What: West African genetic ancestry was associated with increased prostate cancer among men living in disadvantaged neighborhoods but not among men living in more affluent neighborhoods, according to a new study led by researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The findings suggest that neighborhood environment may play a role in determining how genetic ancestry influences prostate cancer risk. The study was published Sept. 16, 2024, in JAMA Network Open. In the United States, most Black Americans have West African genetic ancestry, the researchers noted. Previous studies have shown that West African genetic ancestry is linked to increased prostate cancer risk among Black men, ...

(Santa Barbara, Calif) — Pregnancy is a transformative time in a person’s life where the body undergoes rapid physiological adaptations to prepare for motherhood — that we all know. What has remained something of a mystery is what the sweeping hormonal shifts brought on by pregnancy are doing to the brain. Researchers in Professor Emily Jacobs’ lab at UC Santa Barbara have shed light on this understudied area with the first-ever map of a human brain over the course of pregnancy. “We wanted to look at the trajectory of brain changes specifically within the gestational window,” said Laura Pritschet, lead ...

[Vienna, September 13 2024] – The 15-minute city, a concept where essential services are accessible within a 15-minute walk or bike ride, has become increasingly popular in urban planning in recent years. This is because it offers solutions to several pressing challenges in urban areas, such as traffic, pollution, social isolation, and quality of life. With more than half of the world's population now living in cities—and this figure steadily increasing—these issues are becoming ever more critical. In a recent study, published ...

The CLINICAL24 campaign will see SelectScience partner with a variety of organisations, clinical laboratories and industry brands, to raise awareness of the role of clinical professionals, and those who support them. As part of the partnership, both organisations will share updates and content of interest to their audiences and AMI will supply speakers for SelectScience’s upcoming Clinical Summit in March 2025. Global interdisciplinary community AMI nurtures and engages a global interdisciplinary community, providing opportunities for collaboration, making advancements in, and through, applied microbiology. “We ...

September 16, 2024—(BRONX, NY)— The National Cancer Institute-designated Montefiore Einstein Comprehensive Cancer Center (MECCC) has announced the new Marilyn and Stanley M. Katz Institute for Immunotherapy for Cancer and Inflammatory Disorders.  Xingxing Zang, Ph.D., an international leader in developing novel immunotherapies, has been named its inaugural director.   “Our goal is to be at the forefront of developing novel immunotherapy technologies and advancing them into ...

New research has answered the mystery of how the Crystal Palace in London, which at the time was the world’s largest building, was constructed in only 190 days. The study, led by Professor John Gardner of Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) in Cambridge, England, has discovered that the Crystal Palace was the first building known to have made use of a standard screw thread – something that’s now taken for granted in modern construction and engineering. Completed just in time for the start ...

The importance of disorder in physics is only matched by the difficulty to study it. For example, the remarkable properties of high-temperature superconductors are greatly affected by variations in the chemical composition of the solid. Techniques that enable measurements of such disorder and its impact on the electronic properties, such as scanning tunnelling microscopy, work only at very low temperatures, and are blind to these physics near the transition temperature. Now, a team of researchers of the Max Planck Institute for the Structure and Dynamics of Matter (MPSD) in Germany and Brookhaven National ...

FRANKFURT. In January 2024, 16 Frankfurt-based research institutions joined forces to set up the “Frankfurt Alliance”, made up of Goethe University Frankfurt and several non-university research institutions. With the aim of visualizing at an event held in the heart of the Main metropolis both the strength and the diversity of research conducted in the science city of Frankfurt and the larger Rhine-Main region, including its importance for society, the alliance invites you to the first “Science Festival”, held on Saturday, September 28, from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. at Roßmarkt in ...

The Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology today announced final results will be presented at ESMO 2024 from CABINET (A021602), a phase III trial evaluating cabozantinib compared with placebo in two cohorts of patients with previously treated neuroendocrine tumors: one cohort of patients with advanced pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (pNET) and a second cohort of patients with advanced extra-pancreatic NET (epNET). The study met the primary objective for each cohort, demonstrating that cabozantinib provided dramatic improvements in median ...

To build upon a quarter-century of world-renowned research in zoonotic viral diseases, X.J. Meng has been rewarded with a prestigious National Institutes of Health (NIH) Method to Extend Research in Time (MERIT) Award – the first awarded to Virginia Tech.  “This is a huge honor and privilege,” said Meng, University Distinguished Professor of Molecular Virology in the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. “It is really gratifying to know ...

By Benjamin Boettner (BOSTON) — Researchers at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard Universityreceived a contract for up to $12M from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)’s new SHIELD program. The SHIELD (Synthetic Hemo-technologies to Locate and Disinfect) program aims to develop a prophylactic treatment that can be broadly administered to trauma victims in combat casualty care scenarios to rapidly clear multiple bloodborne bacterial and fungal pathogens, limit morbidity and mortality, and protect recipients for up to seven days. Blood ...

The deadly H5N1 avian influenza virus, which has killed millions of birds worldwide since 2021 – and in rare cases can be transmitted to humans – may be spread through the food-stealing behaviour of some seabirds. A study published today in the journal Conservation Letters highlights food theft – also known as ‘kleptoparasitism’, where some seabird species like frigatebirds and skuas force other birds to regurgitate their prey – as a possible transmission path for the spread of avian flu. Led by scientists from UNSW Sydney’s ...

SAN ANTONIO — September 16, 2024 —Researchers from Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) and The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) are creating innovative military helmet pads designed to prevent traumatic brain injury (TBI). The project, led by SwRI’s Dr. Daniel Portillo and UTSA’s Dr. Morteza Seidi, is supported by a $125,000 grant from the Connecting through Research Partnerships (Connect) program. Traumatic brain injury can affect human performance and quality of life. It is ...

Indianapolis – Patients with low-risk cancers undergoing active surveillance face a favorable long-term prognosis. David Haggstrom, M.D., MAS, makes the case that it’s time for the medical field to help manage the anxiety caused by waiting. Dr. Haggstrom, a physician-researcher with Regenstrief Institute, the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Indianapolis and the Indiana University School of Medicine, is lead author of a Viewpoint article, published in JAMA (Journal of the American Medical ...

The Kinsey Institute at Indiana University, in partnership with leading sexual wellbeing company the Lovehoney Group and its Womanizer brand, has released early data from new nationally representative surveys exploring menopause knowledge, symptom management, medical care engagement, and health disparities among Americans.   Phase 1 surveyed of 1,500 American adults aged 18-88, to assess overall public knowledge and understanding of menopause. Phase 2 surveyed 1,500 women aged 40-65, to better understand women’s experiences with menopause. ...

DALLAS, September 16, 2024 — As the new school year begins, the American Heart Association is supporting student health and well-being by awarding financial grants to nearly 80 elementary, middle and high schools nationwide. These grants, part of the Association’s commitment to improve cardiovascular health for all people everywhere, will allow local schools in communities across the country to invest in vital resources such as new fitness equipment, water filling stations and health education ...

BALTIMORE, September 16, 2024— A new study from Kennedy Krieger Institute shows that the majority of children diagnosed with long COVID are likely to experience orthostatic intolerance (OI), a condition that causes the body to struggle with regulating blood pressure and heart rate when standing up. As a result, children often feel dizzy, lightheaded, fatigued and may experience “brain fog” or cognitive difficulties. Orthostatic intolerance includes disorders such as postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS) and orthostatic hypotension. Among the patients studied, dizziness (67%), fatigue (25%), ...

New research highlights the precarious status of one of Madagascar's most threatened amphibians, the harlequin mantella (Mantella cowanii), revealing small population sizes and the possible extirpation of the species from several of its historic habitats. The findings underscore the urgent need for targeted conservation action to prevent the species from slipping further towards extinction. Research Findings: A Dire Situation  Amphibians around the world are facing unprecedented population declines, and Mantella cowanii is no exception. The study, which focused on confirming the frog’s presence at historic localities and estimating its population size ...

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine Foundation has joined forces with the Restless Legs Syndrome Foundation to fund research leading to new treatments and a cure for RLS. Earlier this year, the AASM Foundation began an agreement with the RLS Foundation to co-fund basic and clinical RLS research. The partnership for 2024 includes the following research priorities: Neurobiological interaction: Elucidate the points of interaction between RLS-relevant neurotransmitters, neuronal pathways, and iron deficiency. Pharmacologic treatments: Elucidate effects of novel pharmacological approaches on RLS. Clinical practice: Research based on innovations in patient ...

Discovery expands understanding of how language is produced by the brain Current method of mapping brain language function for surgery using electrical stimulation hasn’t changed in 50 years Finding could make it easier on patients and doctors to identify critical language sites in the brain to preserve function after surgery CHICAGO --- When surgeons perform brain surgery on people with brain tumors or epilepsy, they need to remove the tumor or abnormal tissue while preserving parts of the brain that control language and movement. A new Northwestern Medicine study may better inform doctors’ ...

Astronomers have used the NASA/ESA James Webb Space Telescope to confirm that supermassive black holes can starve their host galaxies of the fuel they need to form new stars. The international team, co-led by the University of Cambridge, used Webb to observe a galaxy roughly the size of the Milky Way in the early universe, about two billion years after the Big Bang. Like most large galaxies, it has a supermassive black hole at its centre. However, this galaxy is essentially ‘dead’: it has mostly stopped forming new stars. “Based ...

Imagine you’re looking at millions upon millions of mysterious genetic mutations. With CRISPR gene-editing technology, a select few of these mutations might have therapeutic potential. However, proving it would mean many thousands of hours of lab work. Just figuring out which ones are worth exploring further would take a lot of time and money. But what if you could do it in the virtual realm with artificial intelligence? CREME is a new AI-powered virtual laboratory invented by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) Assistant Professor Peter Koo and his team. It allows geneticists to run thousands of virtual experiments ...

Statement Highlights: There are a variety of interrelated social and structural factors that contribute to differences in cardiovascular health among Asian Americans, and these factors are likely different within individual Asian ethnic subgroups. Asian Americans and Asian immigrants are quite diverse and comprise many ethnic groups.  Social determinants, such as immigration-related factors, discrimination, socioeconomic status, English proficiency and cultural beliefs, may influence health behaviors, access to health care and the ability ...

Researchers from the Kind Group have gained new insights into the mechanism behind the spatial organization of DNA within the cells of early embryos. When an embryo is first formed after fertilization, each cell has the potential to become any cell type of the body. The researchers have studied the spatial organization of DNA that is so particular to these early developmental stages. The paper was published in Nature Genetics on September 16th, 2024.  Every cell in our body contains the same DNA. ...

A recent study conducted by researchers from Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine and Fudan University has revealed a significant association between socioeconomic status (SES) inequality and the risk of developing age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Published in Health Data Science, the study highlights how a healthy lifestyle can mitigate some of the risks associated with low SES.   Socioeconomic disparities have long been a concern in various health outcomes. This study, led ...