Amsterdam, NL, 10 July 2014 – Amyloid diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease, type 2 diabetes, cataracts, and the spongiform encephalopathies, all share the common trait that proteins aggregate into long fibers which then form plaques. Yet in vitro studies have found that neither the amylin monomer precursors nor the plaques themselves are very toxic. New evidence using two-dimensional infrared (2D IR) spectroscopy has revealed an intermediate structure during the amylin aggregation pathway that may explain toxicity, opening a window for possible interventions, according ...

Food not only nourishes the body but also affects its internal biological clock, which regulates the daily rhythm of many aspects of human behavior and biology. Researchers reporting in the Cell Press journal Cell Reports provide new insights into how adjusting the clock through dietary manipulation may help patients with various conditions and show that insulin may be involved in resetting the clock. An internal biological or 'circadian' clock plays an important role in preferred sleep times, times of peak alertness, and the timing of certain physiological processes. ...

While careful management has helped stabilize or even improve the state of fisheries resources in some parts of Europe, the situation in the Mediterranean has deteriorated over the past 20 years. In a new report evaluating nine fish species reported in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on July 10, scientists call for stringent monitoring of Mediterranean fishing activities, better enforcement of fisheries regulations, and advanced management plans in Mediterranean waters. Their data show that the fishing pressure in the Mediterranean intensified continuously from ...

Some chimpanzees are smarter than others, and about half of that variation in intelligence depends on the genes that individuals carry and pass on from one generation to the next. The findings reported in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on July 10 show that those genetic differences will be key to understanding the cognitive abilities of primates and their evolution over time. "As is the case in humans, genes matter when it comes to cognitive abilities in chimpanzees," says William Hopkins of the Yerkes National Primate Research Center. "It doesn't mean that they ...

The vegetable oil found in your popcorn or soap might not be ape friendly, and the situation appears likely to get even worse, according to an analysis in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on July 10. The growing demand for vegetable oil has already led to the conversion of Southeast Asian forest into oil palm plantations, bringing trouble for orangutans in particular. If guidelines are not put in place very soon, researchers say the spread of those large-scale industrial plantations from Asia into Africa will be bad news for great apes there as well. "The first ...

In a new study led by UC San Francisco (UCSF) scientists, a chemical compound designed to precisely target part of a crucial cellular quality-control network provided significant protection, in rats and mice, against degenerative forms of blindness and diabetes. In addition to opening a promising drug-development path for the wide range of diseases caused by cell loss, the new research offers a new view of the workings of the unfolded protein response (UPR), a cellular "life-or-death" signaling network: When cells are under stress, the UPR works to ensure that they produce ...

ATLANTA–A chimpanzee's intelligence is largely determined by its genes, while environmental factors may be less important than scientists previously thought, according to a Georgia State University research study. The study found that some, but not all, cognitive, or mental, abilities, in chimpanzees depend significantly on the genes they inherit. The findings are reported in the latest issue of Current Biology. "Intelligence runs in families," said Dr. William Hopkins, professor in the Center for Behavioral Neuroscience at Georgia State and research scientist in the ...

As daily temperatures increase, so does the number of patients seeking treatment for kidney stones. In a study that may both reflect and foretell a warming planet's impact on human health, a research team found a link between hot days and kidney stones in 60,000 patients in several U.S. cities with varying climates. "We found that as daily temperatures rise, there is a rapid increase in the probability of patients presenting over the next 20 days with kidney stones," said study leader Gregory E. Tasian, M.D., M.Sc., M.S.C.E., a pediatric urologist and epidemiologist at ...

In recent years, it has become increasingly clear that many diseases are triggered or maintained by changes in bacterial communities in the gut. However, the general view up into now has been rather simple: bacteria stimulate the immune system, leading to inflammation or autoimmune disorders in a single direction. Now, in work published in Immunity, scientists led by Sidonia Fagarasan from the RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Science in Japan have painted a more complex picture: the gut immune system does not simply prevent the influx of pathogens, but is actively ...

Amsterdam, NL, 10 July 2014 – Up to 70% of Parkinson's disease (PD) patients experience sleep problems that negatively impact their quality of life. Some patients have disturbed sleep/wake patterns such as difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep, while other patients may be subject to sudden and involuntary daytime sleep "attacks." In the extreme, PD patients may exhibit REM-sleep behavior disorder (RBD), characterized by vivid, violent dreams or dream re-enactment, even before motor symptoms appear. A review in the Journal of Parkinson's Disease discusses the underlying ...

Rice University's breakthrough silicon oxide technology for high-density, next-generation computer memory is one step closer to mass production, thanks to a refinement that will allow manufacturers to fabricate devices at room temperature with conventional production methods. First discovered five years ago, Rice's silicon oxide memories are a type of two-terminal, "resistive random-access memory" (RRAM) technology. In a new paper available online in the American Chemical Society journal Nano Letters, a Rice team led by chemist James Tour compared its RRAM technology ...

ROCHESTER, Minn. — The benefits of medical imaging far outweigh the risks when children receive The Right Exam, ordered The Right Way, with The Right Radiation Dose. However, overuse and misuse of imaging change the benefit-risk ratio and Mayo Clinic is leading a collaborative effort to ensure a national protocol is put into action. The commentary, published online in the Journal of Patient Safety, calls for the American College of Radiology, the Joint Commission, the Intersociety Accreditation Commission, and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to require three ...

NOAA's Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite or GOES-West satellite spotted smoke over the U.S. Mid-West from dozens of fires raging in Canada's Northwestern Territories. At 1200 UTC (8 a.m. EDT) on July 9, 2014, GOES-West captured this image of the brownish-colored haze created by forest fires in Canada's Northwest Territories that drifted all the way into South Dakota. This image was created by the NASA GOES Project at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. According to Canada's Natural Resources, Canadian Wildland Fire Information System, fire ...

Once a powerful super typhoon, now an weakening tropical storm, NASA's Terra satellite saw a much weaker Tropical Storm Neoguri moving along the southern coast of Japan. On July 10 at 0:35 UTC, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradometer (MODIS) instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite captured an image of a more disorganized Tropical Storm Neoguri over east central Japan. At the time of the image, a more elongated Tropical Storm Neoguri's center was east of Kyushu, Japan. A visible image from the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument aboard ...

Defining what makes a star "Sun-like" is as difficult as defining what makes a planet "Earth-like." A solar twin should have a temperature, mass, and spectral type similar to our Sun. We also would expect it to be about 4.5 billion years old. However, it is notoriously difficult to measure a star's age so astronomers usually ignore age when deciding if a star counts as "Sun-like." A new technique for measuring the age of a star using its spin - gyrochronology - is coming into its own. Today astronomers are presenting the gyrochronological ages of 22 Sun-like stars. Before ...

Estonian-born Katerina Alba's research at the University of Huddersfield could help to improve the quality of some of the most popular emulsion-based food products – such as butter, mayonnaise, yoghurt and fruit drinks – and she is starting to gain an international profile for her work. Katerina gained her MSc degree in nutrition and food science at the University and now she has embarked on research for a PhD. Working with her supervisor, Dr Vassilis Kontogiorgos, she is investigating the potential of carbohydrates extracted from the pods of the okra plant. They can ...

EVANSTON, Ill. --- Why does a relentless stream of subjective experiences normally fill your mind? Maybe that's just one of those mysteries that will always elude us. Yet, research from Northwestern University suggests that consciousness lies well within the realm of scientific inquiry -- as impossible as that may currently seem. Although scientists have yet to agree on an objective measure to index consciousness, progress has been made with this agenda in several labs around the world. "The debate about the neural basis of consciousness rages because there is no widely ...

Many studies have shown that more severe illness and even death are likely to result if you develop a secondary respiratory infection after developing influenza. Now, however, a team of researchers based at The Wistar Institute has determined that if you reverse the order of infection, the bacteria Streptococcus pneumoniae (often called pneumococcus) may actually protect against a bad case of the flu. The researchers discovered that the bacterial protein pneumolysin, which is described as a bacterial virulence factor, might protect macrophages—a type of immune system ...

(July 10, 2014) – A research review identifying the clinical indicators most strongly associated with concussion is an important first step in the process of developing evidence-based guidelines for concussion diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment, according to a new report published by Neurosurgery, official journal of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health. Based on analysis of the best available research data, a multidisciplinary panel of experts has identified a set of four ...

July 10,2014 – For children and teens living with a cardiac pacemaker, a low sense of self-competence seems to contribute to decreased quality of life, reports a study in the July Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics, the official journal of the Society for Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health. "Self-competence may function as a protective factor against lower health-related quality of life in children with pacemakers," according to the study by Ana M. Gutierrez-Colina ...

The Universe is filled with objects springing to life, evolving and dying explosive deaths. This new image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope captures a snapshot of some of this cosmic movement. Embedded within the egg-shaped blue ring at the centre of the frame are two galaxies. These galaxies have been found to be merging into one and a "chain" of young stellar superclusters are seen winding around the galaxies' nuclei. At the centre of this image lie two elliptical galaxies, part of a galaxy cluster known as[HGO2008]SDSS J1531+3414, which have strayed into each ...

Stars forming like a string of blue pearls along two elliptical galaxies could be the result of a galactic merger, according to an international team of astronomers. The structure could reveal rare insights about elliptical galaxies. Scientists from Rochester Institute of Technology helped analyze data from the Hubble Space Telescope showing elliptical galaxies coalescing at the core of a dense galaxy cluster. The study is part of a program sponsored by the Hubble Space Telescope—an international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency—to look inside 23 ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. – For those students looking to bump up their grade point averages during college, the answer may not be spending more time in a library or study hall, but in a gym. New Michigan State University research shows that students who were members of the recreational sports and fitness centers on MSU's campus during their freshman and sophomore years had higher GPAs than those who weren't. The research also indicated that students with memberships stayed in school longer. An increase of 3.5 percent in two-year retention rates was seen among this group. "That ...

Mathematical algorithms used to control everyday household items such as washing machines could hold the key to winning the fight for conservation, a new study has claimed. As part of an EPSRC research project, a team of UK scientists and mathematicians, including those from the University of Exeter, have shown how techniques commonly used in control engineering, could be replicated in the natural world to help restock declining populations. The innovative new study suggests 'integral control' - in essence a built-in feedback control mechanism to maintain a constant – ...

This natural-color satellite image was collected by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) aboard the Aqua satellite on July 10, 2014. Each hot spot, which appears as a red mark, is an area where the thermal detectors on the MODIS instrument recognized temperatures higher than background. When accompanied by plumes of smoke, as in this image, such hot spots are diagnostic for fire. This area of Russia is extremely remote with little danger coming directly from the fires, although the smoke released by any type of fire (forest, brush, crop, structure, ...