For some birds, recognising their own eggs can be a matter of life or death. In a new study, scientists have shown that many birds affected by the parasitic Common Cuckoo - which lays its lethal offspring in other birds' nests - have evolved distinctive patterns on their eggs in order to distinguish them from those laid by a cuckoo cheat. The study reveals that these signature patterns provide a powerful defense against cuckoo trickery, helping host birds to reject cuckoo eggs before they hatch and destroy the host's own brood. To determine how a bird brain might ...

Sweaty hands can reduce the effectiveness of bacteria-fighting brass objects in hospitals and schools after just an hour of coming into contact with them, according to scientists at the University of Leicester. While copper found in everyday brass items such as door handles and water taps has an antimicrobial effect on bacteria and is widely used to prevent the spread of disease, Dr John Bond OBE from the University of Leicester's Department of Chemistry has discovered that peoples' sweat can, within an hour of contact with the brass, produce sufficient corrosion to ...

Researchers have found no evidence of a protective association between soy food and endometrial cancer risk, says a new study published (18 June) in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. Soy foods are an almost exclusive dietary source of isoflavones, a plant-derived estrogen. Some studies have highlighted their potential cancer protective properties, however, research looking at the link to endometrial cancer has been inconsistent. The study defined short IPI as time from the immediate preceding birth to subsequent birth of the index pregnancy ...

The nationwide shortage of cybersecurity professionals – particularly for positions within the federal government – creates risks for national and homeland security, according to a new study from the RAND Corporation. Demand for trained cybersecurity professionals who work to protect organizations from cybercrime is high nationwide, but the shortage is particularly severe in the federal government, which does not offer salaries as high as the private sector. "It's largely a supply-and-demand problem," said Martin Libicki, lead author of the study and senior management ...

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center have developed and tested a vaccine that triggered the growth of immune cell nodules within pancreatic tumors, essentially reprogramming these intractable cancers and potentially making them vulnerable to immune-based therapies. In their study described in the June 18 issue of Cancer Immunology Research, the Johns Hopkins team tested the vaccine in 39 people with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas (PDAC), the most common form of pancreatic cancer. The disease becomes resistant to standard chemotherapies and is particularly ...

CLEVELAND, Ohio (June 18, 2014)—Calcium and vitamin D are commonly recommended for older women, but the usual supplements may send calcium excretion and blood levels too high for some women, shows a new study published online today in Menopause, the journal of The North American Menopause Society. This randomized, placebo-controlled trial included 163 older (ages 57 to 90) white women whose vitamin D levels were too low. The women took calcium citrate tablets to meet their recommended intake of 1,200 mg/day, and they took various doses of vitamin D, ranging from 400 to ...

A moral story that praises a character's honesty is more effective at getting young children to tell the truth than a story that emphasizes the negative repercussions of lying, according to research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. The findings suggest that stories such as "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" and "Pinocchio" may not be effective cautionary tales when it comes to inspiring honest behavior in children. Stories have long been employed to instill moral and cultural values in young children, but there is little ...

Dublin, June 18th 2014 – Light-fingered chimpanzees are changing the way subsistence farmers make a living in Africa by causing them to grow different crops and spend more time guarding their goods. This is according to work performed by researchers from Trinity College Dublin's School of Geography, who say that communities near the edge of tropical forests are experiencing a lack of 'dietary diversity' and an increased exposure to disease-carrying insects as a result. Through crop raiding, a form of human-wildlife conflict, hundreds of thousands of marginalised farmers ...

An accompanying editorial says this study largely confirms what is already known - that the benefits of breast screening "are modest at best" – and calls for women to be given balanced information including the screening harms of overdiagnosis, psychological stress, and high healthcare costs. Randomised trials from the 1970s and 80s suggested that mammography screening prevents deaths from breast cancer. But the methods used by some of these studies have been criticised, and this has raised doubts about the validity of the findings. Advances in technology and treatment ...

The main source of vitamin D is its production in skin thanks to the sun. Women are more prone to low vitamin D than men - and due to differing weather conditions, concentrations vary in populations across the world. Vitamin D deficiency is especially common among the elderly who often have less sun exposure, but it is unclear what effect the production of vitamin D has on death. So researchers investigated the association of vitamin D with deaths from all-causes, cardiovascular diseases and cancer. They paid particular attention to differences between countries, sexes ...

England remains the only UK country still charging patients for their prescriptions – currently £8.05 (€10; $13.5) per prescribed item. Although prescription charges have been rising, the latest data show that the number of pharmaceutical items prescribed in England reached its highest level yet - over one billion in 2012 - equivalent to nearly 19 per person in that year and an increase of 62% since 2002, writes Appleby. Yet only around 10% of prescribed items attract a charge due to a host of exemptions – for children, elderly people, those in receipt of welfare benefits ...

Patients with mental illness are two and a half times more likely to be victims of homicide than people in the general population, according to a national study examining the characteristics of homicide victims across England and Wales, published in The Lancet Psychiatry journal. Homicides committed by patients with mental illness have received much media attention, but patients' risk of being victims of homicide and their relationship to the perpetrators has rarely been examined. In this study, the National Confidential Inquiry into Suicide and Homicide by People ...

The number of deaths by suicide among mental health patients treated at home by crisis resolution home treatment teams (CRHT)*, has more than doubled in England in recent years, rising from an average of 80 in 2003-2004 to 163 in 2010-2011, according to new research published in The Lancet Psychiatry. In contrast, suicides on psychiatric wards fell by more than half, from 163 in 2003-2004 to 76 in 2010-2011. The research also reveals that despite an 18% fall in the suicide rate among people receiving community care by CRHT teams between 2003 and 2011, the overall suicide ...

The risks and benefits of red blood cell transfusions for patients with trauma and major bleeding might vary considerably based on a patient's predicted risk of death on arrival at a trauma centre, according to new research published in this week's PLOS Medicine. The study by Pablo Perel, from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, United Kingdom, and colleagues, suggests that trauma patients who have the highest predicted risk of death on arrival at a trauma centre receive the greatest benefit from red blood cell transfusions but for those with the lowest predicted ...

Parkinson's disease, which affects millions worldwide, results from neuron loss. Transplantation of fetal tissue to restore this loss has shown promise, but ethical concerns over acquiring this tissue limit its use. In a June 17 study in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Vania Broccoli and others at the San Raffaele Scientific Institute converted fibroblasts into neurons and engrafted them into the brains of rodents with parkinsonism. The cells improved motor function, but not as well as transplanted rat fetal tissues. The authors then used a technology that allows ...

People and mice with mutations in a specific signaling pathway, known as kisspeptin, suffer reproductive effects such as delayed puberty and infertility. Research of this pathway has focused on its role in reproduction, but a June 17 study in the Journal of Clinical Investigation looked at its effects on metabolism. Alexander Kauffman and colleagues at the University of California San Diego found that lack of the kisspeptin pathway in female mice promotes excess weight gain. Mice became overweight as the result of a reduced metabolism and decreased energy, but not as ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- Twist and hold your neck to the left. Now down, and over to the right, until it hurts. Now imagine your neck – or arms or legs – randomly doing that on their own, without you controlling it. That's a taste of what children and adults with a neurological condition called dystonia live with every day – uncontrollable twisting and stiffening of neck and limb muscles. The mystery of why this happens, and what can prevent or treat it, has long puzzled doctors, who have struggled to help their suffering dystonia patients. Now, new re-search from a University ...

A new study at the University of Iowa reports a potential link between stress hormones and short-term memory loss in older adults. The study, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, reveals that having high levels of cortisol—a natural hormone in our body whose levels surge when we are stressed—can lead to memory lapses as we age. Short-term increases in cortisol are critical for survival. They promote coping and help us respond to life's challenges by making us more alert and able to think on our feet. But abnormally high or prolonged spikes in cortisol—like what ...

Heart attack patients with kidney problems may not be getting the full treatment they need, according to a new study led by King's College London. The study found that patients admitted to hospital with chest pains and poorly functioning kidneys are less likely to be given an angiogram and early invasive treatment, which might increase their chance of surviving a heart attack. People admitted to hospital with a suspected heart attack are normally offered early angiography or X-ray of their heart – a procedure recommended in UK, European and US healthcare guidelines regardless ...

A new study by scientists at the University of York has shed new light on the use of mollusc shells as personal adornments by Bronze Age people. The research team used amino acid racemisation analysis (a technique used previously mainly for dating artefacts), light microscopy, scanning electron microscopy and Raman spectroscopy, to identify the raw materials used to make beads in a complex necklace discovered at an Early Bronze Age burial site at Great Cornard in Suffolk, UK. They discovered that Bronze Age craftspeople used species like dog whelk and tusk shells, both ...

BOSTON (June 17, 2014)—A controlled study using functional MRI brain imaging reveals a possible biological link between early musical training and improved executive functioning in both children and adults, report researchers at Boston Children's Hospital. The study, appearing online June 17 in the journal PLOS ONE, uses functional MRI of brain areas associated with executive function, adjusting for socioeconomic factors. Executive functions are the high-level cognitive processes that enable people to quickly process and retain information, regulate their behaviors, make ...

Washington, DC — A new study published in the June 18 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience adds to a body of evidence suggesting stress may accelerate cognitive decline later in life. The study found that aged rats with high levels of the stress hormone corticosterone showed structural changes in the brain and short-term memory deficits. While most people will experience some cognitive decline as they get older, the extent of these changes and how rapidly they progress varies greatly from one person to the next. Scientists are interested in understanding the factors ...

PHILADELPHIA - Bringing clarity to a decades-long debate, a national team of researchers led by experts from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania has found that adding clot-busting medications known as thrombolytics to conventional approaches when treating sudden-onset pulmonary embolism patients is associated with 47 percent fewer deaths than using standard intravenous or under-the-skin anticoagulant medications alone. A pulmonary embolism is a blockage of one or more arteries in the lungs, primarily because of blood clots that travel there ...

In an analysis that included data from 16 trials performed over the last 45 years, among patients with pulmonary embolism, receipt of therapy to dissolve the blood clot (thrombolysis) was associated with lower rates of death, but increased risks of major bleeding and intracranial hemorrhage, according to a study in the June 18 issue of JAMA. The authors note that these findings may not apply to patients with low-risk pulmonary embolism. Pulmonary embolism (PE; a blockage of the main artery of the lung or one of its branches) is an important cause of illness and death, ...

Findings of a large survey indicate that since 2010, when young adults could be covered under their parents' health insurance plans until age 26, self-reported health among this group has improved, along with a decrease in out-of-pocket health care expenditures, according to a study in the June 18 issue of JAMA. Beginning September 23, 2010, the Affordable Care Act allowed young adults to be covered under their parents' plans until 26 years of age. This dependent coverage provision increased insurance coverage and access among young adults. However, little is known about ...