Waiting until marriage to have babies is now "unusual" among less-educated adults close to 30 years old, Johns Hopkins University researchers found. "Clearly the role of marriage in fertility and family formation is now modest in early adulthood and the lofty place that marriage once held among the markers of adulthood is in serious question," sociologist Andrew J. Cherlin said. "It is now unusual for non-college graduates who have children in their teens and 20s to have all of them within marriage." Among parents aged 26 to 31 who didn't graduate from college, 74 ...

Doctors and scientists have for years been astonished to observe patients with kidney disease experiencing renal regeneration. The kidney, unlike its neighbor the liver, was universally understood to be a static organ once it had fully developed. Now a new study conducted by researchers at Sheba Medical Center, Tel Aviv University and Stanford University turns that theory on its head by pinpointing the precise cellular signalling responsible for renal regeneration and exposing the multi-layered nature of kidney growth. The research, in Cell Reports, was conducted by principal ...

PULLMAN, Wash.–Washington State University researchers have developed the first fuel cell that can directly convert fuels, such as jet fuel or gasoline, to electricity, providing a dramatically more energy-efficient way to create electric power for planes or cars. Led by Professors Su Ha and M. Grant Norton in the Voiland College of Engineering and Architecture, the researchers have published the results of their work in the May edition of Energy Technology. A second paper on using their fuel cell with gasoline has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Power ...

EUGENE, Ore. -- (June 16, 2014) -- Maybe turning to sleep gadgets -- wristbands, sound therapy and sleep-monitoring smartphone apps -- is a good idea. A new University of Oregon-led study of middle-aged or older people who get six to nine hours of sleep a night think better than those sleeping fewer or more hours. The study, published in the June issue of the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, reaffirms numerous small-scale studies in the United States, Western Europe and Japan, but it does so using data compiled across six middle-income nations and involving more than ...

Cambridge, Mass. – June 16, 2014 – A team of researchers led by David J. Mooney, Robert P. Pinkas Family Professor of Bioengineering at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, have identified a possible mechanism by which normal cells turn malignant in mammary epithelial tissues, the tissues frequently involved in breast cancer. Dense mammary tissue has long been recognized as a strong indicator of risk for breast cancer. This is why regular breast examinations are considered essential to early detection. Until now, however, the significance of that tissue ...

Your eye could someday house its own high-tech information center, tracking important changes and letting you know when it's time to see an eye doctor. University of Washington engineers have designed a low-power sensor that could be placed permanently in a person's eye to track hard-to-measure changes in eye pressure. The sensor would be embedded with an artificial lens during cataract surgery and would detect pressure changes instantaneously, then transmit the data wirelessly using radio frequency waves. The researchers recently published their results in the Journal ...

LIVERMORE, Calif. – Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory researchers have developed a new and more efficient approach to a challenging problem in additive manufacturing -- using selective laser melting, namely, the selection of appropriate process parameters that result in parts with desired properties. Selective laser melting (SLM) is a powder-based, additive manufacturing process where a 3D part is produced, layer by layer, using a high-energy laser beam to fuse the metal powder particles. Some SLM applications require parts that are very dense, with less than ...

Scientists in the University of Connecticut's Technology Incubation Program have identified a novel approach to treating multiple sclerosis (MS) using human embryonic stem cells, offering a promising new therapy for more than 2.3 million people suffering from the debilitating disease. The researchers demonstrated that the embryonic stem cell therapy significantly reduced MS disease severity in animal models and offered better treatment results than stem cells derived from human adult bone marrow. The study was led by ImStem Biotechnology Inc. of Farmington, Conn., ...

The Antarctic shore is a place of huge contrasts, as quiet, dark, and frozen winters give way to bright, clear waters, thick with algae and peppered with drifting icebergs in summer. But as the planet has warmed in the last two decades, massive losses of sea ice in winter have left icebergs free to roam for most of the year. As a result, say researchers reporting in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on June 16, boulders on the shallow seabed—once encrusted with a rich assemblage of species in intense competition for limited space—now mostly support a single species. ...

The first Canadian guideline for Bell palsy, facial weakness or paralysis caused by facial nerve damage, is aimed at helping physicians manage and treat patients during the acute phase as well as recovery. The guideline, published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal), is based on the growing body of recent evidence on the condition. Bell palsy is damage to the facial nerve that results in sudden weakness or paralysis of one side of the face. It can come on suddenly with symptoms such as drooping of the face and eyelids, twitching, and others that may include ...

Just as electronic circuits work with electrical charges, optical circuits process pulses of light, which gives them a distinct advantage in terms of speed. Optical technologies are therefore the object of intense research, aiming to develop novel optical devices that can control the flow of light at the nanometer scale. EPFL scientists have developed a new method that can optimally design a widely-used class of optical devices with unprecedented effectiveness. Their designs have been fabricated in the US, at the University of Rochester, and successfully tested in Italy, ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. — Scientists have confirmed the function of a gene that controls the awakening of trees from winter dormancy, a critical factor in their ability to adjust to environmental changes associated with climate change. While other researchers have identified genes involved in producing the first green leaves of spring, the discovery of a master regulator in poplar trees (Populus species) could eventually lead to breeding plants that are better adapted for warmer climates. The results of the study that began more than a decade ago at Oregon State University ...

GALVESTON, Texas — For the first time, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston researchers were able to predict further adaptations of the chikungunya virus that recently spread from Africa to several continents that will likely result in even more efficient transmission and infection of more people by this virus strain. A key factor in a viruses' potential to sustain its circulation and ultimately cause disease is its ability to adapt to new host environments. The number and complexity of these adaptations is shaped by how hospitable the new host is to a certain ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. – Nearly half of parents say any qualified health care provider – not just a child's usual provider – can do a sports physical, according to a new University of Michigan C.S. Mott Children's Hospital National Poll on Children's Health. One quarter of the 434 parents surveyed in the poll took their child to an alternate location for the most recent sports physical, says Sarah J. Clark, M.P.H. , associate director of the National Poll on Children's Health and associate research scientist in the University of Michigan Department of Pediatrics. Sports physicals ...

Without proper infection prevention in hospitals, and now homes, the Clostridium difficile bacteria poses a major health threat, cautions a Case Western Reserve University infection control researcher. While mainly a concern in hospitals, cases of the C. difficile infection (or C. diff) are on the rise in the community, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that has seen increased reports of the infected people who have had no contact with hospital patients with the infection. The CDC reported 7.6 people out of 100,000 who had no contact with people ...

June 16, 2014 (San Francisco) – Researchers have long understood there is a strong association between diabetes and depression. But new research presented at the American Diabetes Association's 74th Scientific Sessions® shows that symptoms of depression in people with type 2 diabetes can be significantly reduced through interventions for "diabetes distress," suggesting that much of what is being labeled as depression may not be a co-morbid psychiatric disorder after all, but rather a reaction to living with a stressful, complex disease that is often difficult to manage. ...

June 16, 2014 (San Francisco) – Treatments used to decrease the development of type 2 diabetes continue to be effective an average of 15 years later, according to the latest findings of the Diabetes Prevention Program Outcomes Study, a landmark study funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The results, presented at the American Diabetes Association's 74th Scientific Sessions®, come more than a decade after the Diabetes Prevention Program, or DPP, reported its original findings. In 2001, after an average of three years of study, the DPP announced that the study's ...

TORONTO, June 16, 2014 — Do you work out for health benefits and feel you are exercising more than enough? You might be among the many Canadians who overrate how hard they work out or underestimate what moderate intensity exercise means, according to a recent study out of York University's Faculty of Health. "Our study findings suggest that the majority of young and middle-aged to old adults underestimate the intensity of physical activity that is required to achieve health benefits," says Professor Jennifer Kuk, School of Kinesiology and Health Science. "This is worrisome ...

Athens, Ga. – Researchers at the University of Georgia report in the Journal of Biological Chemistry that an enzyme known as Tumor Progression Locus 2, or Tpl2, plays a key role in directing and regulating several important components of the body's immune system. Their discovery may one day lead to new treatments for many common autoimmune diseases. "We know that immune dysfunction plays a serious role in a number of conditions, and we need better methods for controlling chronic inflammation," said Wendy Watford, assistant professor of infectious diseases in UGA's College ...

Dallas – June 12, 2014 – Adults over 65 who have recently begun thiazide diuretics are at a greater risk for developing metabolic-related adverse events, researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have found. More than two-thirds of older adults have high blood pressure in the United States and thiazide diuretics are often recommended as the initial medication for these hypertensive patients. Thiazide diuretics primarily inhibit sodium transport in the kidney, leading to urinary loss of sodium and water, which decreases blood pressure. While the risks of this medication ...

Weight loss at high altitudes—something universally experienced by climbers and people who move to higher terrain—may not be a detrimental effect, but rather is likely an evolutionarily-programmed adaptation, according to a new article in BioEssays. Researchers explain that low oxygen causes fat and protein to be broken down, leading to the release of ketones and amino acids, which act as metabolic fuels. Also, ketones enhance the efficiency of oxygen use by the body whilst both ketones and certain amino acids protect cellular components from the detrimental effects of ...

This news release is available in French. An international team of researchers has discovered a significant genetic component of Idiopathic Generalized Epilepsy (IGE), the most common form of epilepsy. Epilepsy is a neurological disorder characterized by sudden, uncontrolled electrical discharges in the brain expressed as a seizure. The new research, published in this week's issue of EMBO Reports, implicates a mutation in the gene for a protein, known as cotransporter KCC2. KCC2 maintains the correct levels of chloride ions in neurons, playing a major part in regulating ...

Individuals with celiac disease often experience 'brain fog' in addition to intestinal problems, but a new study shows that adhering to a gluten-free diet can lead to improvements in cognition that correlate with the extent of intestinal healing. The Alimentary Pharmacology & Therapeutics findings indicate that ridding the diet of gluten may help address problems that celiac disease patients can experience related to attention, memory, and other mental tasks. "The study outcomes highlight the importance for individuals with celiac disease of maintaining a gluten-free ...

Alterations in a cellular signaling pathway called cAMP–CREB may help explain why the body clocks of people with bipolar disease are out of sync, according to a new European Journal of Neuroscience study. Researchers established a novel viral method to make a surprising observation: the amplitude of cAMP–CREB signaling in cells from human skin biopsies predicted the way that the circadian hormone melatonin responds to light in healthy individuals, and it was much higher in cells from bipolar patients. "Our study suggests that variation in the activity of a very common ...

June 16, 2014 – Specialists who treat prostate cancer agree that active surveillance is an effective option—yet most don't recommend it when appropriate for their own patients, according to a study in the July issue of Medical Care . The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins , a part of Wolters Kluwer Health. Rather, urologists are more likely to recommend surgery and radiation oncologists are more likely to recommend radiation therapy—the treatments provided by their own specialties. "Given the growing concerns about the overtreatment of prostate ...