New treatments for hepatitis C virus (HCV) may be highly effective but are associated with substantial costs that may compel clinicians and patients to consider delaying treatment. However, a new study shows that immediate treatment of HCV-infected patients with moderate or advanced liver scarring is cost-effective. Immediate treatment of patients with minimal or no scarring can be cost-effective as well, particularly when lower treatment costs are assumed. "The devastating effects of hepatitis C continue to threaten the health of many Americans, with baby boomers at ...

Heidelberg, 16 March 2015 - A new approach for studying the behaviour of proteins in living cells has been developed by an interdisciplinary team of biologists and physicists in the Cell Biology and Biophysics Unit, the Ellenberg Laboratory and the Advanced Light Microscopy Facility at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg. Described in a new study, published today in Nature Biotechnology, the approach allows scientists for the first time to follow the protein networks that drive a biological process in real time. Which proteins interact with each ...

LOS ALAMOS, N.M., March 16, 2015--Two reports from Los Alamos National Laboratory this week in the Nature journal Scientific Reports are helping crack the code of how certain materials respond in the highly-damaging radiation environments within a nuclear reactor. The goal of these efforts is to understand at an atomistic level just how materials develop defects during irradiation, and how those defects evolve to determine the ultimate fate of the material. "The new insights provided by these studies will aid in both predicting and designing materials for improved performance ...

A new study has found a strong link between prolonged work at the World Trade Center (WTC) site following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 and the development of various autoimmune diseases including arthritis and lupus. The risk of developing an autoimmune disease over the next decade increased by about 13% for each month worked at the site. Investigators estimate that individuals worked 10 months at the site were more than 3-times as likely to develop an autoimmune disease than those who worked there for 1 month. "We believe that this is the first study ...

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, or COPD, is characterized by a state of inflammation. A new Respirology study has identified certain inflammatory markers that can be used to predict which patients are at the highest risk of dying prematurely. In a national sample of 1144 US adults who were followed from 1988 to 2006, those with obstructive lung function had higher levels of white blood cell count and fibrinogen as well as a higher percentage of elevated C-reactive protein than participants with normal lung function. White blood cell count and concentrations of ...

Research suggests that the ratio of the lengths of the index finger and the ring finger in males may be predictive of a variety of disorders related to disturbed hormonal balance. When the index finger is shorter than the ring finger, this results in a small 2D:4D ratio, pointing to a high exposure to testosterone in the uterus. In a new study of 103 male patients diagnosed with schizophrenia and 100 matched healthy male individuals, investigators found that the 2D:4D ratio may be an effective predictor of schizophrenia--there were significant differences between schizophrenia ...

Heterothermy, the ability of some animals to lower their metabolism and body temperature, is traditionally seen as an effective adaptation to predictable seasonal bottlenecks of unproductive cold periods. A new review suggests that the use of heterothermy may have been used as a response to acute emergency situations in animals that colonized Madagascar. Land mammals from Africa may have colonized Madagascar by rafting on drifting vegetation, and heterothermy may have facilitated survival on rafts and after colonization. Furthermore, delayed childbirth and prolonged sperm ...

In a study of 171 women, those who obtained more sleep on a given night experienced greater sexual desire the next day. Reflecting sleep's impact on sexual desire, each additional hour of sleep increased the likelihood of sexual activity with a partner by 14%. Sleep was also important for genital arousal, such that women who slept longer on average experienced fewer problems with vaginal arousal than women who obtained less sleep. "The influence of sleep on sexual desire and arousal has received little attention in the field, but these findings indicate that insufficient ...

Some children and adults are allergic to nickel and develop rashes when they come in contact with it. They also may react to foods--including peanuts, chocolate, oats, and processed American cheese--that contain a significant amount of nickel. A new Pediatric Dermatology study presents 4 clinical cases of hypersensitivity in children due to chocolate consumption at Easter. They all developed dermatitis flares approximately 48 to 96 hours after the holiday and admitted to binging on chocolate during their Easter Egg hunts. INFORMATION: ...

MAYWOOD, Ill. (March 16, 2015) - A minimally invasive spinal fusion back surgery results in less blood loss, less postoperative pain, smaller incisions, a shorter hospital stay and faster recovery and return to work. Rather than cutting through paraspinal (back) muscles, the surgeon spreads and dilates the muscles to obtain access to the lumbar (lower back) spine. One such operation is called a minimally invasive transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (MIS TLIF). It's a complex procedure with a steep learning curve, said Loyola University Medical Center spine surgeon ...

Researchers have identified genes that may be involved in determining whether an individual is sensitive or resistant to rabies virus infection. Through a screening method involving mouse embryonic stem cells, the investigators uncovered 63 genes, some with roles in the immune response, that represent potential targets for prevention or treatment. The wide variety of functions of the genes that were identified points to numerous interactions between the host and the virus at all stages of infection. "Our study is the first to show that libraries of mutant stem cells ...

Ecotourism has motivated efforts to reintroduce lions to landscapes where they were not previously common. A new analysis conducted after 4 lions were reintroduced into the fenced Tembe Elephant Park, South Africa, reveals that lions might compete with humans in winter, spring, and autumn and with endemic herbivores in all seasons but winter. Despite the use of fencing to limit conflicts, communities that reintroduce carnivores continually balance the rewards associated with ecotourism and the risks to human safety and species conservation. The findings are published ...

Contrary to common public perception, Canadian taxpayers could save billions by the introduction of a universal public drug plan to provide prescriptions to all Canadians, according to new research published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). Canada is the only developed country with universal health insurance that does not also offer universal prescription drug coverage. "A long-time barrier to the implementation of universal prescription drug coverage in Canada has been the perception that it would necessitate substantial tax increases," writes Dr. Steven ...

Canada could save $7.3 billion annually with universal public coverage of medically necessary prescription drugs. Canada is the only developed country with a universal health care system that does not include prescription drug coverage. New research from the University of British Columbia and University of Toronto, published today in the Canadian Medical Association Journal , shows that universal public drug coverage, also known as universal pharmacare, is within reach for Canada even in times of government fiscal constraint. "It's a win-win," said Steve Morgan, ...

ANN ARBOR--Whether you're baking bread or building an organism, the key to success is consistently adding ingredients in the correct order and in the right amounts, according to a new genetic study by University of Michigan researchers. Using the baker's yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Patricia Wittkopp and her colleagues developed a novel way to disentangle the effects of random genetic mutations and natural selection on the evolution of gene expression. Their findings are scheduled for online publication in the journal Nature on March 16. "These results tell us that ...

A new study from the University of Birmingham and the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences unit in Cambridge has shown how intentional recall is beyond a simple reawakening of a memory; and actually leads us to forget other competing experiences that interfere with retrieval. Quite simply, the very act of remembering may be one of the major reasons why we forget. The research, published today in Nature Neuroscience, is the first to isolate the adaptive forgetting mechanism in the human brain. The brain imaging study shows that the mechanism itself is implemented by the suppression ...

The largest genetic study of tuberculosis (TB) susceptibility to date has led to a potentially important new insight into how the pathogen manages to evade the immune system. Published today in the journal Nature Genetics, the study advances understanding of the biological mechanisms involved in TB, which may open up new avenues to design efficient vaccines for its prevention. TB, caused by infection with the pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis, is a major global public health problem. According to the World Health Organization, in 2013 nine million people fell ill with ...

A Venezuelan evolutionary biologist and a US zoologist state that they have refuted, through mitochondrial DNA sequencing, a recent claim, also based on such sequencing, that unknown type of bear must exist. in the Himalayas and that it may be, at least in part, the source of yeti legends. Their study was published in the open access journal ZooKeys. Last year, B. Sykes and co-authors, in the course of mitochondrial DNA sequencing identification of hair samples that had been attributed to "anomalous primates" (yetis, bigfoots, and others), claimed to have found that ...

Berkeley -- Hard-wiring beetles for radio-controlled flight turns out to be a fitting way to learn more about their biology. Cyborg insect research led by engineers at the University of California, Berkeley, and Singapore's Nanyang Technological University (NTU) is enabling new revelations about a muscle used by beetles for finely graded turns. By strapping tiny computers and wireless radios onto the backs of giant flower beetles and recording neuromuscular data as the bugs flew untethered, scientists determined that a muscle known for controlling the folding of wings ...

In the face of global climate change, increasing the use of renewable energy resources is one of the most urgent challenges facing the world. Further development of one resource, solar energy, is complicated by the need to find space for solar power-generating equipment without significantly altering the surrounding environment. New work from Carnegie's Rebecca R. Hernandez (now at University of California Berkley), Madison K. Hoffacker, and Chris Field found that the amount of energy that could be generated from solar equipment constructed on and around existing infrastructure ...

Northwestern University scientists have developed a robust new material, inspired by biological catalysts, that is extraordinarily effective at destroying toxic nerve agents that are a threat around the globe. First used 100 years ago during World War I, deadly chemical weapons continue to be a challenge to combat. The material, a zirconium-based metal-organic framework (MOF), degrades in minutes one of the most toxic chemical agents known to mankind: Soman (GD), a more toxic relative of sarin. Computer simulations show the MOF should be effective against other easy-to-make ...

"Warmer air transports more moisture and hence produces more precipitation - in cold Antarctica this takes the form of snowfall," lead author Katja Frieler from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) explains. "We have now pulled a number of various lines of evidence together and find a very consistent result: Temperature increase means more snowfall on Antarctica," says Frieler. "For every degree of regional warming, snowfall increases by about 5 percent." Published in the journal Nature Climate Change, the scientists' work builds on high-quality ice-core ...

Researchers have discovered a valley underneath East Antarctica's most rapidly-changing glacier that delivers warm water to the base of the ice, causing significant melting. The intrusion of warm ocean water is accelerating melting and thinning of Totten Glacier, which at 65 kilometres long and 30 kilometres wide contains enough ice to raise global sea levels by 3.5 metres. The glacier is one of the major outlets for the East Antarctic Ice Sheet, which is the largest mass of ice on Earth and covers 98 percent of the continent. Climate change is raising the temperature ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. - A new study confirms that snowfall in Antarctica will increase significantly as the planet warms, offsetting future sea level rise from other sources - but the effect will not be nearly as strong as many scientists previously anticipated because of other, physical processes. That means that many computer models may be underestimating the amount and rate of sea level rise if they had projected more significant impact from Antarctic snow. Results of the study, which was funded by the National Science Foundation, were reported this week in the journal ...

About one quarter of the global seafloor is extremely nutrient poor. Contrary to previous assumptions, it contains oxygen not just in the thin surface layer, but also throughout its entire thickness. The underlying basement rocks contain oxygen as well. An international research team made these new discoveries through analysis of drill cores from the South Pacific Gyre. In the latest issue of Nature Geoscience the scientists also point out the potential effects on the composition of Earth's interior because oxygen-containing deep-sea sediment has a different mineral composition ...