2824 new cases of hantavirus disease were reported in Germany in 2012, the highest number ever in a single year. In the current issue of Deutsches Ärzteblatt International, Detlev Krüger and coauthors present the main facts about this disease (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2013; 110[27-28]: 461-7). Every two to three years, large outbreaks of hantavirus disease are caused by Puumala virus, which is transmitted by bank voles and is endemic to southwestern and western Germany. In the north and east of the country, hantavirus infections are caused by the Dobrava-Belgrad virus, which ...

A new biosensor, applied to the human skin like a temporary tattoo, can alert marathoners, competitive bikers and other "extreme" athletes that they're about to "bonk," or "hit the wall," scientists are reporting. The study, in ACS' journal Analytical Chemistry, describes the first human tests of the sensor, which also could help soldiers and others who engage in intense exercise — and their trainers — monitor stamina and fitness. Joseph Wang and colleagues explain that the sensor monitors lactate, a form of lactic acid released in sweat. Lactate forms when the muscles ...

Artists and craftsmen more than 2,000 years ago developed thin-film coating technology unrivaled even by today's standards for producing DVDs, solar cells, electronic devices and other products. Understanding these sophisticated metal-plating techniques from ancient times, described in the ACS journal Accounts of Chemical Research, could help preserve priceless artistic and other treasures from the past. Gabriel Maria Ingo and colleagues point out that scientists have made good progress in understanding the chemistry of many ancient artistic and other artifacts — crucial ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Small proteins called peptides that consist of 10 to 50 amino acids are being studied as cancer vaccines and as possibly safer, more effective and less costly alternatives to the monoclonal-antibody-based drugs and small-molecule inhibitors now used to treat many malignancies. Researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center - Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James) have identified two regions on the HER1/EGFR receptor, a protein important for cancer-cell growth and metastasis and for ...

Glacier retreat areas provide an excellent window into the evolution of microbial communities, an ideal opportunity for scientists to study how quickly soil biological functions become established and how ecosystems begin to form. Soils are not static in the landscape, but instead evolve with time under the influence of multiple environmental factors – understanding how these factors interact can lead to advancements in the science and management of soils. Aria Hahn and Dr. Sylvie Quideau, researchers at the University of Alberta, conducted their research in Mount Robson ...

This news release is available in German. Diagnosing the presence of Yersinia pestis, the cause of plague, may soon be easier than ever before. Scientists working with Peter Seeberger, Director at the Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces (MPIKG) in Potsdam and Professor at the Freie Universität Berlin, have come up with a simple, inexpensive and reliable method of detecting the bacterium. The research team, specialising in glycochemistry and glycobiology, first identified and synthesised an oligosaccharide structure on bacterial surface before combining ...

Purchasing designer handbags and shoes is a means for women to express their style, boost self-esteem, or even signal status. New University of Minnesota research suggests some women also seek these luxury items to prevent other women from stealing their man. Through a series of five experiments featuring 649 women of varying ages and relationship statuses, Carlson School of Management Associate Professor Vladas Griskevicius and PhD student Yajin Wang discovered how women's luxury products often function as a signaling system directed at other women who pose a threat ...

WASHINGTON -- A "geographic value index" that would tie Medicare payment rates to the health benefits and costs of health services in particular regions of the country should not be adopted by Congress, says a new congressionally mandated report from the Institute of Medicine. The committee that wrote the report concluded that decisions about health care generally are made at the level of the physician or organization, such as a hospital, not at the regional level. Because individual physician performance varies, sometimes even within a single practice group, an index ...

PITTSBURGH - Herpes viruses are like tiny powder kegs waiting to explode. For more than 20 years scientists suspected that herpes viruses were packaged so full of genetic material that they built up an internal pressure so strong it could shoot viral DNA into a host cell during infection. No one had been able to prove that theory until now. Carnegie Mellon University biophysicist Alex Evilevitch together with his graduate student David Bauer and University of Pittsburgh collaborators Fred Homa and Jamie Huffman have measured, for the first time, the pressure inside human ...

San Francisco, CA. (July 24, 2013) – Close to half of older adults undergoing surgery with general anesthesia are found to have delirium in the postanesthesia care unit (PACU), according to a study in the August issue of Anesthesia & Analgesia, official journal of the International Anesthesia Research Society (IARS). Delirium occurring early after surgery is linked to decreased cognitive (mental) function and an increased rate of nursing home admission, according to the study by Dr Karin J. Neufeld of Johns Hopkins University and colleagues. They write, "Recognizing ...

San Francisco, CA. (July 24, 2013) – Forced-air systems used to keep patients warm during surgery may affect the performance of operating room (OR) ventilation systems—potentially increasing exposure to airborne contaminants, reports a study in the August issue of Anesthesia & Analgesia, official journal of the International Anesthesia Research Society (IARS). By comparison, conductive warming systems don't disrupt ventilation airflows over the surgical site, according to the report by Dr Kumar G. Belani of University of Minnesota and colleagues. But an accompanying ...

Efforts to cope with a global water crisis that already has left almost 800 million people without access to drinkable water -- and could engulf many more in the years ahead -- are the topic of the cover story in the current edition of Chemical & Engineering News. C&EN is the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society. Alex Scott, C&EN's senior editor for Europe, points out that most companies involved in water treatment technologies focus on providing services in wealthy industrialized nations. But today's most critical ...

Regular marijuana use in adolescence, but not adulthood, may permanently impair brain function and cognition, and may increase the risk of developing serious psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia, according to a recent study from the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Researchers hope that the study, published in Neuropsychopharmacology — a publication of the journal Nature – will help to shed light on the potential long-term effects of marijuana use, particularly as lawmakers in Maryland and elsewhere contemplate legalizing the drug. "Over the past 20 ...

Surgery is often the first step in treating kidney cancer, and new data from the University of Rochester Medical Center, which contradicts earlier research, questions whether removal of only the tumor (partial nephrectomy) is better than removing the entire kidney (radical nephrectomy). The decided trend for the past decade has been toward a partial resection in the case of smaller cancers. It was based on several earlier studies suggesting that it's better to save as much kidney tissue as possible, and thus preserve kidney function and reduce the likelihood of kidney ...

The fourth tropical depression of the Atlantic Ocean hurricane season was born west of the Cape Verde Islands in the Eastern Atlantic Ocean on July 24. NOAA's GOES-13 satellite provides continuous views of the Atlantic Ocean basin and captured an image of the newborn storm. At 5 a.m. EDT on July 24, the National Hurricane Center announced the birth of Tropical Depression 4 or TD4. At that time TD4 had maximum sustained winds near 35 mph (55 kph). It was centered about 310 miles (500 km) west-southwest of the Cape Verde Islands, near 13.9 north and 28.1 west. TD4 was moving ...

BROOKLYN, N.Y.—Just months after setting a record for detecting the smallest single virus in solution, researchers at the Polytechnic Institute of New York University (NYU-Poly) have announced a new breakthrough: They used a nano-enhanced version of their patented microcavity biosensor to detect a single cancer marker protein, which is one-sixth the size of the smallest virus, and even smaller molecules below the mass of all known markers. This achievement shatters the previous record, setting a new benchmark for the most sensitive limit of detection, and may significantly ...

PHILADELPHIA (July 24, 2013) – Despite major advances in the pharmaceutical treatment of disease, many children reject medicines due to an aversion to bitter taste. As such, bitterness presents a key obstacle to the acceptance and effectiveness of beneficial drugs by children worldwide. A new review, published online ahead of print in Clinical Therapeutics, addresses this critical problem by highlighting recent advances in the scientific understanding of bitter taste, with special attention to the sensory world of children. Written by an interdisciplinary team of leading ...

Less than five percent of promising basic science discoveries that claim clinical relevance lead to approved drugs within a decade, partly because of flawed pre-clinical animal research. A number of recent initiatives seek to improve the quality of such studies, and an article published this week in PLOS Medicine identifies key experimental procedures believed to increase clinical generalizability. The authors, led by Jonathan Kimmelman of McGill University in Montréal, did a systematic literature search and identified 26 guidelines with 55 different procedures that groups ...

The main barriers to the access, delivery, and use of interventions that help to prevent malaria in pregnant women are relatively consistent across sub-Saharan African countries and may provide a helpful checklist to identify the factors influencing uptake of these important interventions, according to a study published in this week's PLOS Medicine. The analysis by Jenny Hill and colleagues from the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine in the UK, the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, and PATH in Seattle, USA, also found that there were more barriers to ...

Frontiers in Pharmacology Why are menthol cigarettes more addictive? Smokers of menthol cigarettes crave cigarettes more frequently, find it more difficult to quit smoking, and are more likely to become addicted. The traditional explanation for the effect of menthol is that it masks the harsh taste of tobacco and thus entices people to smoke more. But Nadine Kabbani from George Mason University in the USA here review recent scientific findings and proposes an novel explanation: menthol may directly promote nicotine craving because it binds to a particular type of ...

In an analysis of 5-year survival rates among black and white women diagnosed with breast cancer between 1991 and 2005, black women continued to have a lower rate of survival, with most of the difference related to factors including poorer health of black patients at diagnosis and more advanced disease, rather than treatment differences, according to a study in the July 24/31 issue of JAMA. "For 20 years health care investigators in the United States have been keenly aware of racial disparities in survival among women with breast cancer. Numerous reports have not only ...

An investigation into the source of a fatal case of raccoon rabies virus exposure indicates the individual received the virus via a kidney transplant 18 months earlier, findings suggesting that rabies transmitted by this route may have a long incubation period, and that although solid organ transplant transmission of infectious encephalitis is rare, further education to increase awareness is needed, according to a study in the July 24/31 issue of JAMA. The rabies virus causes a fatal encephalitis (inflammation of the brain) and can be transmitted through tissue or organ ...

In a survey of about 2,500 U. S. physicians on their perceived role in addressing health care costs, they reported having some responsibility to address health care costs in their practice and expressed general agreement with quality initiatives that may also reduce cost, but expressed less enthusiasm for cost containment involving changes in payment models, according to a study in the July 24/31 issue of JAMA. "The increasing cost of U.S. health care strains the economy. Because physicians' decisions play a key role in overall health care spending and quality, several ...

An analysis of data from three studies that involved a total of more than 240,000 participants found that a self-reported history of kidney stones was associated with a statistically significant increased risk of coronary heart disease among women but no significant association was evident for men, according to a study in the July 24/31 issue of JAMA. "Nephrolithiasis [kidney stones] is a common condition, with the prevalence varying by age and sex. A recent estimate from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, a representative sample of the U.S. population, ...

"The incidence of type l diabetes (T1D), one of the most prevalent chronic diseases in children, has increased worldwide," write Valma Harjutsalo, Ph.D., of the Diabetes Prevention Unit, Helsinki, Finland, and colleagues, who conducted a study to examine the incidence rates of T1D between 2006 and 2011 in Finnish children younger than 15 years as well as the 32-year trend (1980-2011). As reported in a Research Letter, all children with newly diagnosed T1D were ascertained using several nationwide registers. Age-standardized and age-specific annual incidence rates for ...