VIDEO: This video shows the delivery of a viable merozoite via optical tweezers to a healthy erythrocyte and subsequent invasion. Click here for more information. Malaria is a life-threatening disease caused by a parasite that invades one red blood cell after another. Little is known about this infection process because it happens so quickly, potentially explaining why there is currently no approved malaria vaccine. In a study published by Cell Press August 19th in the Biophysical ...

Anyone who has ever had a glass of fizzy soda knows that bubbles can throw tiny particles into the air. But in a finding with wide industrial applications, Princeton researchers have demonstrated that the bursting bubbles push some particles down into the liquid as well. "It is well known that bursting bubbles produce aerosol droplets, so we were surprised, and fascinated, to discover that when we covered the water with oil, the same process injected tiny oil droplets into the water," said Howard Stone, the Donald R. Dixon '69 and Elizabeth W. Dixon Professor of Mechanical ...

The drug perampanel (trade name Fycompa) has been approved since July 2012 as adjunctive ("add-on") therapy for adults and children aged 12 years and older with epileptic fits (seizures). In a new early benefit assessment according to the Act on the Reform of the Market for Medicinal Products (AMNOG), the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) examined whether perampanel offers an added benefit over the appropriate comparator therapy. However, such an added benefit cannot be derived from the new dossier either, as the drug manufacturer did not ...

Ruxolitinib (trade name: Jakavi) has been approved since August 2012 for the treatment of adults with myelofibrosis. In an early benefit assessment pursuant to the Act on the Reform of the Market for Medicinal Products (AMNOG), the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) examined whether this new drug offers an added benefit over the appropriate comparator therapy specified by the Federal Joint Committee (G-BA). According to the results, there is an indication of considerable added benefit in comparison with "best supportive care" (BSC) because ...

Students who have books and computers at home, who take extramural cultural classes, and whose parents give advice and take part in school activities are most likely to enroll for a four-year college degree. Also, more American black students – irrespective of their class or background – will set off on this education path than their white counterparts. So says David Merolla of Wayne State University and Omari Jackson of Colby-Sawyer College in the US, in Springer's journal Race and Social Problems. Merolla and Jackson studied class and race differences in college enrollment, ...

WASHINGTON D.C., Aug. 19, 2014 – Organic photovoltaic cells -- a type of solar cell that uses polymeric materials to capture sunlight -- show tremendous promise as energy conversion devices, thanks to key attributes such as flexibility and low-cost production. But one giant hurdle holding back organic photovoltaic technologies have been the complexity of their power conversion processes, which involve separate charge formation and transport processes. To maneuver around this problem, a team of researchers in Japan has developed a method to determine the absolute value ...

Love and commitment can make sex physically more satisfying for many women, according to a Penn State Abington sociologist. In a series of interviews, heterosexual women between the ages of 20 and 68 and from a range of backgrounds said that they believed love was necessary for maximum satisfaction in both sexual relationships and marriage. The benefits of being in love with a sexual partner are more than just emotional. Most of the women in the study said that love made sex physically more pleasurable. "Women said that they connected love with sex and that love actually ...

New Rochelle, August 19, 2014—A new ovoid structure discovered in the Nakhla Martian meteorite is made of nanocrystalline iron-rich clay, contains a variety of minerals, and shows evidence of undergoing a past shock event from impact, with resulting melting of the permafrost and mixing of surface and subsurface fluids. Based on the results of a broad range of analytical studies to determine the origin of this new structure, scientists present the competing hypotheses for how this ovoid formed, point to the most likely conclusion, and discuss how these findings impact the ...

Women could benefit greatly from the Affordable Care Act's mandate for contraceptive coverage, according to Penn State College of Medicine researchers. The Affordable Care Act requires private insurance plans -- except those grandfathered or exempted due to employers' religious beliefs -- to provide women with access to all FDA-approved contraceptive methods without cost-sharing. This first-dollar coverage "has the potential to dramatically shift contraceptive use patterns, to reduce the U.S. unintended pregnancy rate ... and to improve the health of women and families," ...

The ancestors of today's crocodiles colonised the seas during warm phases and became extinct during cold phases, according to a new Anglo-French study which establishes a link between marine crocodilian diversity and the evolution of sea temperature over a period of more than 140 million years. The research, led by Dr Jeremy Martin from the Université de Lyon, France and formerly from the University of Bristol, UK is published this week in Nature Communications. Today, crocodiles are 'cold-blooded' animals that mainly live in fresh waters but two notable exceptions, ...

Edmonton—The invention of fibre optics revolutionized the way we share information, allowing us to transmit data at volumes and speeds we'd only previously dreamed of. Now, electrical engineering researchers at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada are breaking another barrier, designing nano-optical cables small enough to replace the copper wiring on computer chips. This could result in radical increases in computing speeds and reduced energy use by electronic devices. "We're already transmitting data from continent to continent using fibre optics, ...

Tropical Storm Karina continues to weaken in the Eastern Pacific over open waters, and NASA data shows there's not much punch left in the storm. NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission or TRMM satellite can measure the rate of rainfall from its orbit in space and when it passed over Tropical Storm Karina in the Eastern Pacific it saw an isolated area of heavy rain remaining in the storm. Tropical Storm Karina weakened during the overnight hours and by Tuesday, August 19, maximum sustained winds had decreased to near 60 mph (95 kph). When TRMM passed overhead at 03:04 ...

LIVERPOOL, UK – 19 August 2014: An engineer at the University of Liverpool has found how worms move around, despite not having a brain to communicate with the body. Dr Paolo Paoletti, alongside his colleague at Harvard, Professor L Mahadevan, has developed a mathematical model for earthworms and insect larvae which challenges the traditional view of how these soft bodied animals get around. The most widely accepted model is that of the central pattern generator (CPG) which states that the central brain of these creatures generates rhythmic contraction and extension ...

In less than 24 hours after Tropical Depression 12-E was born in the eastern Pacific Ocean it strengthened into Tropical Storm Lowell. NOAA's GOES-West and NASA's Aqua satellite captured infrared images of the massive storm as it continues to strengthen. On August 18 at 21:11 UTC (5:11 p.m. EDT), NASA's Aqua satellite passed over the Eastern Pacific and the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument gathered infrared data on Lowell's clouds and sea surface temperatures. The AIRS infrared data showed that powerful thunderstorms stretching high into the troposphere ...

Spontaneous gesture can help children learn, whether they use a spoken language or sign language, according to a new report. Previous research by Susan Goldin-Meadow, the Beardsley Ruml Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Psychology, has found that gesture helps children develop their language, learning and cognitive skills. As one of the nation's leading authorities on language learning and gesture, she has also studied how using gesture helps older children improve their mathematical skills. Goldin-Meadow's new study examines how gesturing contributes ...

TEMPE, Ariz. – An Arizona State University alumna has devised the largest catalog ever produced for stellar compositions. Called the Hypatia Catalog, after one of the first female astronomers who lived ~350 AD in Alexandria, the work is critical to understanding the properties of stars, how they form, and possible connections with orbiting planets. And what she found from her work is that the compositions of nearby stars aren't as uniform as once thought. Since it is not possible to physically sample a star to determine its composition, astronomers study of the light ...

MAYWOOD, Ill -- A leukemia drug called dasatinib shows promise for treating skin, breast and several other cancers, according to researchers at Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine. Dasatinib fights leukemia by checking the uncontrolled growth of cancer cells. But when used against other cancer cells, researchers found, the drug employs a different strategy: It causes the cells to clump together, thus preventing them from migrating. Without the ability to migrate, cancer cells cannot metastasize (spread to other parts of the body). Mitchell Denning, ...

Electroacupuncture has traditionally been used to treat pain, but its effect on pain following brachial plexus injury is still unknown. In a recent study reported on the Neural Regeneration Research (Vol. 9, No. 14, 2014), rat models of an avulsion injury to the left brachial plexus root (associated with upper-limb chronic neuropathic pain) were given electroacupuncture stimulation at bilateral Quchi (LI11), Hegu (LI04), Zusanli (ST36) and Yanglingquan (GB34). After electroacupuncture therapy, chronic neuropathic pain in the rats' upper limbs was significantly attenuated. ...

Medical researchers have used DNA sequencing to identify a gene variant responsible for causing lupus in a young patient. The development shows that for the first time, it is feasible for researchers to identify the individual causes of lupus in patients by using DNA sequencing, allowing doctors to target specific treatments to individual patients. Lupus is a chronic autoimmune disease that affects one in 700 Australians, predominantly young and middle aged women. Medical researchers at the Australian National University's Centre for Personalised Immunology, based ...

Researchers from the Institute of General Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry of the Russian Academy of Sciences and MIPT have made an important step towards creating medical nanorobots. They discovered a way of enabling nano- and microparticles to produce logical calculations using a variety of biochemical reactions. Details of their research project are given in the journal Nature Nanotechnology. It is the first experimental publication by an exclusively Russian team in one of the most cited scientific magazines in many ...

Chicago – August 19, 2014 – People taking prescription opioids to treat moderate to severe pain may be able to breathe a little easier, literally. A study published in the September issue of Anesthesiology, the official medical journal of the American Society of Anesthesiologists® (ASA®), found that a new therapeutic drug, GAL-021, may reverse or prevent respiratory depression, or inadequate breathing, in patients taking opioid medication without compromising pain relief or increasing sedation. "Although opioids such as oxycodone, methadone and fentanyl are commonly ...

This news release is available in French. Taking a Stand: balancing the BENEFITS and RISKS of physical activity in children Today the Canadian Society of Exercise Physiology took a stand on the promotion of childhood physical activity and published their position and recommendations in the journal Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism (APNM). This position stand provides an important overview of knowledge in the area of risk of physical activity for children and suggests both practical guidelines and a research agenda. Uniquely, this position stand addresses ...

This news release is available in German. Researchers trying to get new information about the metabolism of plants can switch off individual genes and study the resulting changes. However, Erich Kombrink from the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research in Cologne and Markus Kaiser from the University of Duisburg-Essen adopt a different approach. They identify small molecules that block specific components of the metabolic process like brake pads and prevent the downstream reactions. In their search for these molecules, they use a biological selection ...

DURHAM, N.C. -- Under the right scenario, exporting U.S. coal to power plants in South Korea could lead to a 21 percent drop in greenhouse gas emissions compared to burning the fossil fuel at plants in the United States, according to a new Duke University-led study. "Despite the large amount of emissions produced by shipping the coal such a long distance, our analysis shows that the total emissions would drop because of the superior energy efficiency of South Korea's newer coal-fired power plants," said Dalia Patiño-Echeverri, assistant professor of energy systems and ...

The bacterium Clostridium difficile causes antibiotic-related diarrhoea and is a growing problem in the hospital environment and elsewhere in the community. Understanding how the microbe colonises the human gut when other "healthy" microbes have been destroyed during a course of antibiotics might lead to new ways to control infection. An important clue was reported recently in an open access article published in the journal Acta Crystallographica Section D Biological Crystallography. [Bradshaw et al. (2014). Acta Cryst. D70, 1983-1993; doi:10.1107/S1399004714009997] Ravi ...