Alpha oscillations are electrophysiological features of the human brain linked to fundamental processes including memory and perception. This study introduces a closed-loop auditory stimulation approach to selectively modulate alpha oscillations in the human brain in a phase-dependent and spatially-specific manner. ##### In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Biology:   http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3002651 Article Title: A closed-loop auditory stimulation approach selectively modulates alpha oscillations and sleep onset dynamics in humans Author Countries: United Kingdom Funding: ...

Modern therapies have extended the lives of many cancer patients; however, survivors often live with chronic health conditions, including cardiovascular disease. New research published in JACC: CardioOncology shows that air pollution plays a significant role in increasing cardiovascular disease and mortality in cancer patients and contributes to health disparities related to these conditions. “The review underscores the critical need to consider environmental factors, especially air pollution, in cardio-oncology risk assessment and patient management,” said Xiaoquan Rao, MD, PhD, senior author of the study and a cardiologist ...

Using sound to stimulate certain brain waves has the potential to help those with dementia or cognitive decline sleep better, reveals a new study. Sleep disturbances are a common feature in dementia and may affect up to half of people living with the condition. During the study, the research team from the University of Surrey and the UK Dementia Research Institute Centre for Care Research & Technology at Imperial College London, used sound stimulation to target alpha rhythms, a type of brainwave, at precise timings of the wave to investigate how the brain responds. Alpha rhythms have been associated ...

Black patients who leave hospice care and patients with short stays in hospice care are at increased risks for being admitted to a hospital after being discharged from hospice, according to Rutgers Health researchers.   Their study, published in JAMA Network Open, examined patient outcomes after hospice care discharges to determine what factors contribute to transitions that lead to negative health implications.   “Hospice care teams may want to pay particular attention to the discharge planning needs of patients of racial and ethnic minority groups and patients with more complicated needs,” said Elizabeth Luth, the lead author of the study and ...

Cyclodextrins (CDs) are complicated carbohydrates, a term that describes the natural, sugar-based, starchy material that makes up much of fruits, vegetables and grains. Their unique chemical properties make them ideal for all sorts of uses, including air fresheners, medications and cosmetics. Scientists also are exploring their potential to treat cardiovascular diseases caused by atherosclerotic plaques. Now, more than 130 years after CDs were first discovered and reported, a University of Texas at Arlington team of scientists has created chemical mirror images of these complex ...

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — When stars collapse, they can leave behind incredibly dense but relatively small and cold remnants called neutron stars. If two stars collapse in close proximity, the leftover binary neutron stars spiral in and eventually collide, and the interface where the two stars begin merging becomes incredibly hot. New simulations of these events show hot neutrinos — tiny, essentially massless particles that rarely interact with other matter — that are created during the collision can be briefly trapped at these interfaces and remain out of equilibrium with the cold cores of the merging stars for 2 to 3 milliseconds. ...

Imagine driving through a tunnel in an autonomous vehicle, but unbeknownst to you, a crash has stopped traffic up ahead. Normally, you’d need to rely on the car in front of you to know you should start braking. But what if your vehicle could see around the car ahead and apply the brakes even sooner? Researchers from MIT and Meta have developed a computer vision technique that could someday enable an autonomous vehicle to do just that. They have introduced a method that creates physically accurate, 3D models of an entire scene, including areas blocked from view, ...

Coffee drinking is a heritable habit, and one that carries a certain amount of genetic baggage. Caffeinated coffee is a psychoactive substance, notes Sandra Sanchez-Roige, Ph.D., an associate professor in the University of California San Diego School of Medicine Department of Psychiatry. She is one of an international group of researchers that compared coffee-consumption characteristics from a 23andMe database with an even larger set of records in the United Kingdom. She is the corresponding author of a study recently published in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology. Hayley ...

CLEVELAND—Since 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic has presented significant challenges to global public health, infecting millions and claiming numerous lives. While widespread vaccination efforts have alleviated the immediate threat, lingering questions persist about the long-term effects of the virus on those infected. An interdisciplinary team of scientists has made a significant breakthrough to understand how the body adapts to COVID-19 infection, potentially offering crucial insights into managing the complex disease. Led by  Christopher Wilson, professor of medicine at Loma Linda University, the collaborative effort involved ...

Study Title: Radiation Therapy for HPV-Positive Oropharyngeal Squamous Cell Carcinoma: An ASTRO Clinical Practice Guideline Publication: Practical Radiation Oncology Dana-Farber Cancer Institute author: Danielle Margalit, MD, MPH Summary: A multi-disciplinary task force convened by the American Society for Radiation Oncology has issued new guidelines for radiation therapy for HPV-associated oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC). The expert task force recommends optimal dosing regimens for radiation therapy when used alone or after surgery, incorporating the latest data on minimizing doses to areas that may affect patient quality of life such as swallowing. ...

The Argonne in Chicago South Side STEM Opportunity Landscape Project was awarded the Societal Impact Award by the Chicago Council on Science and Technology (C2ST) for its commitment to advancing equity and opportunity in STEM education and careers across underserved communities. C2ST is a nonprofit that works to inspire and engage all segments of society about science and technology and their contributions to society. The South Side STEM Opportunity Landscape Project is part of Argonne in Chicago, which is focused on driving inclusive innovation to advance economic and societal impacts for underserved and underrepresented communities. The ...

The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation has awarded $3.7 million to kickstart the Western Fire & Forest Resilience Collaborative, led by Winslow Hansen, a forest ecologist at Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies. Funds are enabling the formation of an interdisciplinary collaborative that will advance science-based management solutions to the growing wildfire crisis. In the Western US, climate change and a legacy of fire suppression have led to larger, more severe, and more frequent fires — with devastating consequences for people, natural resources, and the climate. By dramatically speeding ...

The international NOvA collaboration presented new results at the Neutrino 2024 conference in Milan, Italy, on June 17. The collaboration doubled their neutrino data since their previous release four years ago, including adding a new low-energy sample of electron neutrinos. The new results are consistent with previous NOvA results, but with improved precision. The data favor the “normal” ordering of neutrino masses more strongly than before, but ambiguity remains around the neutrino’s oscillation properties. The latest NOvA data provide a very precise measurement ...

Artificial intelligence (AI) has permeated many aspects of medicine, with promises of  accurate diagnoses, better management decisions, and improved outcomes for both patients and the healthcare system. However, to successfully implement AI technology in clinical practice, trust and acceptance among healthcare providers to use such tools is crucial. Now, using the treatment of digestive diseases as a case study, an international study led by Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) has found that doctors in the gastroenterology practice generally trust and accept AI medical tools. Through ...

About The Study: Rates of cannabis-related disorder encounters increased from 2017 through 2022 among Medicare-insured older adults. This study observed the highest rates in states or territories that legalized adult and medical use of cannabis. The results also suggest higher average annual increases in states or territories that legalized medical cannabis. Corresponding author: To contact the corresponding author, Silvia Perez-Vilar, Ph.D., Pharm.D., email silvia.perezvilar@fda.hhs.gov To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media ...

About The Study: In this study of 450 community outpatient mental health treatment facilities in 20 high-burden states, approximately one-third offered medications for opioid use disorder (MOUD). These results suggest that further study is needed to report MOUD uptake, either through increased prescribing at all clinics or through effective referral models. Corresponding author: To contact the corresponding author, Jonathan Cantor, Ph.D., email jcantor@rand.org. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link ...

About The Study: Although Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) hospital star rating was associated with postoperative mortality, serious complications, and readmissions, there was wide variation in surgical outcomes within each star rating group. These findings highlight the limitations of the CMS hospital star rating system as a measure of surgical quality and should be a call for continued improvement of publicly reported hospital grade measures.  Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Adrian Diaz, M.D., M.P.H., email adrian.diaz@osumc.edu. To access the embargoed ...

Sepsis patients could be treated based on their immune system’s response to infection, not their symptoms. New research uncovers how different people respond to sepsis based on their genetic makeup, which could help identify who would benefit from certain treatments and lead to the development of targeted therapies.   The team, from the Wellcome Sanger Institute, the University of Oxford, and collaborators, built on their previous work that identified different subgroups of patients with sepsis. They aimed to understand more about why sepsis response varies between patients and the different underlying immune response pathways. The new study, published today (18 June) in Cell Genomics, ...

The migratory locust Locusta migratoria is an economically important crop pest that is said to have come to Egypt in the Old Testament as the eighth of the ten biblical plagues, "to devour all that plants that grow". The migratory locust is rarely found in Europe, but in Africa and Asia it not only causes millions of dollars’ worth of damage but also has a deadly impact on local people, threatening their food and their very existence. The locusts occur in two phases: as solitary animals and in swarms. The insects are most feared when they ...

A new study published today in JAMA Network Open by an international cohort of researchers provides the latest data on the effectiveness of treating pancreatic cancer patients with chemotherapy (with or without radiation therapy) before surgery to remove a tumor. The study focuses specifically on pancreatic adenocarcinoma patients. The research found that after treatment and surgery, nearly five percent of patients had no detectable cancer cells left in the area where the tumor was, achieving a pathological complete response (pCR). “PCR means that the cancer has responded extremely well to the treatment, leaving no ...

Only a third of outpatient community mental health treatment facilities in 20 states with the highest opioid related overdose deaths report offering medication treatment for opioid use disorders, suggesting efforts may be needed to strengthen such services, according to a new RAND study.   Among the 450 clinics surveyed, factors that increased the likelihood that clinics would provide medication for opioid use disorders included being a certified behavioral health clinic and providing integrated mental and substance use disorder treatment.   Researchers found that most clinics that did not offer medication treatment said they referred patients to other clinics for ...

LA JOLLA (June 18, 2024)—Salk Institute Assistant Professor Jesse Dixon has been named a 2024 Pew Biomedical Scholar by The Pew Charitable Trusts. This honor provides funding to early-career investigators who demonstrate outstanding promise in science toward advancing human health. Dixon and the other 21 awardees will each receive $300,000 over four years to support their research. “Through his development and use of leading-edge genetic tools, Jesse has already made a major impact on how we study diseases such ...

PHILADELPHIA—The Pew Charitable Trusts today announced the 22 researchers who have been selected to join the Pew Scholars Program in the Biomedical Sciences. These early-career scientists will receive four years of funding to explore some of the most pressing questions in human health and medicine. “Pew believes that supporting promising early-career researchers is key to scientific innovation, and for nearly 40 years our scholars have helped change the world—creating lifesaving therapies and responding to emerging health crises around the globe,” ...

Scientists at the University of Cambridge have discovered that a type of white blood cell - called a regulatory T cell - exists as a single large population of cells that constantly move throughout the body looking for, and repairing, damaged tissue. This overturns the traditional thinking that regulatory T cells exist as multiple specialist populations that are restricted to specific parts of the body. The finding has implications for the treatment of many different diseases – because almost all diseases and injuries trigger the body’s immune system. Current anti-inflammatory drugs treat the whole ...

PHILADEPHIA—The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Alexander and Margaret Stewart Trust announced today the 2024 class of the Pew-Stewart Scholars for Cancer Research, five early-career scientists who will each receive four-year grants to explore new avenues in cancer development, diagnosis, and treatment. This is the 11th year the Alexander and Margaret Stewart Trust has partnered with Pew to cultivate a legacy of cutting-edge cancer research. “Despite decades of groundbreaking research and innovative breakthroughs, millions of Americans are still all too familiar with the devastation and uncertainty of a cancer diagnosis,” ...