Between one-third and one-half of individuals in the United States who were infected with HIV around the time of birth may not have sufficient immunity to ward off measles, mumps, and rubella--even though they may have been vaccinated against these diseases. This estimate, from a National Institutes of Health research network, in collaboration with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is based on a study of more than 600 children and youth exposed to HIV in the womb. "Having a high level of immunity to measles, mumps, and rubella is important not only for ...

Researchers from the University of Exeter highlight the risk that engineered nanoparticles released from masonry paint on exterior facades, and consumer products such as zinc oxide cream, could have on aquatic creatures. Textiles, paint, sunscreen, cosmetics and food additives are all increasingly containing metal-based nanoparticles that are engineered, rather than found naturally. The review, published today in the journal Environmental Chemistry, highlights the risks posed to aquatic organisms when nanoparticles 'transform' on contact with water and as they pass ...

Since the chickenpox vaccine became available in the U.S. in 1995, there has been a large reduction in chickenpox cases. Hospitalizations and outpatient visits for chickenpox have continued their decline after a second dose of the vaccine was recommended to improve protection against the disease, according to a new study published in the Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society. The findings also suggest that increasing vaccination coverage against the once common childhood illness helps protect those who are not immunized themselves. Chickenpox, also known ...

Boston, MA-- A marker commonly used to determine if a patient is having a heart attack can also be used to identify stable patients at high risk for deadly cardiac events, according to a new study led by investigators at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH). Using a test that is more sensitive than what is currently used in U.S. hospitals and clinics, the research team found that nearly 40 percent of patients with type 2 diabetes and stable heart disease had abnormal blood levels of the protein troponin. Patients with elevated levels of troponin were twice as likely as ...

When it comes to reproduction, not every individual equally pulls his or her weight. Dana Herman and Mark Colwell of Humboldt State University spent 13 years tracking the successes and failures of almost 200 individual Snowy Plovers (Charadrius nivosus) nesting at a variety of sites in Humboldt County, California, to identify the factors that could be influencing reproductive success for birds in this threatened population. Their results, published this week in The Condor: Ornithological Applications, show that more than human activity, predator presence, exclosures to ...

Working in groups is advantageous because different individuals can be responsible for different information, allowing each individual to develop more in-depth expertise. For instance, a plumber, electrician, and carpenter work together to build a house, but each is responsible for unique aspects of the project. This is an example of a transactive memory system: information is distributed across the group, and each group member is aware of what he or she knows, as well as who knows what. Because the Internet surpasses any person in accessibility, speed, and breadth of ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. (Aug. 12, 2015) Approximately 60 percent of young people habitually skip breakfast up to four times a week, previous research has shown. Although health experts recommend breakfast as a strategy to reduce an individual's chance of obesity, little research has examined if the actual type of breakfast consumed plays a significant role in one's health and weight management. University of Missouri researchers compared the benefits of consuming a normal-protein breakfast to a high-protein breakfast and found the high-protein breakfast - which contained 35 grams ...

All freshwater streams and rivers actually release carbon dioxide, but the source of those emissions has for years been unclear to scientists. Now, researchers have shown that the greenhouse gas appears in streams by way of two different sources -- either as a direct pipeline for groundwater and carbon-rich soils, or from aquatic organisms releasing the gas through respiration and natural decay. CO2's origins -- land or life -- depend largely on the size of the stream or river, according to a paper published Aug. 10 in Nature Geosciences. These findings shed light ...

For any computer, being able to manipulate information is essential, but for quantum computing, singling out one data location without influencing any of the surrounding locations is difficult. Now, a team of Penn State physicists has a method for addressing individual neutral atoms without changing surrounding atoms. "There are a set of things that we have to have to do quantum computing," said David S. Weiss, professor of physics. "We are trying to step down that list and meet the various criteria. Addressability is one step." Quantum computers are constructed and ...

Simply put, cancer is caused by mutations to genes within a cell that lead to abnormal cell growth. Finding out what causes that genetic mutation has been the holy grail of medical science for decades. Researchers at the Texas A&M Health Science Center Institute of Biosciences and Technology believe they may have found one of the reasons why these genes mutate and it all has to do with how stem cells talk to each other. The landmark studies by Texas A&M researchers Fen Wang, Ph.D., and Wallace McKeehan, Ph.D., appear in the Journal of Biological Chemistry and are available ...

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Chemists working in a variety of industries and fields typically go through a laborious process to measure and mix reagents for each reaction they perform. And many of the common reagents they use sit for months or years on shelves in laboratories, where they can react with oxygen and water in the atmosphere, rendering them useless. In a paper published this week in Nature, researchers at MIT describe a technique that could help avoid this costly waste, and greatly reduce the number of steps a chemist must perform to prepare common compounds for use in ...

Male elephant seals compete fiercely for access to females during the breeding season, and their violent, bloody fights take a toll on both winners and losers. These battles are relatively rare, however, and a new study shows that the males avoid costly fights by learning the distinctive vocal calls of their rivals. When they recognize the call of another male, they know whether to attack or flee depending on the challenger's status in the dominance hierarchy. Researchers from UC Santa Cruz have been studying the behavior of northern elephant seals at Año Nuevo ...

BOSTON - Researchers from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) are homing in on the potential benefits of allowing patients access to the notes their clinicians write after a visit. An article published in the August edition of The Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety suggests that this kind of patient engagement has the power to improve safety and quality of care. The practice of sharing visit notes more readily began with the OpenNotes study in 2010. More than 100 primary care doctors at three hospitals invited 20,000 of their patients to ...

In debt and don't know what to do? Conventional economic wisdom says to pay off high-interest loans first. Yet according to a new study in the Journal of Marketing Research, paying off your smallest debts first can provide the motivation you need to successfully pay off even the most burdensome debts. "Winning what are known as 'small victories' by paying off small debts first can give consumers a real boost in eventually paying off all their debts," write the authors of the study, Alexander L. Brown (Texas A&M University) and Joanna N. Lahey (Texas A&M University). "The ...

Legos, the popular toy bricks, may be great for stimulating creativity in little kids. But when it comes to adults, things might be a little different. According to a new study in the Journal of Marketing Research, when adults are given a set of Legos to solve a well-defined problem, their creativity may suffer when tackling subsequent tasks. "There are a lot of studies that explore what enhances creativity. Ours is one of the few that considers ways in which creativity may be undermined," write the authors of the study, C. Page Moreau (University of Wisconsin) and Marit ...

Attention all you would-be forecasters out there. Do you want people to think you know the future? Then predict with a high degree of certainty that something will happen. According to a new study in the Journal of Marketing Research, people trust a forecaster more when she predicts that something is more likely to occur. "When a forecaster predicts that something has a high likelihood of happening, consumers infer that the forecaster is more confident in her prediction, that she is basing the prediction on more in-depth analysis, and that she is more trustworthy," write ...

New companies are often successful because they are innovative. In search of new capital, these companies often go public. But does going public affect a company's ability to remain creative and at the cutting edge--the very qualities that allowed it be successful in the first place? A new study in the Journal of Marketing Research says yes. According to the study, when companies go public, they actually innovate more--but their innovations are far more conservative and less groundbreaking than before. "Going public is a mixed bag for firms when it comes to innovation. ...

Exporting is a popular way to enter an international market. But just how are export decisions made? In a rapidly changing economic environment, can exporting companies rely on improvisation? Or should they commit to carefully thought out and executed plans? According to a new study in the Journal of Marketing Research, companies need to do both, to plan as well as improvise, as there is no one "best way" for export managers to make decisions. "That both planning and improvisation are needed may come as a surprise. Historically, observers have viewed planning and improvisation ...

Rapid Eye Movement (REM) sleep, the period in which we experience vivid dreams, was discovered by scientists in the 1950s. Because REM sleep is associated with dreaming, on the one hand, and eye movement, on the other, it has been tempting to assume that each movement of the eye is associated with a specific dream image. But despite decades of intense research by leading international scientists, this intuitive hypothesis has remained unproven. A new study based on rare neuronal data offers the first scientific evidence of the link between rapid eye movement, dream images, ...

Suppose China wants to buy microprocessors from the United States. The two countries sign a contract--and then the United States hopes that China, as the buyer, holds up its end of the bargain. (One could say the same for China, by the way.) One might think that a contract spelling out in detail the terms of sale and delivery would eliminate the chance that the buyer would violate those terms. A new study in the Journal of International Marketing, however, suggests that well-specified contracts are effective in reducing violations on the part of the buyer only if the buyer ...

Male and female brains operate differently at a molecular level, a Northwestern University research team reports in a new study of a brain region involved in learning and memory, responses to stress and epilepsy. Many brain disorders vary between the sexes, but how biology and culture contribute to these differences has been unclear. Now Northwestern neuroscientists have found an intrinsic biological difference between males and females in the molecular regulation of synapses in the hippocampus. This provides a scientific reason to believe that female and male brains ...

Scientists, for the first time, have identified a mechanism in the muscle cells of the uterus that could point to how contractions in childbirth grow stronger. It is understood that the hormone oxytocin plays a significant role in stimulating contractions during labour, which helps to move a baby down the birth canal. It is not known, however, how these contractions increase and sustain their strength during hours of labour. A team at Liverpool investigated how uterine contractions grow stronger when the human body's 'biological rules' dictates that contractions ...

Mason, Ohio - August 12, 2015 - A new study published in Current Medical Research and Opinion demonstrated $1,036 in annual prescription savings per patient when healthcare providers used the GeneSight® combinatorial pharmacogenomic (CPGx™) test results to guide treatment decisions compared with usual trial-and-error prescribing. CPGx is the evaluation of multiple genetic factors that influence an individual's response to medications. Unlike other tests, GeneSight measures multiple clinically important genomic variants for each patient and weights them together ...

Washington, DC (12 August 2015) - Today the Population Council released new evidence on what works to delay the age of marriage for extremely vulnerable girls in sub-Saharan Africa. Researchers also shared rarely available data on the cost of interventions that were tested, and issued recommendations for policymakers, donors, and organizations concerned about child marriage. Each year, more than 14 million girls around the world get married before the age of 18. In sub-Saharan Africa, more than 1 in 10 girls are married before the age of 15. Four in ten are married before ...

Over the last few decades, researchers have focused their attention on very large molecules and molecular systems. Scientists from all over the world study proteomics, genomics, construct complex proteins, nucleic acids, decode the genomes of entire organisms, and design new sub-cellular structures. Outstanding enthusiasm for these important and essential areas of science has become so widespread that the question arose: "Is there a place for small organic molecules in modern science?" It might seem that old and well-known small organic molecules, as well as some areas ...