New York, NY - The female mosquitoes that spread dengue and yellow fever didn't always rely on human blood to nourish their eggs. Their ancestors fed on furrier animals in the forest. But then, thousands of years ago, some of these bloodsuckers made a smart switch: They began biting humans and hitchhiked all over the globe, spreading disease in their wake. "It was a really good evolutionary move," says Leslie B. Vosshall, the Robin Chemers Neustein Professor and head of the Laboratory of Neurogenetics and Behavior at The Rockefeller University, and a Howard Hughes Medical ...

As cities and incomes increase around the world, so does consumption of refined sugars, refined fats, oils and resource- and land-intense agricultural products such as beef. A new study led by University of Minnesota ecologist David Tilman shows how a shift away from this trajectory and toward healthier traditional Mediterranean, pescatarian or vegetarian diets could not only boost human lifespan and quality of life, but also slash greenhouse gas emissions and save habitat for endangered species. The study, published in the November 12 online edition of Nature by Tilman ...

Menlo Park, Calif. -- A study at the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory suggests for the first time how scientists might deliberately engineer superconductors that work at higher temperatures. In their report, a team led by SLAC and Stanford University researchers explains why a thin layer of iron selenide superconducts -- carries electricity with 100 percent efficiency -- at much higher temperatures when placed atop another material, which is called STO for its main ingredients strontium, titanium and oxygen. These findings, described today ...

Graphene is the miracle material of the future. Consisting of a single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a honeycomb lattice, the material is extremely stable, flexible, highly conductive and of particular interest for electronic applications. ETH Professor Tilman Esslinger and his group at the Institute for Quantum Electronics investigate artificial graphene; its honeycomb structure consists not of atoms, but rather of light. The researchers align multiple laser beams in such a way that they create standing waves with a hexagonal pattern. This optical lattice is then superimposed ...

A research team led by Jackson Laboratory Professors Frank McKeon, Ph.D., and Wa Xian, Ph.D., reports on the role of certain lung stem cells in regenerating lungs damaged by disease. The work, published Nov. 12 in the journal Nature, sheds light on the inner workings of the still-emerging concept of lung regeneration and points to potential therapeutic strategies that harness these lung stem cells. "The idea that the lung can regenerate has been slow to take hold in the biomedical research community," McKeon says, "in part because of the steady decline that is seen ...

The brain's ability to effectively deal with stress or to lack that ability and be more susceptible to depression, depends on a single protein type in each person's brain, according to a study conducted at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and published November 12 in the journal Nature. The Mount Sinai study findings challenge the current thinking about depression and the drugs currently used to treat the disorder. "Our findings are distinct from serotonin and other neurotransmitters previously implicated in depression or resilience against it," says the ...

Not long ago, it would have taken several years to run a high-resolution simulation on a global climate model. But using some of the most powerful supercomputers now available, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) climate scientist Michael Wehner was able to complete a run in just three months. What he found was that not only were the simulations much closer to actual observations, but the high-resolution models were far better at reproducing intense storms, such as hurricanes and cyclones. The study, "The effect of horizontal resolution on simulation ...

The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) can insert itself at different locations in the DNA of its human host - and this specific integration site determines how quickly the disease progresses, report researchers at KU Leuven's Laboratory for Molecular Virology and Gene Therapy. The study was published online today in the journal Cell Host & Microbe. When HIV enters the bloodstream, virus particles bind to and invade human immune cells. HIV then reprogrammes the hijacked cell to make new HIV particles. The HIV protein integrase plays a key role in this process: it ...

Details of the role of glutamate, the brain's excitatory chemical, in a drug reward pathway have been identified for the first time. This discovery in rodents - published today in Nature Communications - shows that stimulation of glutamate neurons in a specific brain region (the dorsal raphe nucleus) leads to activation of dopamine-containing neurons in the brain's reward circuit (dopamine reward system). Dopamine is a neurotransmitter present in regions of the brain that regulate movement, emotion, motivation, and feelings of pleasure. Glutamate is a neurotransmitter ...

HANOVER, N.H. - China's anti-logging, conservation and ecotourism policies are accelerating the loss of old-growth forests in one of the world's most ecologically fragile places, according to studies led by a Dartmouth College scientist. The findings shed new light on the complex interactions between China's development and conservation policies and their impact on the most diverse temperate forests in the world, in "Shangri-La" in northwest Yunnan Province. Shangri-La, until recently an isolated Himalayan hinterland, is now the epicenter of China's struggle to wed sustainable ...

The "surfactant" chemicals found in samples of fracking fluid collected in five states were no more toxic than substances commonly found in homes, according to a first-of-its-kind analysis by researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder. Fracking fluid is largely comprised of water and sand, but oil and gas companies also add a variety of other chemicals, including anti-bacterial agents, corrosion inhibitors and surfactants. Surfactants reduce the surface tension between water and oil, allowing for more oil to be extracted from porous rock underground. In a new ...

Action movies may drive box office revenues, but dramas and deeper, more serious movies earn audience acclaim and appreciation, according to a team of researchers. "Most people think that entertainment is just a silly diversion, but our research shows that entertainment is profoundly meaningful and moving for many people," said Mary Beth Oliver, Distinguished Professor in Media Studies and co-director of Media Effects Research Laboratory, Penn State. "It's not just types of entertainment that we usually think of as meaningful, such as poetry and dance, either, but also ...

Shark populations in the Mediterranean are highly divided, an international team of scientists, led by Dr Andrew Griffiths of the University of Bristol, has shown. Many previous studies on sharks suggest they move over large distances. But catsharks in the Mediterranean Sea appear to move and migrate much less, as revealed by this study. This could have important implications for conserving and managing sharks more widely, suggesting they may be more vulnerable to over-fishing than previously thought. The study, published in the new journal Royal Society Open Science, ...

Providing health information on the internet may not be the "cure all" that it is hoped to be. It could sideline especially those Americans older than 65 years old who are not well versed in understanding health matters, and who do not use the web regularly. So says Helen Levy of the University of Michigan in the US, who led the first-ever study to show that elderly people's knowledge of health matters, so-called health literacy, also predicts how and if they use the internet. The findings¹ appear in the Journal of General Internal Medicine², published by Springer. Substantial ...

Learning a new language changes your brain network both structurally and functionally, according to Penn State researchers. "Learning and practicing something, for instance a second language, strengthens the brain," said Ping Li, professor of psychology, linguistics and information sciences and technology. "Like physical exercise, the more you use specific areas of your brain, the more it grows and gets stronger." Li and colleagues studied 39 native English speakers' brains over a six-week period as half of the participants learned Chinese vocabulary. Of the subjects ...

The tree has been an effective model of evolution for 150 years, but a Rice University computer scientist believes it's far too simple to illustrate the breadth of current knowledge. Rice researcher Luay Nakhleh and his group have developed PhyloNet, an open-source software package that accounts for horizontal as well as vertical inheritance of genetic material among genomes. His "maximum likelihood" method, detailed this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, allows PhyloNet to infer network models that better describe the evolution of certain ...

Most community-based mental health providers are not well prepared to take care of the special needs of military veterans and their families, according to a new study by the RAND Corporation that was commissioned by United Health Foundation in collaboration with the Military Officers Association of America. The exploratory report, based on a survey of mental health providers nationally, found few community-based providers met criteria for military cultural competency or used evidence-based approaches to treat problems commonly seen among veterans. "Our findings suggest ...

A new study from The University of Texas at Arlington biologists examining non-genetic changes in water flea development suggests something human parents have known for years - ensuring a future generations' success often means sacrifice. Matthew Walsh, an assistant professor of biology, and his team looked at a phenomenon called "phenotypic plasticity" in the Daphnia abigua, or water flea. Phenotypic plasticity is when an organism changes its trait expressions or physical characteristics, or those of its offspring, because of external factors. In Daphnia, that can mean ...

Chemists at the University of Basel in Switzerland have succeeded in twisting a molecule by combining molecular strands of differing lengths. The longer strand winds around a central axis like a staircase banister, creating a helical structure that exhibits special physical properties. The results were published in the renowned scientific journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition. The chemistry of all substances is to a large extent defined by their spatial arrangement. Many molecules can be present in two forms (enantiomers), which behave like a person's right ...

November 12, 2014 - In preschool-aged children, a simple test performed in the ophthalmologist's or optometrist's office greatly overestimates the eye's ability to "flex and focus" in order to see small objects clearly, reports a study in the November issue of END ...

Nanomedicine is offering patients a growing arsenal of therapeutic drugs for a variety of diseases but often at a cost of thousands of dollars a month. Generics could substantially reduce the price tag for patients -- if only there were a well-defined way to make and regulate them. An article in Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society, details the challenges on the road to generic nanodrugs. Matt Davenport, a C&EN contributing editor, points out that in small-molecule therapeutics -- aspirin, for example -- the active ...

The loss of eyesight, often caused by retinal degeneration, is a life-altering health issue for many people, especially as they age. But a new development toward a prosthetic retina could help counter conditions that result from problems with this crucial part of the eye. Scientists published their research on a new device, which they tested on tissue from laboratory animals, in the ACS journal Nano Letters. Yael Hanein and colleagues point out that a growing range of medical devices has become available to treat conditions, including visual impairment, that involve sending ...

COLUMBIA, MO. - Sugar-sweetened beverages are the largest source of added sugar in the diets of adolescents in the United States, and young adults ages 15-20 consume more of these drinks than any other age group, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Adolescent obesity rates, which have quadrupled over the past thirty years, led to widespread scrutiny of added dietary sugars, especially those found in carbonated beverages. Now, MU researchers have found that short-term, moderate consumption of high-fructose and high-glucose beverages has little impact ...

INDIANAPOLIS -- People with a newly identified genetic variant perform better on certain types of memory tests, a discovery that may point the way to new treatments for the memory impairments caused by Alzheimer's disease or other age-associated conditions. In what the international research team is calling the largest study to date of human memory, an analysis of genomic data and memory test results from more than 14,000 older adults identified a location in the genome that was associated with better memory performance. The researchers noted that the gene has not been ...

VIDEO: Modeling used to forecast fluctuations in the stock market has been discovered to predict aspects of animal behavior. The movement of zebrafish when mapped is very similar to the stochastic... Click here for more information. In an unexpected mashup of financial and mechanical engineering, researchers have discovered that the same modeling used to forecast fluctuations in the stock market can be used to predict aspects of animal behavior. Their work proposes an unprecedented ...