West Orange, NJ. December 2, 2014. Stroke researchers have found that the presence of frontal lesions predicts better functional improvement in individuals with spatial neglect who received prism adaptation therapy. "Integrity of medial temporal structures may predict better improvement of spatial neglect with prism adaptation treatment" (doi: 10.1007/s11682-012-9200-5) was published in September in the Neuroimaging and Rehabilitation Special Issue of Brain Imaging & Behavior. The authors are Peii Chen, PhD, Priyanka Shah, and A.M. Barrett, MD, of Kessler Foundation, Kelly ...

To arrange for an interview with a researcher, please contact the Communications staff member identified at the end of each tip. For more information on ORNL and its research and development activities, please refer to one of our media contacts. If you have a general media-related question or comment, you can send it to news@ornl.gov. IMAGING - Clearer brain scans ... A clever signal noise reduction strategy developed by a team that includes Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Ben Lawrie could dramatically improve brain imaging. By using quantum correlated beams of light, ...

New Rochelle, NY, December 2, 2014--A study of active duty U.S. Marines who suffered a recent or previous concussion(s) examined whether persistent post-concussive symptoms (PPCS) and lingering effects on cognitive function are due to concussion-related brain trauma or emotional distress. The results are different for a recent concussion compared to a history of multiple concussions, according to the study published in Journal of Neurotrauma, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. The article is available Open Access on the Journal of Neurotrauma ...

DURHAM, N.H. - Environmentalists dispirited by the Republicans' dominance of the recent midterm elections can take heart: non-Tea Party Republicans' views on science and environmental issues are closer to those of Independents than to Tea Party supporters. That's the primary finding of new research by University of New Hampshire sociologists, published this week in the journal Environmental Politics. "Across a range of science and environmental issues, non-Tea Party Republicans are more similar to Independents than they are to Tea Party supporters, and those divisions ...

Witnessing violence by parents or a parent's intimate partner can trigger a chain of negative behaviors in some children that follows them from preschool to kindergarten and beyond, according to researchers at Case Western Reserve University. But girls and boys can be affected differently, researchers concluded. While girls tend to internalize their exposure to such violence, boys are more inclined to act out aggressively, said Megan R. Holmes, PhD, MSW, assistant professor at the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences at Case Western Reserve ...

The Valle de Aguán spiny-tailed iguana is a critically endangered species found in Honduras. A recent survey of people living in the region shows that, although residents are aware of the endangered status of the species, the iguana continues to be hunted for food. Of particular concern is the preference for the consumption of female iguanas that are gravid (carrying eggs in their body). "In this study we worked to gain a better understanding of how humans are harvesting the species for food," said Stesha Pasachnik, Ph.D., a lead researcher on the study and ...

LA JOLLA, CA - December 1, 2014 - Researchers can now explore viruses, bacteria and components of the human body in more detail than ever before with software developed at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI). In a study published December 1 in the journal Nature Methods, the researchers demonstrated how the software, called cellPACK, can be used to model viruses such as HIV. "We hope to ultimately increase scientists' ability to target any disease," said Art Olson, professor and Anderson Research Chair at TSRI who is senior author of the new study. Putting cellPACK ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] -- If decades of effort to bring more underrepresented minority students into science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields were considered a grand chemistry experiment, then the modest results would suggest that while the formula may not be wrong, it may well be incomplete, according to a new article in the journal CBE-Life Sciences Education. "I don't necessarily want to say that we've been doing it wrong all along, it's just that there are other ideas we can bring in," said lead author Andrew G.Campbell, a Brown ...

West Orange, NJ. December 1, 2014. Kessler Foundation researchers have authored a new article that provides insight into the variable impact of traumatic brain injury (TBI) on long-term memory. The article, "Working memory capacity links cognitive reserve with long-term memory in moderate to severe TBI: a translational approach," was epublished ahead of print on October 7 in the Journal of Neurology (10.1007/s00415-014-7523-4). The authors are Joshua Sandry, PhD, John DeLuca, PhD, and Nancy Chiaravalloti, PhD, of Kessler Foundation. This study was supported by grants ...

A new method for determining lung cancer risk could more efficiently identify individuals for annual screening and catch more cancers early, according to a study published in this week's PLOS Medicine. The study, conducted by Martin Tammemägi of Brock University, Canada, and colleagues, evaluates a lung cancer risk prediction model and identifies a risk threshold for selecting individuals for annual lung cancer screening. Computed Tomography (CT) screening can identify lung tumors while they are still treatable, and the US National Lung Screening Trial (NLST) found ...

PITTSBURGH--Psychiatric disorders -- including autism -- are characterized and diagnosed based on a clinical assessment of verbal and physical behavior. However, brain imaging and cognitive neuroscience are poised to provide a powerful advanced new tool. Carnegie Mellon University researchers have created brain-reading techniques to use neural representations of social thoughts to predict autism diagnoses with 97 percent accuracy. This establishes the first biologically based diagnostic tool that measures a person's thoughts to detect the disorder that affects many children ...

People could be putting their lives at risk by dismissing potential warning signs of cancer as less serious symptoms, according to a Cancer Research UK-funded study* published in PLOS ONE today (Tuesday). More than half (53 per cent) of 1,700** people who completed a health questionnaire said they had experienced at least one red-flag cancer 'alarm' symptom during the previous three months***. But only two per cent of them thought that cancer was a possible cause. Researchers sent the questionnaire listing 17 symptoms**** - including 10 widely-publicised potential cancer ...

LIMA--(2 December 2014) A new peer-reviewed study, released today at the start of the UN climate conference in Peru, reveals the unprecedented amount of carbon stored within the nine-nation network of Amazonian indigenous territories and protected natural areas. Accepted for publication in Carbon Management, the paper entitled, "Forest Carbon in Amazonia: The Unrecognized Contributions of Indigenous Territories and Protected Natural Areas," suggests that protecting the vast amount of carbon stored above ground in the forests of indigenous and protected lands - totaling ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. - According to a recent report from the Federal Reserve Board, 31 percent of Americans surveyed said they had no retirement savings, and almost half were not actively thinking about planning for retirement. Studies show that many Americans do not invest because they distrust the market and fear financial losses. Now, a University of Missouri researcher has found a way for financial planners to help decrease their clients' worries, which stem from the fear of losing money. Michael Guillemette, an assistant professor in the MU College of Human Environmental ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. - To hunt or not hunt wolves can't be quantified as simply as men vs. women, hunters vs. anti-hunters, Democrats vs. Republicans or city vs. rural. What's truly fueling the divisive debate is fear of wolves or the urge to care for canis lupis. The social dynamics at play and potential options for establishing common ground between sides can be found in the current issue of the journal PLOS ONE. "People who are for or against this issue are often cast into traditional lots, such as gender, political party or where they live," said Meredith Gore, associate ...

Using a novel gene knock-in technique, effective insertion of an exogenous gene was demonstrated in human cells and in animal models, including silkworms and frogs. This strategy universally enables gene knock-in not only in cultured cells, but also in various organisms. Genome editing using programmable nucleases enables homologous recombination (HR)-mediated gene knock-in. HR activity, however, is relatively low in most cultured cells and organisms. This problem presents technical hurdles for the application of HR-mediated knock-in technology in the field of life sciences. ...

RICHLAND, Wash. - A new study will help researchers create longer-lasting, higher-capacity lithium rechargeable batteries, which are commonly used in consumer electronics. In a study published in the journal ACS Nano, researchers showed how a coating that makes high capacity silicon electrodes more durable could lead to a replacement for lower-capacity graphite electrodes. "Understanding how the coating works gives us an indication of the direction we need to move in to overcome the problems with silicon electrodes," said materials scientist Chongmin Wang of the Department ...

HANOVER, N.H. - Logging doesn't immediately jettison carbon stored in a forest's mineral soils into the atmosphere but triggers a gradual release that may contribute to climate change over decades, a Dartmouth College study finds. The results are the first evidence of a regional trend of lower carbon pools in soils of harvested hardwood forests compared to mature or pristine hardwood forests. The findings appear in the journal Global Change Biology Bioenergy. A PDF of the study is available on request. Despite scientists' growing appreciation for soil's role in the ...

PULLMAN, Wash. - More than one-third of new commercial building space includes energy-saving features, but without training or an operator's manual many occupants are in the dark about how to use them. Julia Day recently published a paper in Building and Environment showing for the first time that occupants who had effective training in using the features of their high-performance buildings were more satisfied with their work environments. Day did the work as a doctoral student at Washington State University; she is now an assistant professor at Kansas State University. Closed ...

TORONTO, ON - Scientists have long known that air pollution caused by cars and trucks, solvent use and even plants, is reduced when broken down by naturally occurring compounds that act like detergents of the atmosphere. What has not been well understood until now are the relative contributions of all the processes producing such compounds. A new study, led by University of Toronto atmospheric chemist Jennifer Murphy, shows a key component of the process is the soil beneath our feet. "Pollutants in the atmosphere are broken down by hydroxyl radicals that are produced ...

This news release is available in German. VIDEO: Scientists decode the three-dimensional structure of the calcium channel with unprecedented accuracy. Click here for more information. Whenever muscles contract, so-called ryanodine receptors come into play. Calcium ions, which are ultimately responsible for the contraction of muscle cells, are released from storage organs and flow ...

Researchers working at the Advanced Light Source (ALS) of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have combined key features of two highly acclaimed X-ray spectroscopy techniques into a new technique that offers sub-nanometer resolution of every chemical element to be found at heterogeneous interfaces, such as those in batteries and fuel cells. This new technique is called SWAPPS for Standing Wave Ambient Pressure Photoelectron Spectroscopy, and it combines standing-wave photoelectron spectroscopy (SWPS) with high ambient ...

When wild birds are a big part of your diet, opening a freshly shot bird to find worms squirming around under the skin is a disconcerting sight. That was exactly what Victoria Kotongan saw in October, 2012, when she set to cleaning two of four spruce grouse (Falcipennis canadensis) she had taken near her home in Unalakleet, on the northwest coast of Alaska. The next day, she shot four grouse and all four harbored the long, white worms. In two birds, the worms appeared to be emerging from the meat. Kotongan, worried about the health of the grouse and the potential risk ...

NASA's Aqua satellite captured a visible picture of Tropical Storm Hagupit in the western North Pacific Ocean on December 2, when several warnings were in effect for islands in Micronesia. Micronesia warnings include a Typhoon Warning for Woleai, Yap and Ngulu in Yap state, a Typhoon Watch posted for Faraulep, Fais and Ulithi in Yap state, and a Tropical Storm Warning for Faraulep in Yap state. When NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Hagupit on Dec. 2 at 03:45 UTC (Dec. 1 at 10:45 p.m. EST) the MODIS instrument took a visible picture of the storm that showed it had become ...

Over the past thirty years, physical activity among children has declined markedly. The public health implications of this decline include a growing prevalence of obesity and chronic diseases such as diabetes and hypertension. A new issue of Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development expands the focus to ask whether physical activity is also related to children's brain and cognitive development and achievement in school. Scholarly articles published by over 20 researchers in Monographs, titled "The Relation of Childhood Physical Activity to Brain Health, ...