Tropical Cyclone Ita made landfall in northeastern Queensland, Australia on April 11 as a powerful Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale, moved south and re-emerged in the Coral Sea on April 14 where NASA's TRMM and NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP Satellites captured imagery of the weakened storm. The VIIRS instrument aboard NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite captured a visible look at Ita's elongating structure on April 14 at 4:12 UTC/12:12. The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument collects visible and infrared imagery and global observations of ...

DALLAS – April 14, 2014 – Popular web information on colorectal cancer is too difficult for most lay people to read and doesn't address the appropriate risks to and concerns of patients, a study by UT Southwestern Medical Center gastroenterologists suggests. In a review of a dozen popular websites, most of the online patient education materials for colorectal cancer screening were written beyond the recommended sixth-grade reading level, while content on the sites failed to address key risks, as well as the barriers to and benefits of screening, according to the study's ...

Late on April 1, the crown jewel of the Department of Energy's Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility ("Jefferson Lab") sparkled its way into a new era. Following an upgrade of the Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility, the CEBAF accelerator delivered the highest-energy electron beams it has ever produced into a target in an experimental hall, recording the first data of the 12 GeV era. The machine sent electrons around the racetrack three times (known as "3-pass" beam), resulting in 6.11 GeV electrons at 2 nanoAmps average current for more than an hour. "This ...

Tropical Depression Peipah has been very stubborn and has moved over the southern and central Philippines bringing clouds, showers and gusty winds. NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite captured an image that showed Peipah's clouds covering the Visayas and Mindanao regions of the country. The VIIRS instrument aboard NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite captured a visible look at the remnant clouds associated with former Tropical Depression Peipah on April 14 at 4:24 UTC/12:24 a.m. EDT. The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument collects visible and infrared ...

Stroke patients managed by a pharmacist had a 12.5% improvement in blood pressure and low-density lipoprotein (LDL), or "bad" cholesterol levels compared with a control group, according to a clinical trial published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). Patients who have a stroke or "mini stroke" (transient ischemic attack) are at high risk of adverse cardiovascular events. Management of high blood pressure and cholesterol after a stroke is important because it can substantially reduce the risk of a negative event; however, many patients receive suboptimal care. ...

Scientists found that the molecule, called microRNA 135b, is a vital 'worker' employed by several important cancer genes to drive the growth of bowel cancers. Drugs targeted at the microRNA could knock out the effects of multiple cancer-causing mutations at once, while tests for it could identify patients with the most aggressive disease, the researchers believe. The research was carried out by an international team including scientists based at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, the University of Glasgow and Ohio State University in the US. Scientists tested ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – A new study identifies a molecule that is a probable driving force in colorectal cancer and suggests that the molecule could be an important target for colorectal cancer treatment and a valuable biomarker of tumor progression. The study of microRNA-135b (miR-135b) in two animal models and human tumors was published in the journal Cancer Cell and was led by researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James) and at the University of Glasgow in ...

Washington, D.C., April 14, 2014—Dietary supplement use by U.S. adults is more prevalent than indicated by published data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES), according to a new article in the peer-reviewed Journal of the American College of Nutrition (JACN). The review article is based on five consecutive years of online market research studies, conducted by Ipsos Public Affairs for the Council for Responsible Nutrition (CRN). According to Annette Dickinson, Ph.D., corresponding author and a consultant for CRN, "This new review adds to ...

CHICAGO --- Depression can hit young fathers hard -- with symptoms increasing dramatically during some of the most important years of their children's lives, a new Northwestern Medicine® study has found. Depressive symptoms increased on average by 68 percent over the first five years of fatherhood for these young men, who were around 25 years old when they became fathers and whom lived in the same home as their children. The results of the study were published April 14 in the journal Pediatrics. This study is the first to identify when young fathers are at increased ...

AUGUSTA, Ga. –A class of drugs widely used to treat osteoporosis appears to impede a cell's ability to repair a protective outer membrane that helps determine what enters and exits, researchers report. The inability to quickly repair a membrane is lethal to a cell and may help explain the rare and serious side effect of jawbone destruction that can occur following dental work in patients taking these drugs, said Caroline Lewis, a sophomore at the Medical College of Georgia at Georgia Regents University. "The bottom line is it inhibits cell membrane repair in two distinct ...

Scientists have unearthed still more evidence that antibiotics can contribute to obesity. Research published ahead of print in the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy suggests that patients on long-term antibiotic treatment gained weight and had significant changes in their gut microbiota. The study, led by Didier Raoult, of Aix-Marseille University, Marseille, France, followed 48 patients who were being treated long-term with doxycycline and hydroxychloroquine for Q fever, and 34 control subjects. Nearly one quarter of the treated patients gained anywhere ...

A house window that doubles as a solar panel could be on the horizon, thanks to recent quantum-dot work by Los Alamos National Laboratory researchers in collaboration with scientists from University of Milano-Bicocca (UNIMIB), Italy. Their project demonstrates that superior light-emitting properties of quantum dots can be applied in solar energy by helping more efficiently harvest sunlight. "The key accomplishment is the demonstration of large-area luminescent solar concentrators that use a new generation of specially engineered quantum dots," said lead researcher Victor ...

In a UT Dallas study involving serious youth offenders, the answer to one open-ended question predicted the teenagers' offending patterns for the next seven years: "How long do you think you'll live?" According to the study, having little hope for the future encourages offending over time. Author Dr. Alex Piquero said the study found those who don't view a very long life ahead of them offend at very high rates and commit more serious offenses, while those who believe they're going to die much later in life offend much less. "In a lot of distressed communities and for ...

WASHINGTON D.C., April 14, 2014 -- By depositing an array of tiny, metallic, U-shaped structures onto a dielectric material, a team of researchers in China has created a new artificial surface that can bend and focus electromagnetic waves the same way an antenna does. This breakthrough, which the team is calling the first broadband transformation optics metasurface lens, may lead to the creation of new types of antennas that are flat, ultra low-profile or conformal to the shape of curved surfaces. The new lens, described in AIP Publishing's journal Applied Physics Letters, ...

WASHINGTON, April 14, 2014 — It seems there are new caffeine-infused products hitting the shelves every day. From energy drinks to gum and even jerky, our love affair with that little molecule shows no signs of slowing. In the American Chemical Society's (ACS') latest Reactions video, we look at the science behind the world's most popular drug, including why it keeps you awake and how much caffeine is too much. The video is available at http://youtu.be/YuJOhpNS0IY. INFORMATION: Subscribe to the series at Reactions YouTube, and follow us on Twitter @ACSreactions to be ...

Scientists from UNC's Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute have released their new study of NC Pre-K, the state's program to prepare four-year-olds for success in kindergarten. According to FPG's report, students enrolled in NC Pre-K show significant gains across all areas of learning. "Children are progressing at an even greater rate during their participation in NC Pre-K than expected for normal developmental growth," said senior scientist Ellen Peisner-Feinberg, who leads the FPG team that has studied the program and provided it with recommendations for ...

Lower weight babies and babies who aren't breastfed or not breastfed for long are at greater risk of developing chronic inflammation and related health problems later in life, according to a new study. "There were good reasons to hypothesize that breastfeeding was important to influencing levels of inflammation in adulthood," says Thomas McDade (Northwestern University), a CIFAR (Canadian Institute for Advanced Research) Fellow in the Child & Brain Development program. "It changes the microbiome. It promotes development of the immune system. Children who are breastfed ...

Using antibiotics alone to treat children with uncomplicated acute appendicitis is a reasonable alternative to surgery that leads to less pain and fewer missed school days, according to a pilot study. The research, led by a team at Nationwide Children's Hospital and published online April 12 in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, is the first prospective study on nonoperative management of acute appendicitis in pediatric patients in the United States. Researchers enrolled 77 patients age 7 to 17 who were diagnosed with uncomplicated acute appendicitis by ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Heart patients with beliefs about health that aren't based on medical evidence are more likely to skip sessions of cardiac rehabilitation, new research suggests. In the Ohio State University study, a higher number of these beliefs – referred to as "irrational health beliefs" on a standard measure of these thoughts – was associated with lower adherence to a prescribed cardiac rehab program. Among the irrational beliefs assessed: Doubting the preventive power of the flu vaccine or believing, based on family history alone, that it's safe to smoke cigarettes ...

Scientists at Chicago's Field Museum and international collaborators have reconstructed the phylogeny and biological history for the Yellow-shouldered bats in the New World tropics, the region of the Earth surrounding the equator. In-depth analysis of mitochondrial and nuclear DNA sequences uncovered three species new to science, each having previously been confused with another species. Since 1960, when modern studies on this group began, Sturnira has grown from eight species to 22. The newest additions were described in a new study, published online in ZooKeys. The ...

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif.--True North Therapeutics, Inc., announced today a publication demonstrating that the company's C1s antibody prevents the destruction of human red blood cells exposed to plasma samples of patients with a type of autoimmune hemolytic anemia (AIHA). The article entitled "TNT003, an inhibitor of the serine protease C1s, prevents complement activation induced by cold agglutinin disease patient autoantibodies" was published on-line in the journal Blood earlier this month. TNT003 is the murine analog of True North's lead humanized monoclonal antibody ...

By tracking brain activity when an animal stops to look around its environment, neuroscientists at the Johns Hopkins University believe they can mark the birth of a memory. Using lab rats on a circular track, James Knierim, professor of neuroscience in the Zanvyl Krieger Mind/Brain Institute at Johns Hopkins, and a team of brain scientists noticed that the rats frequently paused to inspect their environment with head movements as they ran. The scientists found that this behavior activated a place cell in their brain, which helps the animal construct a cognitive map, ...

New technologies for developing electronics and optoelectronics with tunable/adaptive functionalities and performance are critical to emerging applications in wearable technology, communication, pervasive computing, human-machine interfacing and biomedical diagnostics, in which the active and adaptive interactions between devices and stimuli from the ambient/host (e. g. human body) are essential. Mechanical stimuli are ubiquitous and abundant in the environment for interacting with or controlling these electronics/optoelectronics. This is, however, not facile to implement ...

Quantum superposition is a fundamental and also intriguing property of the quantum world. Because of superposition, a quantum system can be in two different states simultaneously, like a cat that can be both "dead" and "alive" at the same time. However, this anti-intuitive phenomenon cannot be observed directly, because whenever a classical measuring tool touches a quantum system, it immediately collapse into a classical state. On the other hand, quantum superposition is also the core of quantum computer's enormous computational power. A quantum computer can easily break ...

Wondering what makes an ICT hotspot? Take a look at Munich, London, Paris or smaller cities such as Darmstadt identified in a new EU Atlas of ICT hotspots. This atlas shows where digital technologies thrive and examines the factors contributing to this success. Most of Europe's ICT activity takes place in 34 regions across 12 countries (listed in the Annex). Key ingredients to success included access to top Universities and research centres and funding opportunities such as venture capital. European Commission Vice-President @NeelieKroesEU said: "This is proof that ...