urging caution in prescribing testosterone therapy to men who have not been diagnosed with hypogonadism, according to a new study published in the Endocrine Society's journal Endocrinology. Testosterone use has soared in the last decade among older men seeking to boost energy and feel younger. One study published in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism found that the number of American men ...

Until now, if you want to print a greeting card for a loved one, you can use colorful graphics, fancy typefaces or special paper to enhance it. But what if you could integrate paper-thin displays into the cards, which could be printed at home and which would be able to depict self-created symbols or even react to touch? Those only some of the options computer scientists in Saarbrücken can offer. They developed an approach that in the future will enable laypeople to print displays in any desired shape on various materials and therefore could change everyday life completely. For ...

In a ground-breaking research project at the University of Gothenburg, seven Swedish women have had embryos reintroduced after receiving wombs from living donors. Now the first transplanted woman has delivered a baby – a healthy and normally developed boy. The world-unique birth was acknowledged in The Lancet on 5 October. The uterus transplantation research project at the University of Gothenburg started in 1999 and has been evaluated in over 40 scientific articles. The goal of the Gothenburg project is to enable women who were born without a womb or who have lost ...