EDMONTON, AB (April 12, 2015) -- "Pull my finger," a phrase embraced by school-aged kids and embarrassing uncles the world over, is now being used to settle a decades-long debate about what happens when you crack your knuckles. In a new study published April 15 in PLOS ONE, an international team of researchers led by the University of Alberta used MRI video to determine what happens inside finger joints to cause the distinctive popping sounds heard when cracking knuckles. For the first time, they observed that the cause is a cavity forming rapidly inside the joint. "We ...

Faster increases in life expectancy do not necessarily produce faster population aging, according to new research published in the journal PLOS ONE. This counterintuitive finding was the result of applying new measures of aging developed at IIASA to future population projections for Europe up to the year 2050. "Age can be measured as the time already lived or it can be adjusted taking into account the time left to live. If you don't consider people old just because they reached age 65 but instead take into account how long they have left to live, then the faster the ...

The ability to make a Lower Paleolithic hand axe depends on complex cognitive control by the prefrontal cortex, including the "central executive" function of working memory, a new study finds. PLOS ONE published the results, which knock another chip off theories that Stone Age hand axes are simple tools that don't involve higher-order executive function of the brain. "For the first time, we've showed a relationship between the degree of prefrontal brain activity, the ability to make technological judgments, and success in actually making stone tools," says Dietrich ...

BALTIMORE, MD, April 15, 2015 - Personal Genome Diagnostics, Inc. (PGDx), a provider of advanced cancer genome analysis and testing services, today announced the publication of a landmark study showing that many of the genetic alterations identified using tumor-only sequencing are not actually associated with the cancer, but instead reflect inherited germline mutations already present in the normal cells of the individual. The study is in the April 15 edition of Science Translational Medicine1 and was conducted by PGDx scientists working in collaboration with company co-founders ...

A study by Johns Hopkins scientists strongly suggests that sequencing tumor genomes for clues to genetic changes might misdirect treatment in nearly half of all patients unless it is compared first to a genetic readout of their noncancerous tissue. The investigators at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center say their analysis of more than 800 cancer patients' sequencing data, which was generated by Personal Genome Diagnostics Inc., a company co-founded by the researchers, shows that without such comparisons, attempts to individualize cancer therapy may be inappropriate ...

How fast is online learning evolving? Are wind turbines a promising investment? And how long before a cheap hoverboard makes it to market? Attempting to answer such questions requires knowing something about the rate at which a technology is improving. Now engineers at MIT have devised a formula for estimating how fast a technology is advancing, based on information gleaned from relevant patents. The researchers determined the improvement rates of 28 different technologies, including solar photovoltaics, 3-D printing, fuel-cell technology, and genome sequencing. They ...

NEW YORK (April 15, 2015) -- Technological advances are enabling scientists to sequence the genomes of cancer tumors, revealing a detailed portrait of genetic mutations that drive these diseases. But genomic studies are only one piece of the puzzle that is precision medicine, a Weill Cornell Medical College researcher writes in Nature. In order to realize the promise of this field, there needs to be an increased focus on creating robust clinical databases that include medical histories from patients around the country, which physicians can then use along with genomic data ...

The long-forecasted El Niño event of 2014/15 did not meet expectations. On March 5, 2015, the National Weather Service finally declared a "weak" event arriving several months later than expected, formally dashing predictions that we would see a major event on par with the monster El Niño of 1997/98 that would bring much-needed rain to California and other western states. Now, a team of researchers believes that they know why this year's event--and others like it--didn't live up to the hype. A new study published online April 13, 2015, in the journal Nature ...

Neuroscientists at NYU Langone Medical Center have discovered how the powerful brain hormone oxytocin acts on individual brain cells to prompt specific social behaviors - findings that could lead to a better understanding of how oxytocin and other hormones could be used to treat behavioral problems resulting from disease or trauma to the brain. The findings are to be published in the journal Nature online April 15. Until now, researchers say oxytocin -- sometimes called the "pleasure hormone" -- has been better known for its role in inducing sexual attraction and orgasm, ...

Previous studies have suggested that pulses of icebergs may have caused cycles of abrupt climate change during the last glacial period by introducing fresh water to the surface of the ocean and changing ocean currents, which are known to play a dominant role in the climate of many of Earth's regions. However, new findings by scientists at Cardiff University present a contradictory narrative and suggest that icebergs generally arrived too late to trigger marked cooling across the North Atlantic. Abrupt climate change, characterised by transitions between warm and cold ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. - Invasive pests known as spruce bark beetles have been attacking Alaskan forests for decades, killing more than 1 million acres of forest on the Kenai Peninsula in southern Alaska for more than 25 years. Beyond environmental concerns regarding the millions of dead trees, or "beetle kill" trees, inhabitants of the peninsula and surrounding areas are faced with problems including dangerous falling trees, high wildfire risks, loss of scenic views and increased soil erosion. Now, a researcher from the University of Missouri and his colleagues have found that ...

Irvine, Calif., April 15, 2015 -- While recent reports question whether fish oil supplements support heart health, UC Irvine scientists have found that the fatty acids they contain are vitally important to the developing brain. In a study appearing today in The Journal of Neuroscience, UCI neurobiologists report that dietary deficiencies in the type of fatty acids found in fish and other foods can limit brain growth during fetal development and early in life. The findings suggest that women maintain a balanced diet rich in these fatty acids for themselves during pregnancy ...

California man Mike May made international headlines in 2000 when his sight was restored by a pioneering stem cell procedure after 40 years of blindness. But a study published three years after the operation found that the then-49-year-old could see colors, motion and some simple two-dimensional shapes, but was incapable of more complex visual processing. Hoping May might eventually regain those visual skills, University of Washington researchers and colleagues retested him a decade later. But in a paper now available online in Psychological Science, they report that ...

NEW YORK (April 15, 2015) -- Weill Cornell Medical College investigators tried to validate a previously reported molecular finding on triple negative breast cancer that many hoped would lead to targeted treatments for the aggressive disease. Instead, they discovered that the findings were limited to a single patient and could not be applied to further clinical work. This discovery, published April 15 in Nature, amends the earlier work and underscores the importance of independent study validation and careful assay development. The earlier - and now dispelled - study, ...

GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- Oxycodone-related deaths dropped 25 percent after Florida implemented its Prescription Drug Monitoring Program in late 2011 as part of its response to the state's prescription drug abuse epidemic, according to a team of UF Health researchers. The drop in fatalities could stem from the number of health care providers who used the program's database to monitor controlled substance prescriptions. "Forty-nine states have prescription drug monitoring programs of some kind, but this is the first study to demonstrate that one of these programs significantly ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio--The unassuming piece of stainless steel mesh in a lab at The Ohio State University doesn't look like a very big deal, but it could make a big difference for future environmental cleanups. Water passes through the mesh but oil doesn't, thanks to a nearly invisible oil-repelling coating on its surface. In tests, researchers mixed water with oil and poured the mixture onto the mesh. The water filtered through the mesh to land in a beaker below. The oil collected on top of the mesh, and rolled off easily into a separate beaker when the mesh was tilted. The ...

April 15, 2015 - Most people who attempt suicide make some type of healthcare visit in the weeks or months before the attempt, reports a study in the May issue of Medical Care, published by Wolters Kluwer. The study also identifies racial/ethnic differences that may help to target suicide prevention efforts in the doctor's office and other health care settings. The lead author was Brian K. Ahmedani, PhD, LMSW, of Henry Ford Health System, Detroit, Mich. Health Visits May Provide Chances for Suicide Prevention Using data from the NIMH-funded Mental Health Research ...

Index shows nearly two points increase in EU overall, but Greece and Latvia fall behind Sweden tops the table, while UK comes fourth with increase in line with EU average A healthy and active old age is a reality for many Europeans and is a genuine possibility for many more, despite the 2008 economic crash and years of austerity measures, according to a new United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and European Commission (EC) report, produced at the University of Southampton. However, countries such as Greece and Latvia have declined in active ageing ...

New work by Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich researchers demonstrates that macrophages can effectively substitute for so-called dendritic cells as primers of T-cell-dependent immune responses. Indeed, they stimulate a broader-based response. The immune response, the process by which the adaptive immune system reacts to, and eliminates foreign substances and cells, depends on a complex interplay between several different cell types. So-called dendritic cells, which recognize and internalize invasive pathogens, play a crucial role in this process. Inside ...

NEWPORT, Ore. - A team of scientists from the United States and Russia has documented the longest migration of a mammal ever recorded - a round-trip trek of nearly 14,000 miles by a whale identified as a critically endangered species that raises questions about its status. The researchers used satellite-monitored tags to track three western North Pacific gray whales from their primary feeding ground off Russia's Sakhalin Island across the Pacific Ocean and down the West Coast of the United States to Baja, Mexico. One of the tagged whales, dubbed Varvara (which is Russian ...

Anti-fungal drug shows promise as potential new cancer treatment A common anti-fungal treatment has joined the ranks of drugs that may be suitable for use in treating cancer, according to research from the Repurposing Drugs in Oncology (ReDO) project published in ecancermedicalscience. The ReDO project is an international collaboration of anticancer researchers dedicated to promoting the cause of common medicines which may represent an untapped source of novel therapies for cancer. In partnership with ecancer, the ReDO project is publishing a series of papers on drugs ...

Twitter users who post information about their personal health online might be considered by some to be "over-sharers," but new research led by the University of Arizona suggests that health-related tweets may have the potential to be helpful for hospitals. Led by Sudha Ram, a UA professor of management information systems and computer science, and Dr. Yolande Pengetnze, a physician scientist at the Parkland Center for Clinical Innovation in Dallas, the researchers looked specifically at the chronic condition of asthma and how asthma-related tweets, analyzed alongside ...

WASHINGTON (April 15, 2015) -- The George Washington University (GW) Cancer Institute has finalized 45 core competency statements for oncology patient navigators, who have become critical members of the health care team. These competency statements were published in the Journal of Oncology Navigation and Survivorship and were created through literature review, focus group data analysis, expert review, and a national survey of oncology patient navigation stakeholders. "Patient navigation is a rapidly growing health profession given new accreditation standards from the ...

Mathematical ideas and tools are often used to describe aspects of large macroscopic systems. Examples abound in areas as varied as finance to psychology. In a paper published last month in the SIAM Journal on Applied Mathematics, author Fabio Bagarello proposes mathematical models to analyze political decision-making. Using a dynamical approach which accounts for interactions between political parties and their constituents, the model tries to deduce whether parties should form coalitions under various circumstances. "Mathematics is important in many aspects of social ...

Depression and type 2 diabetes mellitus were each associated with an increased risk for dementia and that risk was even greater among individuals diagnosed with both depression and diabetes compared with people who had neither condition, according to an article published online by JAMA Psychiatry. Diabetes and major depression are common in Western populations and as many as 20 percent of people with type 2 diabetes mellitus also have depression. Dimitry Davydow, M.D., M.P.H., of the University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, and coauthors examined the risk ...