BOSTON, MA – A new research study from Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) that compares low-dose oral estrogen and low-dose non-hormonal venlafaxine hydrochloride extended release (XR) to placebo were both found effective in reducing the number of hot flashes and night sweats reported by menopausal women. The study is the first clinical trial to simultaneously evaluate estrogen therapy (ET), known as the "gold standard" treatment for hot flashes and night sweats, and a non-hormonal treatment, venlafaxine, a first-line treatment in women who are unwilling or unable to ...

Less Improvement in Infants with Bronchiolitis After Nebulized Hypertonic Saline Treatment Bottom Line: Children with bronchiolitis (a common respiratory tract infection that can result in hospitalization) who were treated in the emergency department showed less clinical improvement after receiving nebulized 3 percent hypertonic saline (HS) than infants who received normal saline (NS). Author: Todd A. Florin, M.D., M.S.C.E., of the Cincinnati Children's Hospital, and colleagues. Background: Nebulized HS has been shown to increase mucociliary clearance (the clearing ...

The first conservation-specific vaccine trial on captive chimpanzees has proved a vaccine against Ebola virus is both safe and capable of producing a robust immune response in chimpanzees. This unprecedented study, published in the journal PNAS, shows that 'orphan' vaccines - which never complete the expensive licensing process for human use - can be co-opted for use on wildlife and might be a godsend for highly endangered species such as gorillas and chimpanzees, say researchers. They suggest that, by ending captive research in an effort to pay back an "ethical ...

Ants are capable of complex problem-solving strategies that could be widely applied as optimization techniques. An individual ant searching for food walks in random ways, biologists found. Yet the collective foraging behaviour of ants goes well beyond that, as a mathematical study to be published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reveals: The animal movements at a certain point change from chaos to order. This happens in a surprisingly efficient self-organized way. Understanding the ants could help analyze similar phenomena - for instance how humans ...

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego have found that DNA packs more easily into the tight confines of a virus when given a chance to relax, they report in a pair of papers to be published in in the early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the week of May 26 and the May 30 issue of Physical Review Letters. DNA is a long, unwieldy molecule that tends to repel itself because it is negatively charged, yet it can spool tightly. Within the heads of viruses, DNA can be packed to near crystalline densities, crammed in by a molecular ...

An international team of scientists has made a major step forward in our understanding of how enzymes 'edit' genes, paving the way for correcting genetic diseases in patients. Researchers at the Universities of Bristol, Münster and the Lithuanian Institute of Biotechnology have observed the process by which a class of enzymes called CRISPR – pronounced 'crisper' – bind and alter the structure of DNA. The results, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) today, provide a vital piece of the puzzle if these genome editing tools are ultimately ...

PHILADELPHIA – Puberty is the defining process of adolescent development, beginning a cascade of changes throughout the body, including the brain. Penn Medicine researchers have discovered that cerebral blood flow (CBF) levels decreased similarly in males and females before puberty, but saw them diverge sharply in puberty, with levels increasing in females while decreasing further in males, which could give hints as to developing differences in behavior in men and women and sex-specific pre-dispositions to certain psychiatric disorders. Their findings are available in Proceedings ...

AMHERST, Mass. – A new study of how biodiversity arises, by evolutionary biologists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, shows how a mutation in a single gene during development can lead to different consequences not only in how animals' skull and jaw are shaped, but how this leads to different feeding strategies to exploit different ecological niches. The study in the cichlid fish model by Yinan Hu, a doctoral student in organismic and evolutionary biology, with his advisor Craig Albertson, is among the first to address how a single genetic change can influence ...

Employers planning to implement mandatory influenza vaccination policies for health care workers need to understand the implications, according to an analysis published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). Vaccination rates among health care workers are less than 50%, well below the level necessary for herd immunity. Evidence indicates that vaccination of health care workers can benefit patient health, leading to a move by many to consider mandatory influenza vaccination as a condition of employment or to require employees to wear a mask during influenza season. ...

Researchers reveal that neurons can utilize a supremely localized internal store of calcium to initiate the secretion of neuropeptides, one class of signaling molecules through which neurons communicate with each other and with other cells. The study appears in The Journal of General Physiology. Neuropeptides are released from neurons through a process that—like other secretory events—is triggered primarily by the influx of calcium into the neuron through voltage-gated channels. Although neuropeptides are stored in large dense core vesicles (LDCVs) that also contain ...

(PHILADELPHIA) -- -- Calorie restriction, a kind of dieting in which food intake is decreased by a certain percentage, has been touted as way to help people live longer. New research suggests that there may be other benefits, including improving outcomes for women in breast cancer. According to a study published May 26th in Breast Cancer Research and Treatment, the triple negative subtype of breast cancer – one of the most aggressive forms – is less likely to spread, or metastasize, to new sites in the body when mice were fed a restricted diet. "The diet turned on a ...

This news release is available in French. A signal that promotes insulin secretion and reduces hyperglycemia in a type 2 diabetes animal model is enhanced by the inhibition of a novel enzyme discovered by CHUM Research Centre (CRCHUM) and University of Montreal researchers. The team is part of the Montreal Diabetes Research Center and their study, published recently in Cell Metabolism, was directed by researchers Marc Prentki and Murthy Madiraju. Insulin is an important hormone in our body that controls glucose and fat utilization. Insufficient insulin release by the ...

This news release is available in French. Research presented by Dr. Lynn Raymond, from the University of British Columbia, shows that blocking a specific class of glutamate receptors, called extrasynaptic NMDA receptors, can improve motor learning and coordination, and prevent cell death in animal models of Huntington disease. As Huntington disease is an inherited condition that can be detected decades before any clinical symptoms are seen in humans, a better understanding of the earliest changes in brain cell (neuronal) function, and the molecular pathways underlying ...

A study published in The Lancet Oncology journal reveals a high demand for costly cancer treatment among refugees from the recent conflicts in Iraq and Syria, with host countries struggling to find the money and the medicine to treat their new patients. The findings have prompted calls from lead author Dr Paul Spiegel, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Chief Medical Expert, for innovative financing schemes to improve access to affordable high-quality cancer care for refugees. In the first study of its kind, Spiegel and colleagues examined data ...

Like our own bodies, cells have their own skeletons called 'cytoskeletons' and are made of proteins instead of bones. These network-like structures maintain the cell's shape, provide mechanical support, and are involved in critical processes of the cell's lifecycle. The cytoskeleton is an object of intense scientific and medical research, which often requires being able to observe it directly in cells. Ideally, this would involve highly-fluorescent molecules that can bind cytoskeletal proteins with high specificity without being toxic to the cell. Publishing in Nature Methods, ...

VIDEO: In the middle of a DNA scaffold is affixed a single strand of DNA, with NAD+ tethered to the end like a ball and string. ASU Professor Han Yan refers... Click here for more information. Using molecules of DNA like an architectural scaffold, Arizona State University scientists, in collaboration with colleagues at the University of Michigan, have developed a 3-D artificial enzyme cascade that mimics an important biochemical pathway that could prove important for future biomedical ...

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have identified a mutated gene common to adenosquamous carcinoma (ASC) tumors – the first known unique molecular signature for this rare, but particularly virulent, form of pancreatic cancer. The findings are published in the May 25 advance online issue of Nature Medicine. Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer-related death in the United States, with roughly 45,220 new cases diagnosed and more than 38,400 deaths annually. Both numbers are rising. ASC cases are infrequent, but ...

"Aha" moments are rare in medical research, scientists say. As rare, they add, as finding mice with Mohawk-like hairstyles. But both events happened in a lab at NYU Langone Medical Center, months after an international team of neuroscientists bred hundreds of mice with a suspect genetic mutation tied to autism spectrum disorders. Almost all the grown mice, the NYU Langone team observed, had sideways,"overgroomed" hair with a highly stylized center hairline between their ears and hardly a tuft elsewhere. Mice typically groom each other's hair. Researchers say they ...

MADISON, Wis. — Soils that formed on the Earth's surface thousands of years ago and that are now deeply buried features of vanished landscapes have been found to be rich in carbon, adding a new dimension to our planet's carbon cycle. The finding, reported today (May 25, 2014) in the journal Nature Geoscience, is significant as it suggests that deep soils can contain long-buried stocks of organic carbon which could, through erosion, agriculture, deforestation, mining and other human activities, contribute to global climate change. "There is a lot of carbon at depths ...

May 25, 2014 — (Bronx, NY) — Researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have discovered a signaling pathway in cancer cells that controls their ability to invade nearby tissues in a finely orchestrated manner. The findings offer insights into the early molecular events involved in metastasis, the deadly spread of cancer cells from primary tumor to other parts of the body. The study was published today in the online edition of Nature Cell Biology. To migrate from a primary tumor, a cancer cell must first break through surrounding connective ...

HOUSTON -- Scientists have found a way to target elusive cells that suppress immune response, depleting them with peptides that spare other important cells and shrink tumors in preclinical experiments, according to a paper published online by Nature Medicine. "We've known about these cells blocking immune response for a decade, but haven't been able to shut them down for lack of an identified target," said the paper's senior author, Larry Kwak, M.D., Ph.D., chair of Lymphoma/Myeloma and director of the Center for Cancer Immunology Research at The University of Texas MD ...

The Greenish Warbler, long considered an idealized example of a single species that diverged into two as it expanded its range, has a much more checkered family history than biologists previously realized. Ring species are a continuous loop of related populations, each adapted to its local environment, with two terminal populations in the loop meeting but now unable to mate. But an in-depth genomic analysis published today in Nature by University of British Columbia researchers reveals that the Greenish Warbler's genetic migration through central Asia involved periods ...

Michael Lewis's bestselling book "Flash Boys" describes how some brokers, engaging in high frequency trading, exploit fast telecommunications to gain fraction-of-a-second advantage in the buying and selling of stocks. But you don't need to have billions of dollars riding on this-second securities transactions to appreciate the importance of fast signal processing. From internet to video streaming, we want things fast. Paul Lett and his colleagues at the Joint Quantum Institute (1) specialize in producing modulated beams of light for encoding information. They haven't ...

Scientists studying brain process involved in sight have found the visual cortex also uses information gleaned from the ears as well as the eyes when viewing the world. They suggest this auditory input enables the visual system to predict incoming information and could confer a survival advantage. Professor Lars Muckli, of the Institute of Neuroscience and Psychology at the University of Glasgow, who led the research, said: "Sounds create visual imagery, mental images, and automatic projections. "So, for example, if you are in a street and you hear the sound of an ...

A brain imaging study shows that patients with chronic fatigue syndrome may have reduced responses, compared with healthy controls, in a region of the brain connected with fatigue. The findings suggest that chronic fatigue syndrome is associated with changes in the brain involving brain circuits that regulate motor activity and motivation. Compared with healthy controls, patients with chronic fatigue syndrome had less activation of the basal ganglia, as measured by fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging). This reduction of basal ganglia activity was also linked with ...