ANN ARBOR, Mich. — One in eight visits to a a doctor for a headache or migraine end up with the patient going for a brain scan, at a total cost of about $1 billion a year, a new University of Michigan Medical School study finds. And many of those MRI and CT scans – and costs – are probably unnecessary, given the very low odds that serious issues lurk in the patients' brains. In fact, several national guidelines for doctors specifically discourage scanning the brains of patients who complain of headache and migraine. But the new study shows the rate of brain scans for ...

A unique 39-year study of wildflower blooms in a Colorado Rocky Mountain meadow shows more than two-thirds of alpine flowers have changed their blooming pattern in response to climate change. Not only are half the flowers beginning to bloom weeks earlier, but more than a third are reaching their peak bloom earlier, and others are producing their last blooms later in the year. The bloom season, which used to run from late May to early September, now lasts from late April to late September, according to University of Maryland Biology Professor David Inouye. The wildflower ...

ANN ARBOR—University of Michigan researchers have learned how to fix a cellular structure called the Golgi that mysteriously becomes fragmented in all Alzheimer's patients and appears to be a major cause of the disease. They say that understanding this mechanism helps decode amyloid plaque formation in the brains of Alzheimer's patients—plaques that kills cells and contributes to memory loss and other Alzheimer's symptoms. The researchers discovered the molecular process behind Golgi fragmentation, and also developed two techniques to 'rescue' the Golgi structure. ...

It's a jungle in there. In the tightly woven ecosystem of the human gut, trillions of bacteria compete with each other on a daily basis while they sense and react to signals from the immune system, ingested food, and other bacteria. Problems arise when bad gut bugs overtake friendly ones, or when the immune system is thrown off balance, as in Crohn's disease, celiac disease, and colorectal cancer. Doctors have struggled to diagnose these conditions early and accurately. But now a new engineered strain of E. coli bacteria could deliver status updates from this complex ...

Using genome sequencing, National Institutes of Health (NIH) scientists and their colleagues have tracked the evolution of the antibiotic-resistant bacterium Klebsiella pneumoniae sequence type 258 (ST258), an important agent of hospital-acquired infections. While researchers had previously thought that ST258 K. pneumoniae strains spread from a single ancestor, the NIH team showed that the strains arose from at least two different lineages. The investigators also found that the key difference between the two groups lies in the genes involved in production of the bacterium's ...

Engineers would love to create flexible electronic devices, such as e-readers that could be folded to fit into a pocket. One approach they are trying involves designing circuits based on electronic fibers, known as carbon nanotubes (CNTs), instead of rigid silicon chips. But reliability is essential. Most silicon chips are based on a type of circuit design that allows them to function flawlessly even when the device experiences power fluctuations. However, it is much more challenging to do so with CNT circuits. Now a team at Stanford has developed a process to create ...

WASHINGTON, DC, and DALLAS (March 17, 2014) – The increasing number of percutaneous coronary interventions (PCIs) being performed at low-volume centers without on-site cardiac surgery backup has driven the need for new safety and quality protocols, according to an expert consensus document released today and written by a committee representing the Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (SCAI), the American College of Cardiology Foundation (ACCF) and the American Heart Association (AHA). The document outlines steps hospitals can take to provide the safest ...

Researchers from the British Antarctic Survey and University of Reading report in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on March 17 that Antarctic mosses can essentially come back to life after 1,500 completely inactive years under the ice. Prior to this finding, direct regeneration from frozen plant material had been demonstrated after 20 years at most. Beyond that, only microbes had been shown to be capable of revival after so many years on hold. "These mosses were basically in a very long-term deep freeze," says Peter Convey of the British Antarctic Survey. "This ...

A review of nearly 200 research articles (~75% published in the last ten years) shows how the issue of population growth is being downplayed and trivialized despite its fundamental role on modern crises related to unemployment, public debt, welfare (e.g., reduced access to food and water or even health and education), extinction of species and climate change. The study suggests that no foreseeable pathways, to fix or ameliorate such crises, are likely without seriously dealing with natality rates by both developed and developing nations. The paper is written by Camilo ...

A new study indicates that in younger adults experiencing heart attacks and angina, men are more likely to receive faster care compared with women. The study, published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) also found that gender-related factors affected access to care for both men and women. To understand why sex differences in mortality exist in younger men and women with acute coronary syndrome, researchers included 1123 patients aged 18 to 55 years recruited from 24 centres across Canada, 1 in the United States and 1 in Switzerland. Of the participants, ...

Researchers from the British Antarctic Survey and Reading University have demonstrated that, after over 1,500 years frozen in Antarctic ice, moss can come back to life and continue to grow. For the first time, this vital part of the ecosystem in both polar regions has been shown to have the ability to survive century to millennial scale ice ages. This provides exciting new insight into the survival of life on Earth. The team, reporting in Current Biology this week, observed moss regeneration after at least 1,530 years frozen in permafrost. This is the first study to show ...

DALLAS, March 17, 2014 — In response to drug-resistant "superbugs" that send millions of people to hospitals around the world, scientists are building tiny, "molecular drill bits" that kill bacteria by bursting through their protective cell walls. They presented some of the latest developments on these drill bits, better known to scientists as antimicrobial peptides (AMPs), at the 247th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world's largest scientific society. The meeting, which features more than 10,000 scientific reports across disciplines ...

DALLAS, March 17, 2014 — Shale, the source of the United States' current natural gas boom, could help solve another energy problem: what to do with radioactive waste from nuclear power plants. The unique properties of the sedimentary rock and related clay-rich rocks make it ideal for storing the potentially dangerous spent fuel for millennia, according to a geologist studying possible storage sites who made a presentation here today. The talk was one of more than 10,000 presentations at the 247th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the ...

DALLAS, March 17, 2014 — Body odor is a deer hunter's worst enemy, an alert to animals that an ominous presence is lurking, but the science behind suppressing it to give hunters an edge oddly enough could help researchers develop a life-saving device for diabetes patients. Scientists today presented the latest advances that tie together these two seemingly unrelated fronts at the 247th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world's largest scientific society. The meeting, attended by thousands of scientists, features more than 10,000 ...

VIDEO: A team of biologists and engineers at UC San Diego applied advanced mathematical tools to answer a basic question in cell biology about how cells move and discovered that the... Click here for more information. A team of biologists and engineers at the University of California, San Diego has discovered that white blood cells, which repair damaged tissue as part of the body's immune response, move to inflamed sites by walking in a stepwise manner. The cells periodically ...

Dallas, TX, March 17, 2014: Eleven top scientists from around the globe presented the latest findings on the powerful compounds found in oats in a scientific session titled, Physicochemical Properties and Biological Functionality of Oats, at the 247th Annual Conference of the American Chemical Society in Dallas, TX. Scientists described research on the diverse health benefits of oats and emphasized the growing evidence that the type of phenolic compound avenanthramide (AVE) – found only in oats – may possess antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-itch and anti-cancer properties. ...

WASHINGTON — A study of more than 15,000 men with early stage prostate cancer finds that those who received androgen deprivation as their primary treatment instead of surgery or radiation did not live any longer than those who received no treatment. The research team, led by scientists at Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, say that the risks of serious adverse events associated with the treatment — which has been linked to impaired cognition, heart disease, diabetes and other disorders — "mitigates against any clinical or policy rationale for use of primary ...

Bayramov's research shows that propagating star-light is substantially deflected by the gravitational-flow. The substantial star-light deflection causes very small visible stellar parallax (visible star position deflection as Earth orbits the Sun). When not accounting for the substantial star-light curvature, using straight-line parallax calculation, main-stream science projects the closest stars to be many light years away, e.g. the closest known star - Proxima Centauri is projected to be 4.2 light years away. By accounting for the substantial star-light deflection ...

2 Art Productions - Presents to the City of Houston artist Mathieu Bitton and his exhibition, Impulse. Bitton is an internationally recognized photographer, director and one of the music world's most sought-after Art Director/Designers. The community is invited to attend this three day exhibition beginning May 30, 2014 and ending June 1, 2014 at Winter Street Studios, 2101 Winter St, Houston, TX 77008. Mathieu Bitton's, Impulse is a multi-media photography exhibition that chronicles the artist's journey over the years. Winter Street Studios will be the host venue providing ...

The film "Legends of the Knight" a documentary of how a fictional superhero has positively influenced ordinary people will be shown at Showcase Cinemas in East Greenwich, Rhode Island with proceeds to benefit the Providence Ronald McDonald's House. The film, by Producer/Director Brett Culp was funded by 1,100 people around the world (through kickstarter.com) and presents examples of the positive influence of storytelling on people from all walks of life. The film is centered around the stories of Batman, the only fictional hero wihout "superpowers" ...

What CM Tooltip does is to create a dictionary of terms for your WordPress site, making sure that your posts are accessible and easy to understand by all readers. Your blog will therefore feature an easy-to-use glossary of chosen terms & their definitions, through a plugin that has a large range of features and allows you to customize it and have a lot of control over how it appears on your site. Once you add a new word to the glossary, every time that word appears in one of your posts or pages, it will be turned into a link to the glossary entry where that specific ...

The Organization for Women in International Trade-Phoenix Chapter, is pleased to announce its new Int'l Trade program event and welcome guest speakers, Robert Clark, Director of Security, APL, and Karen Vellutini, Vice President, Sales & Marketing, Devine Intermodal, and President of Women in Logistics, Northern California, for an informative discussion on "The Maritime Industry's NEW Green Initiatives": What you need to know about Environmental Sustainability and its impact on your business, to be held on March 20th at the Maricopa Association of Governments, ...

Roboshields, in partnership with Actify, is now able to offer an amazing retail kiosk that will allow entrepreneurs to begin a locally owned business, quickly and efficiently. The demand for telephone accessories is one the world's fastest growing markets and the protection that Roboshield offers can save users hundreds of dollars on the replacement cost of an entire phone. Entrepreneurs looking to earn significant profits from a turn-key operation should look at the program offered at http://www.roboshields.com. "It really is reusable. I forgot to wipe down my ...

JAuthor Donna McGoff announces the release of "The Power of Goal Setting". Learning at an early age how to use a simple skill shows kids that they have the power to create their own destiny. Donna McGoff's new book, "The Power of Goal Setting", uses goal setting as a straightforward way of introducing how to exercise the mind to think positively and correctly. Most behavior is goal directed. Learning the process of goal setting teaches children to become more responsible and build character for successful management of behavior, aspire to reach ...

The Sheraton Premiere at Tysons Corner is ready for spring and is pleased to offer guests a number of special packages starting at just $99 per night, now through May 22, 2014. Convenient to downtown Washington, DC, Virginia countryside, parks and historical sites, guests will enjoy easy access to metro, highway and airport transit. The Sheraton Premiere at Tysons Corner is an ideal location for guests to experience such wonderful spring activities like the world-renowned Cherry Blossom Festival, the Easter holiday or a Spring Break getaway. Guests who stay at the ...