A new study found that sexual function in adult living donors was lower at the evaluation phase and at three months following liver transplantation. Results published in Liver Transplantation, a journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases and the International Liver Transplantation Society, suggest that donor education prior to surgery may improve recovery and ease concerns about sexual function following the transplant. Living liver donors provide a healthy portion of their liver to an individual with end-stage liver disease. These donors make ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Researchers have identified two seemingly unrelated but strong predictors of obesity: having low self-esteem related to one's weight and keeping food visibly available around the house, outside the kitchen. The Ohio State University study focused primarily on determining whether the home environment - architectural features and food storage and availability - was associated with obesity, but also measured a number of psychological factors. While architectural features had no relationship to obesity status, several food-related findings did. People in ...

In reconstructive and esthetic medicine, a technique called cell-assisted lipotransfer, i.e., the grafting of the patient's own adipose tissue to another site in the body after mixing with autologous stem cells, is being increasingly used and aggressively promoted. This technique has not been shown to yield better outcomes than conventional lipotransfer without cell enrichment, as discussed by Soraya Grabin and coauthors in a current article in Deutsches Ärzteblatt International (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2015; 112: 255-61). The vitally important matter of safety--in particular, ...

San Francisco, CA, April 28, 2015 - Many eye disorders in young children are asymptomatic and may remain undetected without testing. Since effective treatments are available for many of those conditions, early identification and intervention are critical to prevent potentially permanent vision problems. A new report published in the Journal of the American Association for Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus (AAPOS) describes the effectiveness of a new computer-based vision-screening test, the Jaeb Visual Acuity Screener (JVAS), which is suitable for use in schools and ...

Amsterdam, April 28, 2015 - The demise of Neanderthals may have nothing to do with innovative hunting weapons carried by humans from west Asia, according to a new study published in the Journal of Human Evolution. The researchers, from Nagoya University and The University of Tokyo, Japan, say their findings mean that we may need to rethink the reasons humans survived Neanderthals - and that we may not have behaved as differently as we thought. The researchers looked at innovative stone weapons used by humans about 42,000-34,000 years ago. Traditionally, anthropologists ...

EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK, Fla.-- The largest and longest Burmese Python tracking study of its kind -- here or in its native range -- is providing researchers and resource managers new information that may help target control efforts of this invasive snake, according to a new study led by the U.S. Geological Survey. Among the findings, scientists have identified the size of a Burmese python's home range and discovered they share some "common areas" that multiple snakes use. "These high-use areas may be optimal locations for control efforts and further studies on the ...

People starting to plan for retirement or other big goals should pull out a calculator and multiply the years ahead by 365. Measuring time in days instead of months, or months instead of years, can make future events seem closer and thus more urgent, according to new research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. When units of time were manipulated to bring important events closer to the forefront psychologically, people reported that they should start to plan and save significantly earlier, even when future events ...

When a mirror reflects light, it experiences a slight push. This radiation pressure can be increased considerably with the help of a small superconducting island. This was revealed by the joint research done in the Aalto University and the Universities of Jyväskylä and Oulu. The finding paves a way for the studies of mechanical oscillations at the level of a single photon, the quantum of light. The results of the research were published in Nature Communications in April. In our everyday lives, the effects of the radiation pressure of light can be neglected. ...

Physicists have shown how heat can be exploited for controlling magnetic properties of matter. The finding helps in the development of more efficient mass memories. The result was published yesterday in Physical Review Letters. The international research group behind the breakthrough included Finnish researchers from the University of Jyväskylä and Aalto University. The ability to control the huge amount of information within the Internet is largely based on the ability to use the magnetic properties of electrons for reading memory devices. The phenomenon is ...

To meet the demands of 2020, the 5G research has attracted global attention and made remarkable progress. 5G will be the first meaningful unified wideband mobile communication system. A recent research has systematically overviewed the latest progress on the 5G research and highlighted the network architecture and several promising techniques which could be employed in the future 5G systems. The research also foresees potential research keypoints and directions. The related research paper "Key techniques for 5G wireless communications: network architecture, physical layer, ...

Researchers from the University of Liverpool have used mathematical equations to shed new light on how flowing fluid hinders the movement of bacteria in their search for food. Many bacteria are mobile and inhabit a variety of dynamic fluid environments: from turbulent oceans to medical devices such as catheters. Mathematicians from the Universities of Liverpool and Manchester developed a new set of equations to study how flowing fluid affected the movement of bacteria and how the swimming behaviour of the bacteria themselves affected their travel. Bacteria can ...

New research has indicated that obesity in children has quite different causes at different ages. The research, led by the University of Exeter Medical School and part of the internationally respected EarlyBird Study, could have far-reaching implications for attempts to reduce the global epidemic of childhood obesity, as it indicates that very different approaches may be needed at various stages of development. In a study published today (Monday April 27) in the International Journal of Obesity, scientists compared data on contemporary children with those of the 1980's. ...

Quantum particles behave in strange ways and are often difficult to study experimentally. Using mathematical methods drawn from game theory, physicists of Ludwig-Maximilias-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich have shown how bosons, which like to enter the same state, can form multiple groups. When scientists explore the mysterious behavior of quantum particles, they soon reach the limits of present-day experimental research. From there on, progress is only possible with the aid of theoretical ideas. NIM investigator Professor Dr. Erwin Frey and his team at the Dept. of Statistical ...

Silicon (Si) is the second most abundant element of the earth`s crust after oxygen. It has long been neglected by ecologists, as it is not considered an essential nutrient for plants. However, research of recent years showed that it is beneficial for the growth of many plants, including important crops such as rice, wheat and barley. For instance, Si enhanced the resistance against pests, pathogens and abiotic stresses such as salts, drought and storms. Silicon might, thus, play a crucial role in the development of `sustainable` rice production systems with lower or ...

Emory scientists have adapted an antiviral enzyme from bacteria called Cas9 into an instrument for inhibiting hepatitis C virus in human cells. The results were published Monday April 27, 2015 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Cas9 is part of the CRISPR genetic defense system in bacteria, which scientists have been harnessing to edit DNA in animals, plants and even human cells. In this case, Emory researchers are using Cas9 to put a clamp on RNA, which hepatitis C virus uses for its genetic material, rather than change cells' DNA. Although several ...

Many experimental and clinical data have demonstrated that antibiotic-resistance pathogens, such as Escherichia coli (E. coli) and Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus), may play a vital role in priming chronic inflammation. There is thus a great need to develop novel antibacterial materials, and particularly those that are less likely to lead to bacterial resistance. Now, in a paper appearing recently in Science Bulletin, a team of scientists at the National Center for Nanoscience and Technology, China, led by Guangjun Nie and Yuliang Zhao, has designed and synthesized biocompatible ...

The autonomous locomotion for a macroscopic machine remains an intriguing issue for the researchers to explore. Recently, Professor LIU Jing and his group from Tsinghua University demonstrated that as a versatile material, the liquid metal could be self-actuated when fueled with aluminum (Al) flake, and the motion thus enabled would persist for more than an hour at a quite high velocity. Based on the previous study, the present work proposed to realize a much larger liquid metal machine, which could autonomously move and accelerate with the increase of temperature. More ...

Stark disparities by race, education and literacy Slower medication refills and access to lab results Harder to keep doctors informed about chronic conditions CHICAGO -- Online sites that offer secure access to one's medical record, often referred to as patient portals, are increasingly important for doctor and patient communication and routine access to health care information. But patient portals could widen the gap in health disparities among the most vulnerable patients, according to a new Northwestern Medicine study. Patients with low health literacy, less ...

University of Sydney geoscientists have helped prove that some of the ocean's underwater volcanoes did not erupt from hot spots in the Earth's mantle but instead formed from cracks or fractures in the oceanic crust. The discovery helps explain the spectacular bend in the famous underwater range, the Hawaiian-Emperor seamount chain, where the bottom half kinks at a sixty degree angle to the east of its top half. "There has been speculation among geoscientists for decades that some underwater volcanoes form because of fracturing," said Professor Dietmar Muller, from ...

ROCHESTER, Minn. -- Herceptin has been touted as a wonder drug for women with HER2-positive breast cancer, an aggressive form of the disease that is fueled by excess production of the HER2 protein. However, not all of these patients respond to the drug, and many who do respond eventually acquire resistance. A team of researchers led by Mayo Clinic has found a promising way to circumvent this obstacle. They identified a small site in the HER2 protein that enables it to form a molecular switch that sets off a cascade of events that turn normal cells cancerous. The researchers ...

Westport, CT, April 28, 2015 - In a time when the FDA and state attorneys general are questioning the ingredients and claims of dietary supplements, Americans are looking for assurance that any medicine they use will really work. Infirst Healthcare USA is taking steps, through clinical testing, to ensure that its over-the-counter liquid cold and cough relief medicines, made with FDA-authorized ingredients, are truly effective. Newly published in the International Journal of Clinical Pharmacy (February 2015), the study - conducted by leading cough researcher, Peter Dicpinigaitis, ...

The American Geriatrics Society (AGS) today released updates to several of its recommendations for the ABIM Foundation's Choosing Wisely® campaign, which raises professional and public awareness about treatments and tests to question and discuss because they may lack efficacy or cause potential harm. The AGS's updates reflect an expert review of new research on several important conditions impacting older adults, including agitation, certain types of cancer, delirium, dementia, diabetes, insomnia, unintended weight loss, and certain other health concerns that may warrant ...

For reef-building corals, sponges do not make good neighbors. Aggressive competitors for space, sponges use toxins, mucus, shading, and smothering to kill adjacent coral colonies and then grow on their skeletons. A recent survey of coral reefs across the Caribbean shows that overfishing removes the predators of sponges, greatly increasing the threat of fast-growing sponges to an already diminished population of corals. A research team headed by Dr. Joseph Pawlik at UNC Wilmington surveyed reefs from 12 countries across the Caribbean, comparing 25 sites where fish abundance ...

SAN DIEGO - Girls are diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) later than boys, possibly because females exhibit less severe symptoms, according to a study to be presented Tuesday, April 28 at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in San Diego. To study gender differences in age at diagnosis and compare symptom severity between boys and girls, researchers at the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore, Md., analyzed data from the Institute's Interactive Autism Network. This online registry includes almost 50,000 individuals and family members affected ...

SAN DIEGO - Many suspected victims of child sexual abuse are sharing sexually explicit photos and videos via their cell phones and social media, and are receiving online sexual solicitations, according to a study to be presented Tuesday, April 28 at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in San Diego. Previous research has shown that youths with a history of sexual victimization may be at increased risk for online sexual solicitations, leading to revictimization. Researchers, led by Corey Rood, MD, sought to describe the prevalence of "sexting" (sending ...