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Environment3 Sep 2015

Pollution dispersion in cities improved by trees, research shows

Study examines trees in Leicester City Pollution levels for pedestrians reduced by seven per cent in city environment Highlights importance of trees in urban planning decisions Trees in cities throughout the UK could be significantly improving the quality of the air we breathe by decreasing pollution levels for pedestrians, researchers from the University of Leicester have revealed. The team from the University of Leicester's Department of Physics and Astronomy found that trees have a regionally beneficial impact by increasing turbulence and reducing ambient ...

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Earth Science3 Sep 2015

UNH research: Crop rotation boosts soil microbes, benefits plant growth

In the first study of its kind, new research from the University of New Hampshire shows that crop rotations, in isolation from other management factors, can increase the functions performed by soil microbial communities that benefit plant growth. The study was conducted by researchers with the New Hampshire Agricultural Experiment Station. The study was conducted by Lisa Tiemann, former postdoctoral student, Stuart Grandy, who was Tiemann's postdoctoral advisor, and Marshall McDaniel, former postdoctoral student of Grandy, all of the UNH Department of Natural Resources ...

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Medicine3 Sep 2015

Do antipsychotic medications affect cortical thinning?

Philadelphia, PA, September 3, 2015 - People diagnosed with schizophrenia critically rely upon treatment with antipsychotic medications to manage their symptoms and help them function at home and in the workplace. But despite their benefits, antipsychotic medications might also have some negative effects on brain structure or function when taken for long periods of time. In fact, "the role played by antipsychotic treatment on the pathophysiologic trajectory of brain abnormalities in schizophrenia is currently a matter of lively debate," explains Dr. Antonio Vita, Professor ...

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Environment3 Sep 2015

Metallic gels produce tunable light emission

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--Researchers at MIT have developed a family of materials that can emit light of precisely controlled colors -- even pure white light -- and whose output can be tuned to respond to a wide variety of external conditions. The materials could find a variety of uses in detecting chemical and biological compounds, or mechanical and thermal conditions. The material, a metallic polymer gel made using rare-earth elements, is described in a paper in the Journal of the American Chemical Society by assistant professor of materials science and engineering Niels Holten-Andersen, ...

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Environment3 Sep 2015

X-rays reveal fossil secrets

A sophisticated imaging technique has allowed scientists to virtually peer inside a 10-million-year-old sea urchin, uncovering a treasure trove of hidden fossils. The international team of researchers from the United Kingdom, Spain and Germany, including Dr Imran Rahman from the University of Bristol, studied the exceptional specimen with the aid of state-of-the-art X-ray computed tomography (CT). Their results show that the sea urchin fossil was riddled with borings made by shelled invertebrates called bivalves. These fossilized boring bivalves were preserved inside ...

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Science3 Sep 2015

DC needle exchange program prevented 120 new cases of HIV in 2 years

WASHINGTON, DC (September 3, 2015)-- The District of Columbia's needle exchange program prevented 120 new cases of HIV infection and saved an estimated $44 million over just a two-year period, according to a first-of-a-kind study published today by researchers at the Milken Institute School of Public Health (Milken Institute SPH) at the George Washington University. "Our study adds to the evidence that needle exchange programs not only work but are cost-effective investments in the battle against HIV," says Monica S. Ruiz, PhD, MPH, an assistant research professor in ...

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Medicine3 Sep 2015

Drug for fungal infections in lung transplant recipients increases risk for cancer, death

Voriconazole, a prescription drug commonly used to treat fungal infections in lung transplant recipients, significantly increases the risk for skin cancer and even death, according to a new study by UC San Francisco researchers. The team recommends physicians consider patient-specific factors that could modify the drug's risks and benefits, when providing care. Their study appears online Sept. 3, 2015, in the American Journal of Transplantation. "It is important for physicians to be aware of the impact of voriconazole on these outcomes," said senior author Sarah Arron, ...

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Science3 Sep 2015

Arabs or Jews, children who need pain relief in the ER get it

WASHINGTON -- Children with broken bones or joint dislocations in northern Israel emergency departments received equal pain treatment, regardless of their ethnicity or the ethnicity of the nurses who treated them, even during a period of armed conflict between the two ethnic groups. An investigation of potential disparities in pediatric emergency department pain relief in northern Israel was published online today in Annals of Emergency Medicine (""Emergency Department Pain Management in Pediatric Patients with Fracture or Dislocation in a Bi-Ethnic Population"). "The ...

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Social Science3 Sep 2015

Hiring more minority teachers in schools gives fairer perception of discipline

SAN FRANCISCO -- Black students in schools with more black teachers have more positive attitudes and higher perceptions of fairness in school discipline, according to a new study that includes a University of Kansas researcher. The study also found white students who attend schools with a higher number of minority teachers are more likely to believe discipline from school officials is fair as well. "Increasing the proportion of minority teachers in a school enhances all students' perceptions of school discipline fairness," said Don Haider-Markel, professor and chair ...

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Medicine2 Sep 2015

Who gets a transplant organ

Imagine 12 patients who need new kidneys, and six kidneys available. How would you allocate them? New research by Rutgers social psychologists suggests your answer would depend on how the patients and their situations are presented to you. In research recently published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, Gretchen Chapman and Jeff DeWitt of Rutgers and Helen Colby of the University of California-Los Angeles found that people make dramatically different decisions about who should receive a transplant depending on whether the ...

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Science2 Sep 2015

Taking apart termite mounds

As animal architects go, the average termite doesn't have many tools at their disposal - just their bodies, soil and saliva. And as guidance, variations in wind speed and direction and daily fluctuations in temperature as the sun rises and sets. Despite such limitations, the tiny insects have managed build structures that are efficiently ventilated - a challenge that human architects still struggle with. Led by L. Mahadevan, Lola England de Valpine Professor of Applied Mathematics, of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, and of Physics, a team of researchers that ...

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Science2 Sep 2015

Supply signals critical to firms' profitability

RIVERSIDE, Calif. -- Advance supply signals, such as financial health and production viability, contain rich information on supplier conditions. When and how these signals should be used is critical for improving firms' forecast and profitability. A recent paper, "Dynamic Supply Risk Management with Signal-Based Forecast, Multi-Sourcing, and Discretionary Selling," provides mathematical tools and management principles on this issue. The authors, Long Gao (from University of California, Riverside School of Business Administration), Nan Yang and Renyu Zhang (both from ...

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Medicine2 Sep 2015

Texas A&M team finds neuron responsible for alcoholism

Scientists have pinpointed a population of neurons in the brain that influences whether one drink leads to two, which could ultimately lead to a cure for alcoholism and other addictions. A study, published in the Journal of Neuroscience by researchers at the Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine, finds that alcohol consumption alters the structure and function of neurons in the dorsomedial striatum, a part of the brain known to be important in goal-driven behaviors. The findings could be an important step toward creation of a drug to combat alcoholism. ...

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Medicine2 Sep 2015

Food insecurity linked to adolescent obesity, metabolic syndrome

New research indicates that household food insecurity dramatically increases the likelihood of metabolic diseases in children, with many showing chronic disease markers before they graduate from high school. The study published today in the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association. Food insecurity, defined as lacking access to food for an active, healthy life, is a preventable health threat. Yet, lack of basic access to food affects 14.3 percent of all U.S. households and 19.5 percent of households with children. "This is a looming health issue for the nation. ...

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Science2 Sep 2015

Researchers identify a new approach for lowering harmful lipids

Brooklyn, NY - Xian-Cheng Jiang, PhD, professor of cell biology at SUNY Downstate Medical Center, has led a study identifying a new approach for lowering "bad" lipids in blood circulation, a critical means to combat devastating cardiovascular diseases such as atherosclerosis. The research was published in the online edition of Gastroenterology. The team established that an enzyme called LPCAT3 (Lysophosphatidylcholine acyltransferase 3) is involved in the biosynthesis of phosphatidylcholine (PC), a type of compound lipid that is a major component of cell membranes. ...

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Medicine2 Sep 2015

Study shows that nutrient shortfalls are a serious and persistent health disparity

Northridge, CA (September 2, 2015) - A study published Monday in the Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved (JHCPU) concludes that ethnicity is associated with nutrient shortfalls of important nutrients. This study compared usual intake for essential nutrients between Non-Hispanic Black and Non-Hispanic White Americans using data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), 2007-2010. This new analysis is consistent with previous research and confirms a continuing diet-related health disparity in the American population. Nutrient shortfalls ...

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Medicine2 Sep 2015

How protein tangles accumulate in the brain and cause neurological disorders

LA JOLLA, Calif., September 2, 2015 - A new Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute (SBP) study takes a step forward in understanding how similar, yet genetically unrelated neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease, frontal temporal dementia, and progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) are caused by the protein tau. The findings, published today in Neuron, create new opportunities to target this key protein that leads to the brain lesions found in patients with impaired motor functions and dementia. "Our research shows how the abundance of a protein ...

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Science2 Sep 2015

Fire in the Amazon

Intentional burning in tropical forests has accounted for nearly 20% of all greenhouse-gas emissions since preindustrial times and will have major implications for Earth's climate and biodiversity in years to come. To better understand the complex dynamics surrounding these fires, a team of researchers led by Jennifer K. Balch, of the University of Colorado-Boulder, conducted a six-year controlled burn experiment in an Amazonian rainforest block located in Mato Grasso, Brazil. The results are described in an article that is part of BioScience's just-released Special Section ...

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Medicine2 Sep 2015

Scientists see motor neurons 'walking' in real time

LA JOLLA--When you're taking a walk around the block, your body is mostly on autopilot--you don't have to consciously think about alternating which leg you step with or which muscles it takes to lift a foot and put it back down. That's thanks to a set of cells in your spinal cord that help translate messages between your brain and your motor neurons, which control muscles. Now, for the first time, researchers have created a method to watch--in real time--the activity of those motor neurons. The new technology, developed by Salk scientists and published in Neuron, is ...

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Technology2 Sep 2015

Artificial intelligence authors crowdsourced interactive fiction

Georgia Institute of Technology researchers have developed a new artificially intelligent system that crowdsources plots for interactive stories, which are popular in video games and let players choose different branching story options. With potentially limitless crowdsourced plot points, the system could allow for more creative stories and an easier method for interactive narrative generation. Current AI models for games have a limited number of scenarios, no matter what a player chooses. They depend on a dataset already programmed into a model by experts. Using ...

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Space2 Sep 2015

NASA sees Tropical Storm Fred losing its punch

Tropical Storm Fred is losing its punch. Satellite imagery shows that there are no strong thunderstorms developing in the tropical storm indicating that the storm is weakening. The RapidScat instrument that flies aboard the International Space Station measured Tropical Storm Fred's winds on September 1 at 4 a.m. EDT. RapidScat saw that the strongest winds tightly circled the center and were on the northern side of the storm, as strong as 24 and 27 meters per second (53.6 mph/ 86.4 kph and 60.4/97.2 kph). On September 1 at 13:00 UTC (9 a.m. EDT) the MODIS instrument ...

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Science2 Sep 2015

This week from AGU: Water tables, 3D rock formations, wind speed maps & hydrothermal vents

GeoSpace High water tables can be a boon to crop yields A high water table - usually a bane to crop yields - can provide much-needed water during drought and to crops planted in coarse-grained soils, found a new study published online in Water Resources Research. 3-D maps illustrate formation of the Hangai Dome in central Mongolia Scientists used 1.7 million seismic wave measurements from 227 earthquakes across East Asia to create animated 3-D images of subsurface rock formations under the Hangai Dome in central Mongolia as part of their recent study accepted in Geophysical ...

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Environment2 Sep 2015

Saving coral reefs depends more on protecting fish than safeguarding locations

A new study by WCS (Wildlife Conservation Society) has found that coral reef diversity 'hotspots' in the southwestern Indian Ocean rely more on the biomass of fish than where they are located, a conclusion that has major implications for management decisions to protect coral reef ecosystems. Using data gathered over a 12-year period from nearly 270 coral reefs across the southwestern Indian Ocean, the WCS study found that the highest conservation priorities in the region should be reef systems where fish biomass exceeds 600 kilograms per hectare. This finding conflicts ...

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Earth Science2 Sep 2015

Stanford soil sleuths solve mystery of arsenic-contaminated water

Can water ever be too clean? If the intent is to store it underground, the answer, surprisingly, is yes. In a new study, Stanford scientists have shown that recycled water percolating into underground storage aquifers in Southern California picked up trace amounts of arsenic because the water was too pure. The research, published online in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, sheds light on a poorly understood aspect of groundwater recharge with purified recycled water, namely the potential mobilization of arsenic. Arsenic is a naturally occurring element that ...

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Medicine2 Sep 2015

Prophylactic surgery nearly doubles in men with breast cancer

ATLANTA - Sept. 2, 2015 - The number of men with breast cancer who undergo surgery to remove the unaffected breast has risen sharply, according to a new report by American Cancer Society and Dana Farber Cancer Institute researchers. The report, appearing in JAMA Surgery, is the first to identify the trend, which mirrors a trend seen in U.S. women over the past two decades. Breast cancer in men is rare, accounting for only about 1 percent of all cases in the United States. In women (particularly younger women), the use of contralateral prophylactic mastectomy (CPM) surgery ...

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