U of T Breakthrough Allows Fast, Reliable Pathogen Identification TORONTO, ON – Life-threatening bacterial infections cause tens of thousands of deaths every year in North America. Increasingly, many infections are resistant to first-line antibiotics. Unfortunately, current methods of culturing bacteria in the lab can take days to report the specific source of the infection, and even longer to pinpoint the right antibiotic that will clear the infection. There remains an urgent, unmet need for technologies that can allow bacterial infections to be rapidly and specifically ...

Parasites comprise a large proportion of the diversity of species in every ecosystem. Despite this, they are rarely included in analyses or models of food webs. If parasites play different roles from other predators and prey, however, their inclusion could fundamentally alter our understanding of how food webs are organized. In a paper published 11 June in the open access journal PLOS Biology, Santa Fe Institute Professor Jennifer Dunne and her team test this assertion and show that including parasites does alter the structure of food webs, but that most changes occur because ...

People in India who walk or cycle to work are less likely to be overweight or obese, according to a study led by Christopher Millett from Imperial College London and the Public Health Foundation of India and colleagues. Their paper reporting the study, published in this week's PLOS Medicine, reveals that cyclists are also less likely to have diabetes or high blood pressure compared to people who take public or private transport to work. These findings are important as they suggest that active travel could reduce rates of important risk factors for many chronic diseases, ...

Nine years after the World Health Organization adopted a global strategy on diet, physical activity, and health to address risk factors for chronic diseases such as heart disease and diabetes (referred to internationally as noncommunicable diseases), only a few low-and middle-income countries have implemented robust national policies to help prevent such diseases, according to a study by international researchers published in this week's PLOS Medicine. These findings are important as they suggest that the majority of the world's low- and middle-income countries are not ...

MADRID -- The painful rheumatic condition gout is often associated with the big toe, but it turns out that patients at highest risk of further flare-ups are those whose gout first involved other joints, such as a knee or elbow, Mayo Clinic has found. The study is among several that Mayo researchers are presenting in Madrid at the European League Against Rheumatism's annual meeting. In other findings, Mayo discovered a clue to why lupus tends to be worse in African-Americans; chronicled erratic blood pressure in rheumatoid arthritis patients; found gout-like deposits in ...

A team of NIH-supported researchers is the first to show, in mice, an unexpected two-step process that happens during the growth and regeneration of inner ear tip links. Tip links are extracellular tethers that link stereocilia, the tiny sensory projections on inner ear hair cells that convert sound into electrical signals, and play a key role in hearing. The discovery offers a possible mechanism for potential interventions that could preserve hearing in people whose hearing loss is caused by genetic disorders related to tip link dysfunction. The work was supported by ...

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital has found that childhood cancer survivors overwhelmingly experience a significant amount of undiagnosed, serious disease through their adult years, establishing the importance of proactive, life-long clinical health screenings for this growing high-risk population. The findings appear in the June 12 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. Overall, 98 percent of the 1,713 survivors in the study had at least one chronic health condition, hundreds of which were diagnosed through clinical screenings conducted as part ...

An intervention consisting of clinician education coupled with personalized audit and feedback about antibiotic prescribing improved adherence to prescribing guidelines for common pediatric bacterial acute respiratory tract infections, although the intervention did not affect antibiotic prescribing for viral infections, according to a study in the June 12 issue of JAMA. "Antibiotics are the most common prescription drugs given to children. Although hospitalized children frequently receive antibiotics, the vast majority of antibiotic use occurs in the outpatient setting, ...

In an analysis that included more than 1,700 adult survivors of childhood cancer, researchers found a very high percentage of survivors with 1 or more chronic health conditions, with an estimated cumulative prevalence of any chronic health condition of 95 percent at age 45 years, according to a study in the June 12 issue of JAMA. "Curative therapy for pediatric malignancies has produced a growing population of adults formerly treated for childhood cancer who are at risk for health problems that appear to increase with aging. The prevalence of cancer-related toxic effects ...

In a study that included more than 1.5 million deliveries in Sweden, maternal overweight and obesity during pregnancy were associated with increased risk for preterm delivery, with the highest risks observed for extremely preterm deliveries, according to a study in the June 12 issue of JAMA. "Maternal overweight and obesity has, due to the high prevalence and associated risks, replaced smoking as the most important preventable risk factor for adverse pregnancy outcomes in many countries. Preterm birth, defined as a delivery of a liveborn infant before 37 gestational weeks, ...

Simultaneously elevated levels of the biomarkers C-reactive protein, fibrinogen and leukocyte count in individuals with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) were associated with increased risk of having exacerbations, even in those with milder COPD and in those without previous exacerbations, according to a study in the June 12 issue of JAMA. "Exacerbations of respiratory symptoms in COPD are of major importance because of their profound and long-lasting adverse effects on patients. Frequent episodes accelerate loss of lung function, affect the quality of life ...

"Hearing loss (HL) is a chronic condition that affects nearly 2 of every 3 adults aged 70 years or older in the United States. Hearing loss has broader implications for older adults, being independently associated with poorer cognitive and physical functioning. The association of HL with other health economic outcomes, such as health care use, is unstudied," writes Dane J. Genther, M.D., of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, and colleagues, in a Research Letter. The authors investigated the association of HL with hospitalization and burden of disease ...

Cross-country skiers who take part in one of the world's most challenging ski races, the 90 km Vasaloppet in Sweden, are at increased risk of developing arrhythmia – problems with the rate or rhythm of their heart beat – according to a study of nearly 53,000 race participants published online today (Wednesday) in the European Heart Journal [1]. The risk of developing atrial fibrillation (an irregular or abnormally fast heart beat) or bradyarrhythmias (a heart beat that is too slow) was greater among skiers who completed a higher number of races and with a faster finishing ...

People in India who walk or cycle to work are less likely to be overweight or obese, have diabetes or high blood pressure, a study has found. These findings suggest that encouraging more people to use physically active modes of transport could reduce rates of important risk factors for many chronic diseases, say the researchers from Imperial College London and the Public Health Foundation of India. Rates of diabetes and heart disease are projected to increase dramatically in India and other low and middle income countries over the next two decades. The study, published ...

The risk of preterm delivery increases with maternal overweight and obesity, according to a new Swedish study published in Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Women with the highest Body Mass Index (BMI) also had the highest statistical risk of giving preterm birth – and especially extremely preterm birth. "For the individual woman who is overweight or obese, the risk of an extremely preterm delivery is still small", says Dr. Sven Cnattingius, Professor at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden, who led the study. "However, these finding are important from a ...

As disease-causing microbes continue their worrisome trend of developing resistance to commonly used antibiotics, public health experts have called for more selective use of those medicines. A new study suggests that educating pediatricians in their offices, and auditing their prescription patterns, encourages them to choose more appropriate antibiotics for children with common respiratory infections. "Although much research has focused on improving how hospitals use antibiotics, there have been few studies of interventions in outpatient settings, where the vast majority ...

A moderate case of obstructive sleep apnea can significantly increase a person's risk for sudden cardiac death, an often fatal condition where the heart stops beating and must be immediately treated with CPR or an automated external defibrillator, according to the largest study of its kind published online today in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Sleep apnea is diagnosed when a person stops breathing for 10 seconds or longer at least five times per hour during sleep. Symptoms can include loud snoring, choking or gasping during sleep, and morning drowsiness. ...

Younger mothers are at a higher risk of preterm birth while older mothers are more likely to have a caesarean section, suggests a new study published today (12 June) in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. The study, conducted over a 12-year period (2000-2011) in Ireland, examined the delivery outcomes of 36,916 first-time mothers at varying maternal ages. The pregnant women were subdivided into five age groups, 3.3% at 17 years or younger (17-), 7.2% at 18-19 years, 77.9% at 20-34 years, 9.9% at 35-39 years and 1.7% at 40 years or older (40+). ...

Scheduled exercise, regular meals and the periodic warming and cooling of joints could be used to relieve the symptoms of osteoarthritis according to scientists at The University of Manchester. Their research may also help explain why older people are more prone to developing this common joint disorder. The team in the Faculty of Life Sciences has established for the first time that cartilage cells have a functioning body clock that switches on and off genes controlling tissue function. The rhythm of the cartilage clock perhaps goes some way to explain why osteoarthritis ...

The findings came from X-ray experiments by a team from The University of Manchester, working with colleagues at the US Department of Energy's (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. The scientists were able to find chemical traces of the original 'dinobird' and dilute traces of plumage pigments in the 150 million-year-old fossil. "This is a big leap forward in our understanding of the evolution of plumage and also the preservation of feathers," said Dr Phil Manning, a palaeontologist at The University of Manchester and lead author of the report in the June 13 issue ...

A team of Johns Hopkins researchers working with animals has developed a vaccine that prevents the virulent TB bacterium from invading the brain and causing the highly lethal condition TB meningitis, a disease that disproportionately occurs in TB-infected children and in adults with compromised immune system. A report on the federally funded research is published online June 11 in the journal PLOS ONE. TB brain infections often cause serious brain damage and death even when recognized and treated promptly, researchers say. This is so because many drugs currently used ...

VIDEO: University of Chicago researchers found that people's concept of what perfect pitch is can be changed, a discovery that underscores the malleability of the brain. Click here for more information. People who think they have perfect pitch may not be as in tune as they think, according to a new University of Chicago study in which people failed to notice a gradual change in pitch while listening to music. When tested afterward, people with perfect, or absolute pitch, thought ...

Using star-shaped block co-polymer structures as tiny reaction vessels, researchers have developed an improved technique for producing nanocrystals with consistent sizes, compositions and architectures – including metallic, ferroelectric, magnetic, semiconductor and luminescent nanocrystals. The technique relies on the length of polymer molecules and the ratio of two solvents to control the size and uniformity of colloidal nanocrystals. The technique could facilitate the use of nanoparticles for optical, electrical, optoelectronic, magnetic, catalysis and other applications ...

HAMILTON, ON (June 11, 2013) -- One in six women arriving at orthopedic fracture clinics have been victims of physical, emotional, or sexual violence at the hands of an intimate partner within the past year, and one in 50 arrive as a direct result of intimate partner violence (IPV), according to the largest multinational study of its kind to date, led by McMaster University researchers. The report has been published on Online First by The Lancet. "The unexpectedly high rate of IPV in orthopedics suggests that injury clinics are the ideal location for identification ...

LA JOLLA — It's common wisdom that one rotten apple in a barrel spoils all the other apples, and that an apple ripens a green banana if they are put together in a paper bag. Ways to ripen, or spoil, fruit have been known for thousands of years—as the Bible can attest—but now the genes underlying these phenomena of nature have been revealed. In the online journal eLIFE, a large international group of scientists, led by investigators at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, have traced the thousands of genes in a plant that are activated once ethylene, a gas that ...