Lithium-ion batteries remain the technology-of-choice for today's crop of electric cars, but challengers are revving up to try to upset the current order. An article in Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society, takes a look at two of the top contenders vying to erode lithium-ion's dominance. Alex Scott, a senior editor at C&EN, reports on two developments from companies in England that seem poised to compete in the electric car battery market within the next two to four years. One is a sodium-ion version, produced by ...

If you experience a major heart attack the damage could cost you around five billion heart cells. Future stem cell treatments will require this number and more to ensure those cells are replaced and improve your chances of survival. Experts at The University of Nottingham have discovered the first fully synthetic substrate with potential to grow billions of stem cells. The research, published in the academic journal Advanced Materials, could forge the way for the creation of 'stem cell factories' - the mass production of human embryonic (pluripotent) stem cells. The ...

Canada has almost eliminated mother-to-child HIV transmission, known as vertical transmission, in recent years by ensuring that all women have the opportunity to be screened for HIV in pregnancy and that women with the disease receive treatment before giving birth. In 2014, there was only one recorded transmission of the virus to babies born to women known to be living with HIV. These findings were presented at the International AIDS Society 2015 conference in Vancouver by researchers from the Canadian Perinatal HIV Surveillance Program (CPHSP), a national group that ...

SALT LAKE CITY- As part of a multi-institutional effort, researchers with Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah have found that multiple myeloma patients with a genetic variation in the gene FOPNL die on average 1-3 years sooner than patients without it. The finding was identified with a genetic mapping technique, genome wide association studies (GWAS), and verified in patient populations from North America and Europe. This was the first study to survey the entire human genome for genetic variation influencing survival, and included a total of 1,635 patients. Published ...

A test of the Mobile Bridge® Version 4.0 (MB4.0) over a real river demonstrated its viability for practical use. During the test, the bridge was set up without any foundation work, and a vehicle could easily travel across it. This was achieved safely with very few people and without any problems. The MB4.0 viability test results were presented at a symposium of the Japan Society of Civil Engineers (JSCE) on June 23, 2015, by Dr. Ichiro Ario, Assistant Professor at the Institute of Engineering, Hiroshima University. Background of developing MB: Natural disasters include ...

A new theory says dark matter acts remarkably similar to subatomic particles known to science since the 1930s. We owe a lot to dark matter - it is the thing keeping galaxies, stars, our solar system, and our bodies intact. Yet no one has been able to observe it, and it has often been regarded as a totally new exotic form of matter, such as a particle moving in extra dimensions of space or its quantum version, super-symmetry. Now an international group of researchers has proposed a theory that dark matter is very similar to pions, which are responsible for binding atomic ...

Bethesda, MD (July 22, 2015) -- Newborn children born with a mutation in the Plasmalemma Vesicle Associated Protein (PLVAP) gene develop severe protein losing enteropathy, according to a case study1 published in Cellular and Molecular Gastroenterology and Hepatology, the basic science journal of the American Gastroenterological Association. Protein losing enteropathy is a condition of the GI tract that results in loss of protein from the body, and often leads to severe abdominal swelling, malnutrition and early death in affected infants The investigators utilized next-generation ...

This news release is available in German. New methods for modifying the genome are currently widely discussed: Using CRISPR/Cas for instance, scientists can remove parts of the genetic code of a gene, thereby knocking it out. Furthermore, there are ways to inhibit translation of a gene into a protein. Both methods have in common that they impede production of a protein and should therefore have comparable consequences for an organism. However, it has been shown that consequences can differ, after a gene is either knocked, out or only blocked. Scientist from the ...

Levels of biomarkers in the blood of pregnant women can be used to predict which women are at risk of pre-eclampsia, finds a study published today (22 July) in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (BJOG). ADMA and Hcy, both known to be raised in women with pre-eclampsia, are present in the blood in higher than normal concentrations a month before the onset of the condition. Pre-eclampsia is a combination of raised blood pressure (hypertension) and protein in the urine (proteinuria). It is quite common, usually occurring after 20 weeks of pregnancy, ...

Scientists at Lawson Health Research Institute have uncovered an important new target for ovarian cancer therapy. Contrary to current research this new study found that LKB1, a molecule that regulates the metabolism of many adult cells, is an important molecule in the cancer's promotion and survival. Thousands of women are living with ovarian cancer in Canada. It is estimated that this year, 2,800 Canadian women will be newly diagnosed with this disease. Even though ovarian cancer continues to be one of the most serious women's cancers, there is a real lack in reliable ...

Patients suffering from chronic cardiopulmonary diseases could soon have a solution to help them accurately monitor their health and warn doctors at the first sign of trouble. By simply carrying their cellphone, equipped with the health-tracking app, MoveSense, developed by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, a patient's oxygen saturation level can be passively monitored with medical accuracy. Oxygen saturation is a standard measure of health status, the single most important clinical measure. Unlike other methods of measuring oxygen saturation ...

Roughly 20 to 30 percent of patients with hepatitis C virus (HCV) are also infected with human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV). Both blood-borne viruses share the same modes of transmission, but many HCV medications currently have significant limitations due to adverse interactions with HIV treatments. Researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine report a new combination that effectively treats HCV in patients co-infected with HIV. The study, published online in the New England Journal of Medicine, found the combination of HCV drugs daclatasvir ...

Smokers who successfully lowered their nicotine intake when they were switched to low-nicotine cigarettes were unable to curb their smoking habits in the long term, according to a study by researchers at UCSF and San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center. The study, published online today (July 22) in the journal Addiction found that levels of cotinine, a derivative of nicotine measured in the blood, plummeted six months after smokers' regular cigarettes were replaced with low-nicotine ones. But levels started to rebound later into the study when smokers returned ...

You may have never seen or heard of it, but hair ice - a type of ice that has the shape of fine, silky hairs and resembles white candy floss - is remarkable. It grows on the rotten branches of certain trees when the weather conditions are just right, usually during humid winter nights when the air temperature drops slightly below 0°C. Now, a team of scientists in Germany and Switzerland have identified the missing ingredient that gives hair ice its peculiar shape: the fungus Exidiopsis effusa. The research is published today (22 July) in Biogeosciences, an open access ...

Wealthy people may be likely to oppose redistribution of wealth because they have biased information about how wealthy most people actually are, according to new research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. The findings indicate that people use their own neighborhoods and communities as a gauge of how much wealth other people possess, leading wealthy people to perceive the broader population as being wealthier than it actually is. "If you're rich, there's a good chance you know lots of other rich people and relatively ...

New research based on modern techniques suggests that recommendations for protein intake in healthy populations may be incorrect. In a paper just published in Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism, an NRC Research Press journal (a division of Canadian Science Publishing), researchers put the focus on protein as an essential component of a healthy diet. Protein helps people stay full longer, preserve muscle mass, and when combined with adequate physical activity, has the potential to serve as a key nutrient for important health outcomes and benefits. It's not ...

For centuries it has been thought that culture is what distinguishes humans from other animals, but over the past decade this idea has been repeatedly called into question. Cultural variation has been identified in a growing number of species in recent years, ranging from primates to cetaceans. Chimpanzees, our closest living relatives, show the most diverse cultures aside from humans, most notably, in their use of a wide variety of tools. The method traditionally used to establish the presence of culture in wild animals compares behavioural variation across populations ...

In their struggle to survive and prosper, multicellular organisms rely on a complex network of communication between cells, which in humans are believed to number about 40 trillion. Now, in a study published in Nature Communications, a research group led by scientists from the RIKEN Center for Life Science Technologies (CLST) has published an overall map of how the cells in the human body communicate by systematically analyzing the relationship between ligands--substances such as insulin and interferon that embody messages between cells, and receptors--the proteins on cell ...

A new review published in the Cochrane Library, indicates that eradicating Helicobacter pylori bacterium-- the main cause of stomach ulcers - with a short course of therapy comprising two commonly used medicines may help to reduce the risk of gastric cancer. Stomach, or gastric, cancer is the third most common cause of death from cancer worldwide, and people who are infected with the Helicobacter pylori bacterium are more likely to develop the disease. About two-thirds of us have H. pylori in our bodies, but in most cases we experience no discomfort or other symptoms. ...

The US Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, passed in 2009, permits the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to set standards for cigarette nicotine content. The FDA is accordingly supporting research into how very low nicotine content (VLNC) cigarettes might function as a regulatory measure to make cigarettes non-addictive, reduce smoke exposure, and improve public health, even among people who don't want to quit smoking. New research published today in the scientific journal Addiction shows that simply reducing the nicotine content of cigarettes may ...

New research shows that HIV treatment for illicit drug users improves their social and socioeconomic wellbeing as well as their health. While the health benefits of antiretroviral therapy (ART) for HIV are well documented, less is known about possible secondary benefits. Lindsey Richardson, an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of British Columbia and research scientist with the BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS (BC-CfE), presented findings from two studies July 22 at the International AIDS Society (IAS) Conference in Vancouver. ...

Researchers studying wild banded mongooses in Uganda have discovered that these small mammals have either cooperative or selfish personalities which last for their entire lifetime. The findings of the 15-year study are published today in the journal Animal Behaviour. The researchers investigated the selfish behaviour of mongoose mate-guarding - where dominant males guard particular females - and the cooperative behaviour of 'babysitting' and 'escorting' the young. They found that cooperative mongooses that helped out with offspring care did so consistently over their ...

Regular consumption of sugar sweetened drinks is positively associated with type 2 diabetes independent of obesity status, finds a study published in The BMJ this week. Artificially sweetened drinks and fruit juice also showed a positive association with type 2 diabetes, but the quality of evidence was limited. None the less, the authors warn that neither artificially sweetened drinks nor fruit juice are suitable alternatives to sugar sweetened drinks for the prevention of type 2 diabetes. Artificially sweetened beverages have been seen as possible alternatives to ...

A low birth weight combined with an unhealthy lifestyle in adulthood are jointly related to an increased risk of type 2 diabetes, finds a study published in The BMJ this week. The researchers say their findings emphasise the importance of adopting a healthy lifestyle to prevent the majority of type 2 diabetes cases in the population. Diabetes has become a global epidemic, with an estimated 387 million living with diabetes and 4.9 million attributable deaths in 2014. Both unhealthy lifestyles and early life development have been implicated in the rapid rise of type 2 ...

A complex web of interactions between industry, advocacy organisations, and academia may be fuelling enthusiasm for calcium and vitamin D supplements to prevent and treat osteoporosis, despite evidence of lack of benefit, warn doctors in The BMJ this week. Calcium and vitamin D are highly profitable treatments that are widely recommended for osteoporosis, despite increasing evidence contradicting the practice, write Andrew Grey and Mark Bolland from the University of Auckland. Several therapies previously recommended for osteoporosis, such as oestrogen and fluoride, ...