Coastal communities are often relaxing locales with lush natural attributes. At the same time, they face many challenges from both natural and manmade elements. Thomas Colbert, professor at the University of Houston's Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture, dedicates his research to discovering ways to protect coastlines and delta regions from severe weather threats and other dangers. This week, he joins a roster of international scholars, designers and architects at the 2014 International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam (IABR) in the Netherlands. Colbert is among ...

VIDEO: Researchers watched TAT proteins (green) journey into microtubules (red). TAT proteins are known to label the insides of the tubes. They observed that TAT can move quickly, back and... Click here for more information. In a new study, scientists at the National Institutes of Health took a molecular-level journey into microtubules, the hollow cylinders inside brain cells that act as skeletons and internal highways. They watched how a protein called tubulin acetyltransferase ...

NASA scientists have created a new recipe that captures key flavors of the brownish-orange atmosphere around Saturn's largest moon, Titan. The recipe is used for lab experiments designed to simulate Titan's chemistry. With this approach, the team was able to classify a previously unidentified material discovered by NASA's Cassini spacecraft in the moon's smoggy haze. "Now we can say that this material has a strong aromatic character, which helps us understand more about the complex mixture of molecules that makes up Titan's haze," said Melissa Trainer, a planetary scientist ...

BELLINGHAM, Washington, USA — A new special section on Human Vision in the current issue of Optical Engineering showcases optics and optical engineering research into new techniques and approaches for the study of human vision and the design of novel imaging systems. Put into practice, these new approaches enable applications such as earlier diagnosis of disease, improved treatment monitoring, and more accurate guidance for treatment and surgery. The journal is published by SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics. The special section includes 11 papers ...

VIDEO: This TRMM satellite flyby animation shows that Tropical Storm Nanauk contained powerful towering thunderstorms that were reaching heights of up to 16.8 km (10.4 miles) on June 11, 2014.... Click here for more information. Tropical Storm Nanauk was dissipating in the Arabian Sea on Friday, June 13 as it ran into increasing vertical wind shear, dry air moving into the tropical cyclone and cooler sea surface temperatures. NASA's TRMM satellite observed the soaking rains the ...

Hurricane Cristina intensified rapidly on June 12 and infrared satellite data showed cloud top temperatures became extremely cold as thunderstorms towered to the top of the troposphere. One day later, Cristina was weakening quickly and infrared data showed cloud top temperatures were warming as the cloud tops dropped. Infrared data basically reads a cloud top's temperature. When NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Hurricane Cristina early on June 12, cloud top temperatures exceeded -80C (-112F). Today, June 13, infrared data showed cloud top temperatures had warmed to near ...

(June 13, 2014)- Concerted effort is needed to reverse the ongoing rise in pertussis cases and deaths, especially among children and young people, according to the article by Emily Peake, APRN, MSN, FNP-C, CLC, and Lisa K. McGuire, MSN, MBA-HCM, RN. "This effort begins with nurses and nurse practitioners and other primary care providers who educate patients and the public," they write. "The battle of pertussis is winnable through education, awareness, and vaccination." In US and Abroad, Rising Rates of Pertussis Infection and Death Caused by infection with Bordetella ...

Health-related buzzwords, such as "antioxidant," "gluten-free" and "whole grain," lull consumers into thinking packaged food products labeled with those words are healthier than they actually are, according to a new research study conducted by scholars at the University of Houston (UH). That "false sense of health," as well as a failure to understand the information presented in nutrition facts panels on packaged food, may be contributing to the obesity epidemic in the United States, said Temple Northup, an assistant professor at the Jack J. Valenti School of Communication ...

By now, most people feel comfortable conducting financial transactions on the Web. The cryptographic schemes that protect online banking and credit card purchases have proven their reliability over decades. As more of our data moves online, a more pressing concern may be its inadvertent misuse by people authorized to access it. Every month seems to bring another story of private information accidentally leaked by governmental agencies or vendors of digital products or services. At the same time, tighter restrictions on access could undermine the whole point of sharing ...

TAMPA, Fla. (June 13, 2014) – A new Moffitt Cancer Center study published Thursday in Genetics in Medicine shows that counseling from a genetic health care provider before genetic testing educates patients and may help reduce unnecessary procedures. Up to 10 percent of cancers are inherited, meaning a person was born with an abnormal gene that increases their risk for cancer. "Pre-test genetic counseling in which a health care provider takes a thorough family history and discusses the potential risks and benefits of genetic testing is standard of care as recommended ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] —Women diagnosed with breast cancer often face a crucial decision about the extent of their surgical treatment. Many meet national guidelines recommending testing for mutations in the BRCA 1 and 2 genes, which carry a substantial risk of future cancer. A new study reports that among women with breast cancer who undergo recommended testing before surgery, more than 7 in 10 who test positive will change their surgical plan, typically opting for a more extensive procedure such as a double mastectomy and sometimes ovary removal. "As soon ...

Five charities in the UK are both active in alcohol policy processes and funded by the alcohol industry, according to a new study published in the European Journal of Public Health. The study, carried out by researchers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, looks at the relationships between the alcohol industry, charities and policy influence in the UK. Two of the charities, Addaction and Mentor UK, are the only remaining non-industry, non-governmental members of the Public Health Responsibility Deal's alcohol network – the UK government's initiative ...

Biologists at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) have discovered new mechanisms used by bacteria to manufacture lipids, i.e. fat molecules, for the cell membrane. Those mechanisms are a combination of familiar bacterial synthesis pathways and of such that occur in higher organisms. Thus, the team headed by Prof Dr Franz Narberhaus and Dr Roman Moser has debunked the long-standing theory that lipid production in bacteria differs substantially from that in higher organisms. The results have been published in the journal Molecular Microbiology. Potential for the pharmaceutical ...

An imbalance of female sex hormones among men in Western nations may be contributing to high levels of male obesity, according to new research from the University of Adelaide. In a paper published in the online journal PLOS ONE, researchers from the University's School of Medical Sciences suggest that obesity among Western men could be linked with exposure to substances containing the female sex hormone estrogen – substances that are more often found in affluent societies, such as soy products and plastics. The research was conducted by University of Adelaide medical ...

Referees may soon have a new way of determining whether a football team has scored a touchdown or gotten a first down. Researchers from North Carolina State University and Carnegie Mellon University, in collaboration with Disney Research, have developed a system that can track a football in three-dimensional space using low-frequency magnetic fields. The technology could be particularly useful for situations when the ball is blocked from view, such as goal-line rushing attempts when the ball carrier is often buried at the bottom of a pile of players. The technology could ...

It is the breakthrough that physicists and chemists around the world have long anticipated and it will play a pivotal role in information technology in coming years. Researchers at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) have managed, for the first time, to directly observe the 100 percent spin polarization of a Heusler compound. Heusler alloys are composed of several metallic elements arranged in a lattice structure. They are among those materials that potentially can be used for ever smaller data storage components with ever greater storage capacity. However, doubts ...

A new drug target to fight Alzheimer's disease has been discovered by a research team led by Gong Chen, a Professor of Biology and the Verne M. Willaman Chair in Life Sciences at Penn State University. The discovery also has potential for development as a novel diagnostic tool for Alzheimer's disease, which is the most common form of dementia and one for which no cure has yet been found. A scientific paper describing the discovery will be published in Nature Communications on 13 June 2014. Chen's research was motivated by the recent failure in clinical trials of once-promising ...

New cohort studies presented today at the European League Against Rheumatism Annual Congress (EULAR 2014) have shown the amino acid valine at position 11 of HLA-DRB1 gene to be the strongest independent genetic determinant of radiological damage in rheumatoid arthritis (RA).1 In addition, positions 71 and 74 were found to represent independent predictors, with the three positions together: 11, 71 and 74 strongly associated with disease outcomes.1 According to lead author Dr Sebastien Viatte of the Arthritis Research UK Centre for Genetics and Genomics, Manchester, United ...

A new study presented today at the European League Against Rheumatism Annual Congress (EULAR 2014) highlights the increased health care costs associated with musculoskeletal conditions compared to other diseases. Health care costs were almost 50% higher for people with a musculoskeletal condition compared to any other singly occurring condition.1 This disparity remained high where two conditions co-existed, with health care costs still one third higher (36%) for those people with one of their two conditions musculoskeletal in nature, highlighting the significant impact ...

A new study presented today at the European League Against Rheumatism Annual Congress (EULAR 2014) showed a significantly increased risk of heart attack in patients with Sjögren's syndrome (SjS), particularly in the first year following diagnosis. There was also a trend towards an increased risk for stroke. SjS is an auto-immune inflammatory disease where the body's immune system attacks glands that secrete fluid, such as the tear and saliva glands.2 Inflammation within the glands reduces fluid production causing painful burning in the eyes, dry mouth, and sometimes dryness ...

Data presented today at the European League Against Rheumatism Annual Congress (EULAR 2014) demonstrate the possibility of using biomarkers (developed from whole blood gene expression profiles) in children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) to predict the status of their disease at 12 months. The long-term disease status at 12 months was accurately predicted only after treatment had been initiated, in newly diagnosed patients.1 JIA is the most common childhood* chronic rheumatic disease,2 affecting 16-150 children in every 100,000. As indicated by the name, the ...

WASHINGTON — The inexpensive anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) reverses resistance to tamoxifen, a widely used breast cancer drug, in mice. In the June 15 issue of Clinical Cancer Research, investigators from Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center say adding HCQ to tamoxifen could provide a new treatment option for some women with advanced, postmenopausal estrogen receptor-positive (ER+) breast cancer. The ER+ subtype accounts for an estimated 70 percent of all breast cancers. While many of these women are treated with tamoxifen, which blocks estrogen ...

A new study of pollution records indicates that the Western Amazon, an area of unparalleled biological and cultural diversity, may have been contaminated by widespread oil pollution over a 30-year period. This work will be presented at the Goldschmidt conference in Sacramento, California Most of the world's tropical rainforests contain oil and gas reserves. Oil production started in the Western Amazon in the 1920s and peaked in the 1970s, but current growing global demand is stimulating a renewed growth in oil and gas extraction. Nearly 70% of the Peruvian Amazon was ...

New research published in Diabetologia (the journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes) shows that children diagnosed with type 1 diabetes have a less balanced composition of gut bacteria compared with children of the same age without diabetes. The research is by Dr Marcus de Goffau and Dr Hermie Harmsen, University Medical Center Groningen, the Netherlands, and colleagues. The incidence of type 1 diabetes is increasing worldwide, showing a particularly sharp increase among children under the age of 5 years. Recent studies indicate that adverse changes ...

Phone dating apps used by gay men to find a sexual partner carry a higher risk of getting common sexually transmitted infections than meeting online or in bars and clubs, suggests research published online in the journal Sexually Transmitted Infections. Previous research has suggested that gay and bi-curious men who meet online are more likely to indulge in unprotected sex and to have more partners than men meeting potential partners in other ways. But since 2009 smartphone apps, such as Grindr, Scruff, and Recon, have become an increasingly popular way to hook up with ...