The American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) has released new guidelines on the management of asymptomatic neoplastic pancreatic cysts found incidentally during computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). The author of a commentary being published in Annals of Internal Medicine explains how the AGA's bold new recommendations will affect the way physicians consider diagnostic testing. The new guidelines back away from previous recommendations that were more aggressive. Rather than promote invasive work-up, surveillance, or surgery for typical patients, ...

After six years of painstaking research, a UCLA-led team has validated the first standardized protocol for measuring one of the earliest signs of Alzheimer's disease -- the atrophy of the part of the brain known as the hippocampus. The finding marks the final step in an international consortium's successful effort to develop a unified and reliable approach to assessing signs of Alzheimer's-related neurodegeneration through structural imaging tests, a staple in the diagnosis and monitoring of the disease. The study is published in the journal Alzheimer's and Dementia. Using ...

MELBOURNE, FLA. -- Reef-building corals, already thought to be living near their upper thermal limits, are experiencing unprecedented declines as the world's oceans continue to warm. New evidence from scientists at Florida Institute of Technology shows there may be some climate refuges where corals will survive in the future. The study appears in the March issue of Global Change Biology. Ph.D. student Chris Cacciapaglia and his advisor, Robert van Woesik, hypothesized that not all regions of the oceans are warming at the same rate. "The idea was to identify regions ...

Tracking the rotation speed of solid planets, like the Earth and Mars, is a relatively simple task: Just measure the time it takes for a surface feature to roll into view again. But giant gas planets Jupiter and Saturn are more problematic for planetary scientists, as they both lack measureable solid surfaces and are covered by thick layers of clouds, foiling direct visual measurements by space probes. Saturn has presented an even greater challenge to scientists, as different parts of this sweltering ball of hydrogen and helium are known to rotate at different speeds, whereas ...

(New York - March 25, 2015) Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) -- adult cells reprogrammed back to an embryonic stem cell-like state--may better model the genetic contributions to each patient's particular disease. In a process called cellular reprogramming, researchers at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai have taken mature blood cells from patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and reprogrammed them back into iPSCs to study the genetic origins of this rare blood cancer. The results appear in an upcoming issue of Nature Biotechnology. In MDS, genetic mutations ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. - Deep-water marine fish living on the continental slopes at depths from 2,000 feet to one mile have liver pathologies, tumors and other health problems that may be linked to human-caused pollution, one of the first studies of its type has found. The research, conducted in the Bay of Biscay west of France, also discovered the first case of a deep water fish species with an "intersex" condition, a blend of male and female sex organs. The sampling was done in an area with no apparent point-source pollution, and appears to reflect general ocean conditions. The ...

DURHAM, N.C. -- The value of many oceanfront properties on the East Coast could drop dramatically if Congress were to suddenly end federal beach nourishment subsidies, a new study by researchers at three universities finds. In beach nourishment, new sand, often dredged from nearby inlets or the offshore sea floor, is added to an eroding beach to widen it and help prevent future erosion. "The expectation that the federal government will continue to provide subsidies for erosion-control measures has significantly inflated property values in many coastal communities," ...

Would-be participants of higher education must be given full and transparent advice before they accumulate debts as students that follow them into the workplace, according to a report published in the International Journal of Pluralism and Economics Education. Deborah Figart of the School of Education, at The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey in Galloway, says that there is a dearth of pre-loan and post-loan counseling for undergraduate students using student loans to help finance their higher education. She has devised an assignment that can be adapted to a wide ...

A new paper to be published in the journal Zootaxa (April 6, 2015) describes 30 new insect species in a single genus, Megaselia, of the fly family Phoridae. Describing 30 species in a single paper is rare, but what's especially striking is that all these come from urban Los Angeles. The discoveries come from researchers in the BioSCAN project (Biodiversity Science: City and Nature) at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County (NHM). The BioSCAN project is a three year investigation of patterns of biodiversity in and around urban Los Angeles, based on sampling ...

AUBURN, AL - In the production of organic vegetables, nitrogen is important, yet can be quite costly to manage. Nitrogen management is even more challenging when production practices call for the use of polyethylene mulch combined with fertigation. The authors of a new study published in HortScience have found that hydrolyzed fish fertilizer holds promise as an "economically feasible" nitrogen source for growing organic vegetables. "Soluble organic nitrogen sources suitable for fertigation in organic vegetable production are much needed," said lead author of the study, ...

(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) -- In an editorial posted online today in the Annals of Emergency Medicine, two practicing emergency medicine physicians from the University of California, Davis, and Brown University -- both thought leaders at the forefront of finding solutions to the public health crisis of gun violence -- urge their colleagues to take direct action to protect the health and safety of patients and communities. Their editorial follows the Feb. 24 call to action by eight health professional organizations, including the American College of Emergency Physicians, and ...

In the year since the World Health Organization (WHO) was first notified of an outbreak of what proved to be Ebola virus disease in the west African country of Guinea, more than 24,000 cases have been reported and over 10,000 individuals have died - primarily in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Moreover, countless non-Ebola deaths have occurred as a result of the closing of health systems in those countries, and an international aid effort has invested billions of dollars in control efforts. In a paper published in the open-access journal PLOS Medicine, experts in ...

NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite captured an image of the remnants of Tropical Cyclone Nathan over the southern Top End of Australia's Northern Territory on March 25. On March 25, the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (ABM) issued a Severe Weather Warning for heavy rainfall for people in the Daly, Arnhem, Carpentaria and Gregory forecast districts of Top End. The Top End contains the region's capital city of Darwin, and is home to Kakadu National Park, the country's largest national park. For updated watches and warnings, visit: http://www.bom.gov.au/cyclone/. When Suomi ...

Getting a good education may not improve your life chances of happiness, according to new mental health research from the University of Warwick. In a new study published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, researchers from Warwick Medical School examined socioeconomic factors related to high mental wellbeing, such as level of education and personal finances. Low educational attainment is strongly associated with mental illness but the research team wanted to find out if higher educational attainment is linked with mental wellbeing. The team found all levels of ...

Mobile devices have a large number of different adjustable system settings whose energy impact can be difficult to understand for the average user, and even for the expert. Some system settings have a direct and significant correlation with energy consumption, for example screen brightness and network connectivity. The energy impact of system settings and their combinations, such as the combination of roaming, high operating temperature, and bad signal strength, are much more difficult to predict. The research article by the Finnish computer scientists demonstrates that ...

An analysis conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future (CLF) found that the risks of drinking raw (unpasteurized) cow's milk are significant. Consumers are nearly 100 times more likely to get foodborne illness from drinking raw milk than they are from drinking pasteurized milk. In fact, the researchers determined that raw milk was associated with over half of all milk-related foodborne illness, even though only an estimated 3.5% of the U.S. population consumes raw milk. Based on their findings, the researchers discourage the consumption ...

DETROIT - Co-existing psychiatric illness should be considered in assessing hospital readmissions for three common medical conditions used by Medicare and Medicaid to penalize hospitals with "excessive" readmission rates. That was the conclusion of a newly published collaborative study by 11 major U.S. healthcare providers - including Henry Ford Health System - affiliated with the nationwide Mental Health Research Network (MHRN). The study is published in Psychiatric Services. The subject of readmission rates has been of increasing concern to U.S. hospitals since ...

Scientists at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health report that children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) were two-and-a-half times more likely to have persistent gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms as infants and toddlers than children with typical development. Results are published in JAMA Psychiatry. The study is based on a large longitudinal survey of Norwegian mothers who were asked about their child's GI disturbances during the first three years of life. Questionnaires were completed when the children were 18 and 36 months of age. The authors ...

Gastrointestinal symptoms reported by mothers were more common and more often persistent in the first three years of life in children with autism spectrum disorder than in children with typical development and developmental delay, according to an article published online by JAMA Psychiatry. Autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) are characterized by problems in social communication and interaction, as well as restricted/repetitive behaviors. Medical and psychiatric conditions are frequently associated with ASD and among the most common are gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms and ...

A new analysis of surgical outcomes nationwide concludes that more use of minimally invasive surgery for certain common procedures can dramatically reduce post-operative complications and shave hundreds of millions of dollars off the nation's health care bill. Results of the research, conducted by Johns Hopkins investigators and published March 25 in JAMA-Surgery, indicate that American hospitals collectively could prevent thousands of post-surgical complications and save between $280 million and $340 million a year by using more minimally invasive procedures instead ...

A small imaging study suggests prenatal exposure to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), the toxic air pollution caused in part by vehicle emissions, coal burning and smoking, may be bad for children's brains and may contribute to slower processing speeds and behavioral problems, including attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder (ADHD) symptoms, according to an article published online by JAMA Psychiatry. PAHs are caused by the incomplete combustion of organic materials. In addition to outdoor air pollution, sources of indoor air pollution caused by PAHs can be cooking, ...

A variety of dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) interventions helped to reduce suicide attempts and nonsuicidal self-injury acts in a randomized clinical trial of women with borderline personality disorder who were highly suicidal, according to an article published online by JAMA Psychiatry. DBT is a multicomponent therapy for individuals at high risk for suicide and for those with multiple severe mental disorders, particularly those who have marked impulsivity and an inability to regulate emotions. The components of DBT include individual therapy, group skills training, ...

Magnetic nanoparticles can open the blood-brain barrier and deliver molecules directly to the brain, say researchers from the University of Montreal, Polytechnique Montréal, and CHU Sainte-Justine. This barrier runs inside almost all vessels in the brain and protects it from elements circulating in the blood that may be toxic to the brain. The research is important as currently 98% of therapeutic molecules are also unable to cross the blood-brain barrier. "The barrier is temporary opened at a desired location for approximately 2 hours by a small elevation of the temperature ...

BETHESDA, MD, USA and VIENNA, AUSTRIA - Two of the world's largest professional societies of human geneticists have issued a joint position statement on the promise and challenges of non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT), a new procedure to test blood drawn from pregnant mothers for Down syndrome and other chromosomal disorders in the fetus. The document addresses the current scope of and likely future improvements in NIPT technology, ways it may best fit with existing prenatal screening tools and protocols, options and priorities in its implementation, and associated social ...

This news release is available in French. Montreal, March 25, 2015 -- "Create a password" is a prompt familiar to anyone who's tried to buy a book from Amazon or register for a Google account. Equally familiar is that red / yellow / green bar that rates the new password's strength. But when those meters give the go-ahead to passwords like Password1+, their effectiveness is called into question. New research from Concordia University exposes the weakness of password strength meters, and shows consumers should remain sceptical when the bar turns green in order to create ...