A Swedish-German research team has successfully tested a new method for the production of ultra-strong cellulose fibres at DESY's research light source PETRA III. The novel procedure spins extremely tough filaments from tiny cellulose fibrils by aligning them all in parallel during the production process. The new method is reported in the scientific journal Nature Communications. "Our filaments are stronger than both aluminium and steel per weight," emphasizes lead author Prof. Fredrik Lundell from the Wallenberg Wood Science Center at the Royal Swedish Institute of Technology ...

(Washington, DC) – New research published in the June 2014 issue of Language presents evidence that the methods employed by the authors of articles published in prestigious international science journals are not supported by a more rigorous linguistic analysis. The Language article, "A statistical comparison of written language and non-linguistic symbol systems," was authored by Richard Sproat, a Research Scientist at Google, based on work he previously did at the Oregon Health & Science University. A pre-print version of the article is available for review at: http://www.linguisticsociety.org/document/language-vol-90-issue-2-june-2014-sproat. ...

New research reveals that bilingualism has a positive effect on cognition later in life. Findings published in Annals of Neurology, a journal of the American Neurological Association and Child Neurology Society, show that individuals who speak two or more languages, even those who acquired the second language in adulthood, may slow down cognitive decline from aging. Bilingualism is thought to improve cognition and delay dementia in older adults. While prior research has investigated the impact of learning more than one language, ruling out "reverse causality" has proven ...

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, June 2, 2014 – Myriad Genetics, Inc. (Nasdaq: MYGN) today presented results from a pivotal clinical validation study of the Myriad myPath™ Melanoma test at the 2014 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting in Chicago, Ill. The Myriad myPath Melanoma test is a novel molecular test that accurately differentiates malignant melanoma from benign skin lesions with a high level of accuracy and helps physicians deliver a more objective and confident diagnosis for patients. "Unfortunately, some melanomas mimic benign skin lesions, making ...

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, June 2, 2014 – Myriad Genetics, Inc. (Nasdaq: MYGN) today presented several clinical studies on the Myriad myRisk™ Hereditary Cancer test at the 2014 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting in Chicago, Illinois. Among the important new findings is that the myRisk test detects significantly more deleterious mutations than single cancer tests and helps solve the overlap dilemma that exists among hereditary cancer syndromes. "There is robust evidence that hereditary cancers are caused by mutations in many genes and testing for only ...

As Brazil gets set to host the 2014 FIFA World Cup this month amid concerns about the amount of public money being used to stage the world's largest sporting event, Physics World's editorial team reveals in a new special report how physicists are taking full advantage of the four-fold increase in science funding that the government has invested over the past 10 years. Negotiations are currently under way to make Brazil an associate member of the CERN particle-physics lab in Geneva, while the country is also taking a leading role in the Pierre Auger Observatory – an international ...

Analysis of genetic variation in the exome, the DNA sequence of genes that are translated into protein, can aid in uncovering the cause of conditions for which no genetic cause could previously be found, and this can directly impact clinical management, the annual conference of the European Society of Human Genetics will hear today. Dr Jayne Hehir-Kwa, Assistant Professor of Bioinformatics in the Translational Research group, Department of Human Genetics, Radboud UMC, Nijmegen, The Netherlands, will describe results from her group's study that set out to determine whether ...

New understanding of the genes involved in taste perception and food preferences could lead to personalised nutrition plans effective not just in weight loss but in avoiding diseases such as cancer, depression, and hypertension, Italian researchers will tell the annual conference of the European Society of Human Genetics (ESHG) today (Monday). Knowing why individuals prefer certain food tastes and being able to personalise health interventions based on them will help people age in a healthier way and greatly improve their quality of life, as well as engender considerable ...

New research presented at this year's Euroanaesthesia meeting in Stockholm shows that having parents present during the induction of their child's anaesthesia improves the quality of that anaesthesia. The study is by Dr Alicia Sánchez, Department of Anaesthesiology, Hospital de Sagunto, Spain, and colleagues. Induction of anaesthesia can be distressing for parents and children. The effect of parental presence at anaesthesia induction on children anxiety and children anaesthesia compliance has been previously investigated but the few studies to date have produced contradictory ...

A session at this year's Euroanaesthesia meeting will discuss how improving the skills of members of the public, including schoolchildren, in resuscitation following cardiac arrest could save up to 100,000 lives per year. The presentation will be given by Professor Bernd Böttiger, Director of Science and Research at the European Resuscitation Council (ERC), and also Head of the Department of Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine at University Hospital Cologne, Germany. The best estimates currently available suggest that 350,000 deaths in each year in Europe are ...

New research presented at this year's Euroanaesthesia meeting in Stockholm shows that children exposed to indoor coal-burning stoves and/or second-hand tobacco smoke are much more likely to suffer postoperative complications and excessive pain after tonsillectomies. The research is by Professor Daniel Sessler, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio, USA and Dr Onur Koyuncu, Mustafa Kemal University, Hatay, Turkey, and colleagues. Almost half of the world's population uses solid fuel including biomass (wood, crop residues, and animal dung) or coal for heating and cooking. ...

A single-letter change in the genetic code is enough to generate blond hair in humans, in dramatic contrast to our dark-haired ancestors. A new analysis by Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) scientists has pinpointed that change, which is common in the genomes of Northern Europeans, and shown how it fine-tunes the regulation of an essential gene. "This particular genetic variation in humans is associated with blond hair, but it isn't associated with eye color or other pigmentation traits," says David Kingsley, an HHMI investigator at Stanford University who led the ...

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have erased and reactivated memories in rats, profoundly altering the animals' reaction to past events. The study, published in the June 1 advanced online issue of the journal Nature, is the first to show the ability to selectively remove a memory and predictably reactivate it by stimulating nerves in the brain at frequencies that are known to weaken and strengthen the connections between nerve cells, called synapses. "We can form a memory, erase that memory and we can reactivate it, at will, ...

DURHAM, N.C. – A collaborative effort between Duke Medicine researchers and neurosurgeons and scientists in China has produced new genetic insights into a rare and deadly form of childhood and young adult brain cancer called brainstem glioma. The researchers identified a genetic mutation in the tumor cells that plays a role in both the growth and the death of a cell. Additionally, the mutation to the newly identified gene may also contribute to the tumor's resistance to radiation. The findings, published online in the journal Nature Genetics on June 1, 2014, provide ...

Laser beams 60,000 billion times more powerful than a laser pointer have been used to recreate scaled supernova explosions in the laboratory as a way of investigating one of the most energetic events in the Universe. Supernova explosions, triggered when the fuel within a star reignites or its core collapses, launch a detonation shock wave that sweeps through a few light years of space from the exploding star in just a few hundred years. But not all such explosions are alike and some, such as Cassiopeia A, show puzzling irregular shapes made of knots and twists. To investigate ...

Around a quarter of smokers who carry a defect in the BRCA2 gene will develop lung cancer at some point in their lifetime, a large-scale, international study reveals. Scientists announce a previously unknown link between lung cancer and a particular BRCA2 defect, occurring in around 2 per cent of the population, in research published in Nature Genetics today (Sunday). The defect in BRCA2 - best known for its role in breast cancer - increases the risk of developing lung cancer by about 1.8 times. Smokers as a group have a high lifetime risk of around 13 per cent (16 ...

Using a flash of light, scientists have inactivated and then reactivated a memory in genetically engineered rats. The study, supported by the National Institutes of Health, is the first cause-and-effect evidence that strengthened connections between neurons are the stuff of memory. "Our results add to mounting evidence that the brain represents a memory by forming assemblies of neurons with strengthened connections, or synapses, explained Roberto Malinow, M.D., Ph.D., of the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), a grantee of the NIH's National Institute of Mental ...

HOUSTON – (June 1, 2014) – Baylor College of Medicine scientists defined a previously unrecognized genetic cause for two types of birth defects found in newborn boys, described in a report published today in the journal Nature Medicine. "Cryptorchidism and hypospadias are among the most common birth defects but the causes are usually unknown," said Dr. Dolores Lamb, director of the Center for Reproductive Medicine at Baylor, professor and vice chair for research of urology and molecular and cellular biology at Baylor and lead author of the report. Cryptorchidism is ...

HOUSTON -- (June 1, 2014) -- The first preclinical study of a new Rice University-developed anti-cancer technology found that a novel combination of existing clinical treatments can instantaneously detect and kill only cancer cells -- often by blowing them apart -- without harming surrounding normal organs. The research, which is available online this week Nature Medicine, reports that Rice's "quadrapeutics" technology was 17 times more efficient than conventional chemoradiation therapy against aggressive, drug-resistant head and neck tumors. The work was conducted by ...

Researchers from the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) have developed a software based on the discovery of some algorithms that enable the identification of each individual, therefore allowing their tracking within the group. Thus, the door opens to the quantitative study of the rules of social interaction for many species. The work has been published in the Nature Methods journal. Animals that move in groups make decisions considering what other members of their community do. To find out the rules of these interactions, researchers record monitoring videos through ...

Writing in Nature Physics, a large international team led by Dr Artem Mishchenko and Sir Andre Geim from The University of Manchester shows that the electronic properties of graphene change dramatically if graphene is placed on top of boron nitride, also known as 'white graphite'. One of the major challenges for using graphene in electronics applications is the absence of a band gap, which basically means that graphene's electrical conductivity cannot be switched off completely. Whatever researchers tried to do with the material so far, it remained highly electrically ...

The combined action of two enzymes, Srs2 and Exo1, prevents and repairs common genetic mutations in growing yeast cells, according to a new study led by scientists at NYU Langone Medical Center. Because such mechanisms are generally conserved throughout evolution, at least in part, researchers say the findings suggest that a similar DNA repair kit may exist in humans and could serve as a target for controlling some cancers and treating a rare, enzyme-linked genetic disorder called Aicardi-Goutieres syndrome. The syndrome, an often fatal neurological condition, is found ...

PITTSBURGH—University of Pittsburgh researchers have become the first to detect a fundamental particle of light-matter interaction in metals, the exciton. The team will publish its work online June 1 in Nature Physics. Mankind has used reflection of light from a metal mirror on a daily basis for millennia, but the quantum mechanical magic behind this familiar phenomenon is only now being uncovered. Physicists describe physical phenomena in terms of interactions between fields and particles, says lead author Hrvoje Petek, Pitt's Richard King Mellon Professor in the Department ...

STANFORD, Calif. — A molecule critical to stem cell function plays a major role in determining human hair color, according to a study from the Stanford University School of Medicine. The study describes for the first time the molecular basis for one of our most noticeable traits. It also outlines how tiny DNA changes can reverberate through our genome in ways that may affect evolution, migration and even human history. "We've been trying to track down the genetic and molecular basis of naturally occurring traits — such as hair and skin pigmentation — in fish and humans ...

VIDEO: This video simulation shows how a laser that illuminates a small carbon rod launches a complex flow, consisting of supersonic shocks and turbulent flow. When the grid is present, turbulence... Click here for more information. Astrophysicists have established that cosmic turbulence could have amplified magnetic fields to the strengths observed in interstellar space. "Magnetic fields are ubiquitous in the universe," said Don Lamb, the Robert A. Millikan Distinguished ...