What The Study Did: This observational study assessed CRISPR-based methods for screening to detect SARS-CoV-2 among asymptomatic college students. Authors: Carolina Arias, Ph.D., of the University of California, Santa Barbara, 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.2020.37129) Editor's Note: The article includes funding/support 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: ...

What The Study Did: Changes in otolaryngology surgical volumes in the United States early on in the COVID-19 pandemic are described in this study. Authors: Anirudh Saraswathula, M.D., M.S., of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, 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/jamaoto.2020.5472) Editor's Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest ...

What The Viewpoint Says: How pandemic-related disruptions may adversely impact progress toward a gender-balanced workforce in academic oncology is described in this article, which also offers possible solutions to mitigate the problem in this specialty. Authors: Reshma Jagsi, M.D., D.Phil., of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, 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/jamaoncol.2020.7681) Editor's Note: The article includes conflicts 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 ...

Your brain is constantly evaluating which aspects of your experiences to either remember for later, ignore, or forget. Dartmouth researchers have developed a new approach for studying these aspects of memory, by creating a computer program that turns sequences of events from a video into unique geometric shapes. These shapes can then be compared to the shapes of how people recounted the events. The study provides new insight into how experiences are committed to memory and recounted to others. The results are published in Nature Human Behavior and were based on how people remembered the experience of watching an episode of Sherlock, a BBC television show. "When we represent experiences and memories as shapes, we can use the tools ...

Considered the most lethal form of DNA damage, double-strand breaks must be repaired to prevent cell death. In developing therapies for hard-to-treat breast and ovarian cancers in patients with BRCA gene mutations, scientists aim to identify ways to keep cancer cells from using DNA break repair pathways. New findings demonstrate a previously-unknown capability for polymerase theta (pol theta) - a key enzyme in this repair function - that shows promise as a new avenue for treatment development. The study results are published in Molecular Cell. Researchers at the University of Vermont (UVM), The University of Texas MD Anderson ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. - A survey of more than 18,000 land parcels spanning 2 million square miles across 63 countries shows that a "protected area" designation reduces the rate of deforestation but does not prevent it. Published today in Nature Ecology and Evolution, the findings are important because most terrestrial species live in forests and because the study suggests that just 6.5% of the Earth's woodlands are truly protected, well below the 2020 target of 17% set by the United Nations' Convention on Biological Diversity. The findings are also timely given President Biden's recent executive order on climate change, which calls for protecting 30% of the United States' ...

Observations of lithium and potassium around white dwarf stars point to remains of rocky planet crusts Analysis by astronomers led by University of Warwick shows chemical composition of crusts is very similar to Earth's continental crust The outer layers of the white dwarfs contain up to 300,000 gigatonnes of rocky debris, which includes up to 60 gigatonnes of lithium and 3,000 gigatonnes of potassium These white dwarfs are among the oldest stars in our galaxy, and could host one of the oldest planetary systems discovered so far Remnants of planets with Earth-like crusts have been discovered in the atmospheres of four nearby white dwarf stars by University of Warwick astronomers, offering a glimpse of the planets that may have once orbited ...

BOSTON -- Sleep and health are inextricably connected. New research from investigators at Brigham and Women's Hospital explores the connection between sleep disturbances and deficiencies among older adults and risk of dementia and death, finding that risk of dementia was double among participants who reported getting less than five hours of sleep compared to those who reported 7-8 hours of sleep per night. The team also found associations between sleep disturbance and sleep deficiency with overall risk of death. Results are published in Aging. "Our findings illuminate a connection between sleep deficiency and risk of dementia and confirm the importance of efforts to help older individuals obtain ...

Combination of pine scent and ozone as super source of particulate emissions from coniferous forests Scientists have managed to figure out why conifer forests produce so many fine particles into the atmosphere. Aerosol particles are particularly abundant when ?-pinene, the molecule responsible for the characteristic pattern of pine trees reacts with atmospheric ozone. Atmospheric aerosol particles affect the Earth's climate by forming clouds, but at the same time they also pollute the air, thereby increasing mortality. Aerosol particles in the atmosphere have their origins in many sources. The significant amount of aerosol particles in the atmosphere is caused ...

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is the most common neurological disease in young adults, affecting more than 2 million individuals worldwide, with about 1500 cases in Estonia. About 20% of MS patients experience optic neuritis (ON) as the presenting symptom, but not all ON patients develop MS. The TalTech gene technology research unit, in collaboration with the laboratory of Protobios OÜ and medical researchers of the University of Helsinki, published their findings in the prestigious journal of EBioMedicine entitled "Identification of two highly antigenic epitope markers predicting multiple sclerosis in optic neuritis patients". The lead author Helle Sadam and co-authors Mariliis Jaago and Annika ...

Ithaca, NY--The European House Sparrow has a story to tell about survival in the modern world. In parts of its native range in Europe, House Sparrow numbers are down by nearly 60%. Their fate in the U.S. and Canada is less well known. A new study by Cornell Lab of Ornithology scientists aims to clarify the status of this non-native species, using 21 years of citizen science data from the Cornell Lab's Project FeederWatch. The results are published in the Wilson Journal of Ornithology. "We wanted to find out where and how much House Sparrows might be declining here," explains lead author Liam Berigan, who did this work while at the Cornell Lab and who is now a Ph.D. student at the University of Maine. "We also explored whether the declines would match up with an increase in hawk ...

The CIPD is today launching a new research report, co-authored by the University of Bath's Dr Luke Fletcher, to highlight how LGBT+ workers tend to have a more negative experience of work. 'Inclusion at work: Perspectives on LGBT+ working lives' draws on data from the CIPD's UK Working Lives Survey and a separate survey of trans workers to explore their perspectives on working life, hence the intentional use of LGB+ rather than LGBT, in the research findings: Over 40% of LGB+ workers experienced a conflict at work over a twelve-month period, compared with 29% of heterosexual workers. Conflicts typically involve being undermined/ humiliated or discriminatory behaviour aimed at a protected characteristic. More than half (55%) of trans workers surveyed said they had experienced conflict ...

A commercially available genomic test may help oncologists better determine which patients with recurrent prostate cancer may benefit from hormone therapy, according to new research from the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center and 15 other medical centers. Researchers studied prostate cancer samples from 352 participants in the NRG/RTOG 9601 clinical trial, which compared radiation therapy alone with radiation therapy combined with hormone therapy. The investigators found that the Decipher test, which measures the activity of 22 genes among seven known cancer pathways, independently estimated the participants' risk of metastasis, death from prostate cancer and overall ...

The PCR test is the most accurate tool to identify SARS-CoV-2. However, valid results are often available only after days. Moreover, the laboratory must be well equipped, have trained personnel and sufficient financial resources. All of this is usually a problem in Africa. A portable suitcase could help. In cooperation with several African universities, scientists at Leipzig University have found that this mini-laboratory provides test results that are almost as good as a PCR test - and almost in real time. The researchers have now published their findings in the journal "Analytical Chemistry". The compact case could provide rapid coronavirus test results in regions of ...

Neuroblastomas are malignant solid tumours that occur mainly in early childhood. They arise from degenerated immature cells of the sympathetic nervous system. One prognostic marker to assess the malignancy of the tumour is the MYCN oncogene. High-risk neuroblastoma patients often have amplification of MYCN, i.e. very high levels of this protein, which drives uncontrolled tumour growth. Conversely, inhibiting MYCN or its function could be a promising therapeutic opportunity. An important step towards this direction was taken by an international research project led by scientists ...

A urine test based on University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center research could have avoided one third of unnecessary prostate cancer biopsies while failing to detect only a small number of cancers, according to a validation study that included more than 1,500 patients. The findings appear in the March issue of the Journal of Urology. The MyProstateScore test, which is being commercialized by LynxDX, a U-M startup company, measures levels of cancer-specific genes in a patient's urine. It is based on U-M research that discovered that half of all prostate tumors harbor a certain ...

Among firearm-owning individuals who died by suicide, handgun ownership was associated with greater odds of having died by self-inflicted gunshot wound rather than by another method, according to a Rutgers researcher. The study, published in the Archives of Suicide Research, surveyed surviving loved ones of 121 handgun and shotgun owners who died by suicide -- 93 of whom died with a firearm and 28 who died through other means -- and asked about the numbers and types of firearms the individuals had and the circumstances of their deaths. The researchers found that 77 percent of those who died using a firearm, as well as 61 percent of those who died using another method, owned a handgun. They also found that 88.8 percent of individuals who only owned handguns used a firearm in their ...

Superconductors -- materials that conduct electricity without resistance -- are remarkable. They provide a macroscopic glimpse into quantum phenomena, which are usually observable only at the atomic level. Beyond their physical peculiarity, superconductors are also useful. They're found in medical imaging, quantum computers, and cameras used with telescopes. But superconducting devices can be finicky. Often, they're expensive to manufacture and prone to err from environmental noise. That could change, thanks to research from Karl Berggren's group in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. The researchers are developing a superconducting nanowire, which could enable more efficient superconducting electronics. The ...

It is no secret that U.S. politics is polarized. An experiment conducted by MIT researchers now shows just how deeply political partisanship directly influences people's behavior within online social networks. Deploying Twitter bots to help examine the online behavior of real people, the researchers found that the likelihood that individuals will follow other accounts on Twitter triples when there appears to be a common partisan bond involved. "When partisanship is matched, people are three times more likely to follow other accounts back," says MIT professor David Rand, co-author of a new paper detailing the study's results. "That's a really big effect, and clear evidence of how important a role partisanship plays." The finding helps reveal ...

A new largescale genetic analysis has found biological mechanisms that contribute to making people more susceptible to muscle weakness in later life, finding that diseases such as osteoarthritis and diabetes may play a large role in susceptibility. As we get older we lose muscle strength, and in some people this severe weakness impacts their ability to live everyday lives, a condition called sarcopenia. Around 10 per cent of people over 50 experience sarcopenia. Many causes thought to impact likelihood of developing this weakness, which is linked to higher death rates. In a genetic analysis of over 250,000 people aged over 60 from UK Biobank and 21 other cohorts, an international team led by researchers at the University of Exeter ...

WASHINGTON -- Researchers have created a new plasmonic metasurface that achieves record high light efficiency over the entire centimeter-scale metasurface. The advance makes the new nanostructured thin film practical for use in a variety of applications from light-based communication to fluorescence-based biosensing. "The major obstacles for using plasmonic structures for practical applications is that they are either too inefficient or their nanoscale properties aren't easily scalable to larger sizes," said research team leader Maiken H. Mikkelsen from Duke University. "We designed ...

DURHAM, N.C. - Visible and infrared light can carry more data than radio waves, but has always been confined to a hard-wired, fiber-optic cable. Working with Facebook's Connectivity Lab, a Duke research team has now made a major advance toward the dream of ditching the fiber in fiber optics. While working to create a free-space optical communication system for high-speed wireless internet, the researchers also show that speed and efficiency properties previously demonstrated on tiny, single-unit plasmonic antennas can also be achieved on larger, centimeter-scale devices. The research appears online Feb. 11 in the journal Optica. In 2016, researchers from Internet.org's Connectivity Lab--a subsidiary of Facebook--outlined a new type of light detector that could ...

A total of 1.1 million bitcoin were stolen in the 2013-2017 period. Given the current price for Bitcoin exceeding $40,000, the corresponding monetary equivalent of losses is more than $44 billion highlighting the societal impact of this criminal activity. The question arises how does the uncertainty in the Bitcoin market - measured by its volatility - respond to such cyberattacks. A recently published research article from Dr. Klaus Grobys (University of Vaasa, Finland) in the well-known journal Quantitative Finance addresses this question. In his study, he examined 29 hacking incidents that occurred in the Bitcoin market in the 2013-2017 period. A surprising result of this study is that Bitcoin volatility does not respond to hackings with a subsequent ...

Research from the University of Kent, Goethe-University in Frankfurt am Main, and the Philipps-University in Marburg has provided crucial insights into the biological composition of SARS-CoV-2, the cause of COVID-19, revealing vital clues for the discovery of antiviral drugs. Researchers compared SARS-CoV-2 and the closely related virus SARS-CoV, the cause of the 2002/03 SARS outbreak. Despite being 80% biologically identical, the viruses differ in crucial properties. SARS-CoV-2 is more contagious and less deadly, with a fatality rate of 2% compared to SARS-CoV's 10%. Moreover, SARS-CoV-2 can be spread by asymptomatic individuals, whereas SARS-CoV was only transmitted by those who were already ill. Most functions in cells are carried ...

A team of researchers studying the effectiveness of different types of face masks has found that in order to provide the best protection against COVID-19, the fit of a mask is as important, or more important, than the material it is made of. The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, carried out a series of different fit tests, and found that when a high-performance mask - such as an N95, KN95 or FFP2 mask - is not properly fitted, it performs no better than a cloth mask. Minor differences in facial features, such as the amount of fat under the skin, make significant differences in how well a mask fits. The results, published in the journal PLoS ONE, also suggest that the fit-check routine used in many healthcare settings has high failure rates, as minor leaks ...