The dreaded scratch or puncture test is the most common way of assessing allergic reactions to as many as 40 different substances at once. But because the test involves needles that prick multiple points along the skin's surface, it's a particularly high-stress examination for children -- and their understandably anxious parents. A new study by Tel Aviv University researchers provides the first quantitative analysis of the role of "medical clowns" in assuaging the anxiety and pain felt by children undergoing allergy tests. The research, published in Allergy, was conducted ...

Far too many "teachable moments" are lost in a doctor's office during which young adults with hypertension could have learned how to reduce their blood pressure. In fact, only one in every two hypertensive young Americans does in fact receive such advice and guidance from a healthcare provider within a year from being diagnosed, says Heather M. Johnson of the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in the US. She led a study which examined how regularly such education is provided and documented by one of the ten largest physician practice groups in ...

A major new Series on health and ageing, published in The Lancet, warns that unless health systems find effective strategies to address the problems faced by an ageing world population, the growing burden of chronic disease will greatly affect the quality of life of older people. As people across the world live longer, soaring levels of chronic illness and diminished wellbeing are poised to become a major global public health challenge. Worldwide, life expectancy of older people continues to rise. By 2020, for the first time in history, the number of people aged 60 years ...

A car powered by its own body panels could soon be driving on our roads after a breakthrough in nanotechnology research by a QUT team. Researchers have developed lightweight "supercapacitors" that can be combined with regular batteries to dramatically boost the power of an electric car. The discovery was made by Postdoctoral Research Fellow Dr Jinzhang Liu, Professor Nunzio Motta and PhD researcher Marco Notarianni, from QUT's Science and Engineering Faculty - Institute for Future Environments, and PhD researcher Francesca Mirri and Professor Matteo Pasquali, from Rice ...

Toronto, ON - For most cancer patients, primary tumours are often not the most deadly. Instead, it is the metastatic tumours - tumours that spread from their original location to other parts of the body - that are the cause of most cancer deaths. The catalysts behind the formation of these deadly metastatic tumours are believed to be cancer cells that are launched into the bloodstream from the original site of the cancer. Researchers are very interested in leveraging these circulating tumour cells, or CTCs, which have the potential to allow the properties of a tumour ...

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has snapped a striking view of a multiple star system called XZ Tauri, its neighbour HL Tauri, and several nearby young stellar objects. XZ Tauri is blowing a hot bubble of gas into the surrounding space, which is filled with bright and beautiful clumps that are emitting strong winds and jets. These objects illuminate the region, creating a truly dramatic scene. This dark and ominous landscape is located some 450 light-years away in the constellation of Taurus The Bull). It lies in the north-eastern part of a large, dark cloud known ...

Engineers at the University of California, San Diego, are proposing a new surgical intervention for children born with a single ventricle in their heart--instead of the usual two. The new approach would potentially reduce the number of surgeries the patients have to undergo in the first six months of life from two to just one. If successful, it would also create a more stable circuit for blood to flow from the heart to the lungs and the rest of the body within the first days and months of life. Engineers ran computer simulations of the surgery and found it would reduce ...

Scientists at Helmholtz Zentrum München (HMGU), at Karolinska Institutet (KI), Stockholm and the University College London investigated the function of ciliary cell extensions in the pancreas. Stimulation of the insulin-producing beta cells increases the number of insulin receptors on their cilia. The cilia consequently play an important role in the release and signal transduction of insulin, a hormone that reduces sugar levels. Defective cilia lead to elevated blood sugar levels and lowered insulin release The lead author of the paper Dr. Jantje Gerdes, formerly ...

Human-caused climate change, ocean acidification and species extinctions may eventually threaten the collapse of civilization, according to some scientists, while other people argue that for political or economic reasons we should allow industrial development to continue without restrictions. In a new paper, two astrophysicists argue that these questions may soon be resolvable scientifically, thanks to new data about the Earth and about other planets in our galaxy, and by combining the earth-based science of sustainability with the space-oriented field of astrobiology. "We ...

This news release is available in German. "The technique makes it possible for the first time to remove large organic molecules from associated structures and place them elsewhere in a controlled manner," explains Dr. Ruslan Temirov from Jülich's Peter Grünberg Institute. This brings the scientists one step closer to finding a technology that will enable single molecules to be freely assembled to form complex structures. Research groups around the world are working on a modular system like this for nanotechnology, which is considered imperative for the ...

New research reports that the rate of hospitalization due to hepatitis A virus (HAV) infection has significantly declined in the U.S. from 2002 to 2011. Findings published in Hepatology, a journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, show that older patients and those with chronic liver disease are most likely to be hospitalized for HAV. Vaccination of adults with chronic liver disease may prevent infection with hepatitis A and the need for hospitalization. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that each year 1.4 million individuals worldwide ...

A genetically diverse mouse model is able to predict the range of response to chemical exposures that might be observed in human populations, researchers from the National Institutes of Health have found. Like humans, each Diversity Outbred mouse is genetically unique, and the extent of genetic variability among these mice is similar to the genetic variation seen among humans. Using these mice, researchers from the National Toxicology Program (NTP), an interagency program headquartered at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), were able to identify ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 6, 2014--Short-term certificate programs at community colleges offer limited labor-market returns, on average, in most fields of study, according to new research published today in Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis (EEPA), a peer-reviewed journal of the American Educational Research Association. The results of the study, which focused on community college programs in Washington State, are in line with recent research in other states (Kentucky, North Carolina, and Virginia) that found only small economic returns from short-term programs. ...

WASHINGTON, DC (November 6, 2014)--In honor of Veterans Day, the peer-reviewed journal Women's Health Issues (WHI) today released a new Special Collection on women veterans' health, with a focus on mental health. The special collection also highlights recent studies addressing healthcare services, reproductive health and cardiovascular health of women veterans. "In recent years, we have seen the Veterans Administration working to improve care and health outcomes of women veterans and service members," said Chloe Bird, editor-in-chief of Women's Health Issues. "The studies ...

Paramedics respond to a 911 call to find an elderly patient who's having difficulty breathing. Anxious and disoriented, the patient has trouble remembering all the medications he's taking, and with his shortness of breath, speaking is difficult. Is he suffering from acute emphysema or heart failure? The symptoms look the same, but initiating the wrong treatment regimen will increase the patient's risk of severe complications. Researchers from MIT's Research Laboratory of Electronics, working with physicians from Harvard Medical School and the Einstein Medical Center in ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Power outages have never been more costly. Electricity is critical to communication, transportation, commerce and national security systems, and wide-spread or prolonged outages have the potential to threaten public safety and cause millions, even billions, of dollars in damages. "It doesn't seem that dire until a storm hits, or somebody makes a mistake, and then you are risking a blackout," said Inara Scott, an assistant professor in the College of Business at Oregon State University. "You have to consider the magnitude of the potential harm ...

High-speed reading of the genetic code should get a boost with the creation of the world's first graphene nanopores - pores measuring approximately 2 nanometers in diameter - that feature a "built-in" optical antenna. Researchers with Berkeley Lab and the University of California (UC) Berkeley have invented a simple, one-step process for producing these nanopores in a graphene membrane using the photothermal properties of gold nanorods. "With our integrated graphene nanopore with plasmonic optical antenna, we can obtain direct optical DNA sequence detection," says Luke ...

ATLANTA, GA (November 6, 2014) – Whether allergy sufferers have symptoms that are mild or severe, they really only want one thing: relief. So it's particularly distressing that the very medication they hope will ease symptoms can cause different, sometimes more severe, allergic responses. According to a presentation at the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI) Annual Scientific Meeting, an allergic response to a medication for allergies can often go undiagnosed. The presentation sheds light on adverse responses to topical skin preparations; ...

Berlin, Germany (November, 2014) – A specimen of the ancient horse Eurohippus messelensis has been discovered in Germany that preserves a fetus as well as parts of the uterus and associated tissues. It demonstrates that reproduction in early horses was very similar to that of modern horses, despite great differences in size and structure. Eurohippus messelensis had four toes on each forefoot and three toes on each the hind foot, and it was about the size of a modern fox terrier. The new find was unveiled at the 2014 Annual Meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology ...

VIDEO: Scientists at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF) are growing the first American chestnut trees that can withstand the blight that virtually eliminated the once-dominant tree from... Click here for more information. SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Scientists at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF) are growing the first American chestnut trees that can withstand the blight that virtually eliminated the once-dominant tree from the eastern ...

WASHINGTON, DC, November 6, 2014 -- Go to almost any American high school and the elements of teen social networks become quickly apparent: the cliques, the pecking orders, and the varying degrees of self-segregation by race, age, gender, and social status. For years, sociologists have identified seemingly universal human instincts that spur this kind of sorting. These include the desires for familiarity and certainty; for control and dominance; and for security and support. But as ubiquitous as those instincts are, students in some schools form more cliquish, hierarchical, ...

North Carolina State University researchers have developed technology that allows cyborg cockroaches, or biobots, to pick up sounds with small microphones and seek out the source of the sound. The technology is designed to help emergency personnel find and rescue survivors in the aftermath of a disaster. The researchers have also developed technology that can be used as an "invisible fence" to keep the biobots in the disaster area. "In a collapsed building, sound is the best way to find survivors," says Dr. Alper Bozkurt, an assistant professor of electrical and computer ...

Berlin, Germany (November, 2014) – A new study, which teamed cutting-edge engineering techniques with paleontology, has found that take-off capacity may have determined body size limits in extinct flying reptiles. The research simulated pterodactyl flight using computer modeling, and will be presented at the upcoming Society of Vertebrate Paleontology meeting in Berlin. Findings suggest that a pterodactyl with a wingspan of 12m or more would simply not be able to get off the ground. Pterosaurs (commonly known as pterodactyls) were truly giants of the sky. With ...

For ALMA's first observations in its new and most powerful mode, researchers pointed the antennas at HL Tauri — a young star, about 450 light-years away, which is surrounded by a dusty disc [1]. The resulting image exceeds all expectations and reveals unexpectedly fine detail in the disc of material left over from star birth. It shows a series of concentric bright rings, separated by gaps [2]. "These features are almost certainly the result of young planet-like bodies that are being formed in the disc. This is surprising since such young stars are not expected to ...

Astronomers have captured the best image ever of planet formation around an infant star as part of the testing and verification process for the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array's (ALMA) new high-resolution capabilities. This revolutionary new image reveals in astonishing detail the planet-forming disk surrounding HL Tau, a Sun-like star located approximately 450 light-years from Earth in the constellation Taurus. ALMA uncovered never-before-seen features in this system, including multiple concentric rings separated by clearly defined gaps. These structures ...