Some 2.5 million years ago, early humans survived on a paltry diet of plants. As the human brain expanded, however, it required more substantial nourishment - namely fat and meat - to sustain it. This drove prehistoric man, who lacked the requisite claws and sharp teeth of carnivores, to develop the skills and tools necessary to hunt animals and butcher fat and meat from large carcasses. Among elephant remains some 500,000 years old at a Lower Paleolithic site in Revadim, Israel, Prof. Ran Barkai and his graduate students Natasha Solodenko and Andrea Zupanchich of Tel ...

DENVER, March 23, 2015 -- Since HIV emerged in the '80s, drug "cocktails" transformed the deadly disease into a manageable one. But the virus is adept at developing resistance to drugs, and treatment regimens require tweaking that can be costly. Now scientists at the 249th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS) are announcing new progress toward affordable drugs that could potentially thwart the virus's ability to resist them. ACS, the world's largest scientific society, is holding the meeting here through Thursday. It features nearly 11,000 ...

Washington, D.C.--To combat global climate change caused by greenhouse gases, alternative energy sources and other types of environmental recourse actions are needed. There are a variety of proposals that involve using vertical ocean pipes to move seawater to the surface from the depths in order to reap different potential climate benefits. A new study from a group of Carnegie scientists determines that these types of pipes could actually increase global warming quite drastically. It is published in Environmental Research Letters. One proposed strategy--called Ocean ...

What if there were a pill that made you more compassionate and more likely to give spare change to someone less fortunate? UC Berkeley scientists have taken a big step in that direction. A new study by UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco researchers finds that giving a drug that changes the neurochemical balance in the prefrontal cortex of the brain causes a greater willingness to engage in prosocial behaviors, such as ensuring that resources are divided more equally. The researchers also say that future research may lead to a better understanding of the interaction between ...

URBANA, Ill. - Over the last several decades there have been substantial yield improvements in soybean. Because of new varieties and new agronomic practices, the yield potential in soybean is higher now than ever before. But a lack of updated information on the nutritional needs of soybean crops may be limiting the crop's potential. Researchers from the University of Illinois Crop Physiology Laboratory led by Fred Below have recently provided an updated set of nutrition needs for soybean, identifying exactly which nutrients the plant needs, when those nutrients are accumulated ...

Acne, a scourge of adolescence, may be about to meet its ultra high-tech match. By using a combination of ultrasound, gold-covered particles and lasers, researchers from UC Santa Barbara and the private medical device company Sebacia have developed a targeted therapy that could potentially lessen the frequency and intensity of breakouts, relieving acne sufferers the discomfort and stress of dealing with severe and recurring pimples. "Through this unique collaboration, we have essentially established the foundation of a novel therapy," said Samir Mitragotri, professor ...

Our eyes are drawn to several dimensions of an object--such as color, texture, and luminance--even when we need to focus on only one of them, researchers at New York University and the University of Pennsylvania have found. The study, which appears in the journal Current Biology, points to the ability of our visual system to integrate multiple components of an item while underscoring the difficulty we have in focusing on a particular aspect of it. "Even when we want and need to focus on one dimension of things we come across every day, such as the texture of your cat's ...

For in vitro fertilization and other assisted reproductive technologies, selecting the healthiest and best swimming sperm from a sample of semen can dramatically increase success. Microfluidics--micro-scale technologies that were originally developed to enable high-throughput gene sequencing and for Point-Of-Care diagnostics--are now being adapted to enhance sperm sorting. These new methods, reviewed by engineers in the journal Trends in Biotechnology, are generating promising results in applications such as single-sperm genomics, in-home male fertility testing, and wildlife ...

A combination of human stem cell transplantation and antidiabetic drugs proved to be highly effective at improving body weight and glucose metabolism in a mouse model of type 2 diabetes. The findings, published March 19th by Stem Cell Reports, could set the stage for clinical trials to test the first stem cell-based approach for insulin replacement in patients with type 2 diabetes. Type 2 diabetes, which accounts for 90%-95% of the now approaching 400 million cases of diabetes worldwide, is currently treated by oral medication, insulin injections, or both to control blood ...

Altered signaling through the vitamin D receptor on certain immune cells may play a role in causing the chronic inflammation that leads to cardiometabolic disease, the combination of type 2 diabetes and heart disease that is the most common cause of illness and death in Western populations. The research appears March 19 in the journal Cell Reports. "Because low vitamin D levels are associated with diabetes and heart disease, we looked at the connections between vitamin D, immune function, and these disease states," says senior author Carlos Bernal-Mizrachi, of the Washington ...

Scientists at the University of British Columbia and BetaLogics, part of Janssen Research & Development, LLC have shown for the first time that Type 2 diabetes can be effectively treated with a combination of specially-cultured stem cells and conventional diabetes drugs. Stem cells - generic cells that haven't yet taken on specialized form and function - have recently been used by scientists at UBC and elsewhere to reverse Type 1 diabetes in mice. In Type 1 diabetes, which usually begins in childhood, the pancreas produces little or no insulin, the hormone that enables ...

A research team at UC San Francisco has discovered an RNA molecule called Pnky that can be manipulated to increase the production of neurons from neural stem cells. The research, led by neurosurgeon Daniel A. Lim, MD, PhD, and published on March 19, 2015 in Cell Stem Cell, has possible applications in regenerative medicine, including treatments of such disorders as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease and traumatic brain injury, and in cancer treatment. Pnky is one of a number of newly discovered long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs), which are stretches of 200 or more ...

A new study has shown that the dottyback, a small predatory reef fish, can change the colour of its body to imitate a variety of other reef fish species, allowing the dottyback to sneak up undetected and eat their young. The dottyback also uses its colour-changing abilities to hide from larger predators by colour-matching to the background of its habitat - disappearing into the scenery. The research, published today in the journal Current Biology, reveals a sophisticated new example of 'mimicry': disguising as a different species to gain evolutionary advantage. ...

Stem cells can have a strong sense of identity. Taken out of their home in the hair follicle, for example, and grown in culture, these cells remain true to themselves. After waiting in limbo, these cultured cells become capable of regenerating follicles and other skin structures once transplanted back into skin. It's not clear just how these stem cells -- and others elsewhere in the body -- retain their ability to produce new tissue and heal wounds, even under extraordinary conditions. New research at Rockefeller University has identified a protein, Sox9, that takes the ...

There is no doubt that teenage boys and girls are swayed and shaped by music TV. For example, sexually active youth of both genders, after watching music TV, think their peers are sexually active, too. Moreover, when girls and boys perceive males in music videos as being sexually active, it makes boys watch more music TV, and girls watch less. These are some of the surprising findings from a study conducted at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium, published in Springer's journal Sex Roles. The results question the frequently reported blanket influence of the mass ...

A tiny new millipede has been found which is only known to occur within the city of Launceston, Tasmania, Australia. The 1 cm-long species was discovered in a city park by two local naturalists, Wade and Lisa Clarkson. Working with millipede specialist Dr Bob Mesibov of Launceston's Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, the Clarksons carefully mapped the range of the new species over several years. To their surprise, the millipede was easy to find in eucalypt woodland in city parks and reserves, but apparently absent from eucalypt woodland just outside the city, or ...

A device resembling a plastic honeycomb yet infinitely smaller than a bee's stinger can steer light beams around tighter curves than ever before possible, while keeping the integrity and intensity of the beam intact. The work, conducted by researchers at the University of Texas El Paso (UTEP) and at the University of Central Florida (UCF) and published in the journal Optics Express, introduces a more effective way to transmit data rapidly on electronic circuit boards by using light. Sending information on light beams, instead of electrical signals, allows data to be ...

Black and Hispanic women with breast cancer were less likely to pick their surgeon and the hospital for treatment based on reputation compared with white women, suggesting minority patients may rely more on physician referrals and health plans in those decisions, according to a study published online by JAMA Oncology. Racial and ethnic disparities in the use, quality and delivery of medical care have been well described. However, data are limited with regard to how women select surgeons and hospitals for cancer treatment and whether there are racial and ethnic differences ...

Current smoking and heavy alcohol consumption appear to be risk factors for prolonged use of a gastrostomy tube (GT, feeding tube) in patients with head and neck cancer undergoing radiotherapy or chemoradiotherapy, according to a report published online by JAMA Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery. Chemoradiotherapy is a well-established treatment for advanced cancer of the head and neck. But its toxic effects can compromise eating and result in weight loss and malnutrition. Consequently, many institutions recommend prophylactic GT insertion before starting treatment, according ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Orthopedic surgeons from The Miriam Hospital have conducted a cost-benefit analysis of topical tranexamic acid (TXA) in primary total hip and knee arthroplasty patients that revealed a 12 percent transfusion rate reduction - from 17.5 percent to 5.5 percent - with no significant difference in complication rates. In addition to reducing the risk for postoperative bleeding and transfusion following total joint replacement, use of topical TXA enabled approximately 9.3 percent more patients to be discharged to home rather than to a skilled nursing facility. ...

This news release is available in French. In Latin America, consensual (common-law) unions are traditionally associated with poorer or indigenous populations. But recent research is turning this conventional wisdom on its head, finding that that in the past 30 years or so consensual unions have become increasingly popular throughout Latin America, including in higher-income groups. In certain countries, such as Panama, common-law partnerships are now as widespread as in Quebec. Another widely held belief was that only low-income, uneducated women bore children in ...

DURHAM, N.C.-- Children who are older when they start kindergarten do well in the short term, academically and socially. But as teenagers, these old-for-grade students are more likely to drop out and commit serious crimes, says new research from Duke University. The negative outcomes are significantly more likely for children from disadvantaged backgrounds. "This research provides the first compelling evidence of a causal link between dropout and crime. It supports the view that crime outcomes should be considered in evaluating school reforms," said lead author Philip ...

Amateur botanists in the Western Cape Province of South Africa have discovered two new species of beautiful blue-flowered legumes. The study was published in the open access journal PhytoKeys. Few people take the chance to tramp the empty rolling ranges of mountains and the fragmented and jagged coastline of the Southern Cape in South Africa. Most avoid it because of how wild and tough-going it can be. This region is part of a unique and species rich global flora called the Cape Floral Kingdom. Yet there are a band of intrepid walkers and climbers who traverse these ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Across much of the Western world, 25 years of expansion of the medical system has actually led to people feeling less healthy over time, a new study has found. A researcher at The Ohio State University used several large multinational datasets to examine changes in how people rated their health between 1981 and 2007 and compared that to medical expansion in 28 countries that are members of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. During that time, the medical industry expanded dramatically in many of those countries, which you might ...

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. (March 3, 2015) - Getting sick when you're pregnant is especially difficult, but women whose children are at risk for developing asthma should avoid antibiotics, according to a new study. The study, published in the Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, the scientific publication of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI), followed 298 mother-child pairs through the child's third year of life. The study found that 22 percent of the 103 children born to mothers who took antibiotics during pregnancy were diagnosed with ...