Volatile organic compounds (VOCs), with toxicity and irritability, could cause atmospheric environmental problems such as haze and photochemical smog, seriously threatening the ecological environment and human health. The primary source of VOCs is human production, such as the petrochemical industry, pharmaceutical industry, footwear industry, electronic manufacturing, and cooking fumes. Catalytic oxidation technology can highly effectively remove organic pollutants without secondary pollution, and it is receiving increasing attention in VOC pollution control. In real-world operating conditions, the ...

HONG KONG (21 July 2024) --- The progress of solar energy technology took a step forward recently with the development of a groundbreaking living passivator at City University of Hong Kong (CityUHK) that can substantially enhance the stability and efficiency of perovskite solar cells. This newly developed passivator is a type of corrosion inhibitor that appreciably changes the potential of a metal. The CityUHK technology leverages dynamic covalent bonds that activate on exposure to moisture and heat, enabling it to evolve new passivators in response to environmental factors. This innovative approach allows for real-time repair and maintenance of perovskite solar cells. ...

New research presented at this year’s Annual Meeting of the European Association for Study of Diabetes (Madrid, Spain, 9-13 September) shows that the risk of developing type 1 diabetes (T1D) decreases markedly in girls after age 10 years, while the risk in boys stays the same. Furthermore, risk of T1D is significantly higher boys with a single autoantibody than their female counterparts, suggesting the sex could be linked with autoantibody development, indicating the importance of incorporating sex in the assessment ...

Background and Goal: Sulfonylureas are a class of oral medications used to manage blood glucose levels in patients with type 2 diabetes. These drugs increase insulin production regardless of blood sugar levels. For this reason, the drugs can cause blood sugar to drop too low, leading to hypoglycemia. The goal of this study was to compare how prevalent impaired awareness of hypoglycemia was when patients with type 2 diabetes were treated with either insulin or sulfonylureas for both long and short-term periods. Study Approach: Researchers collected data from a group of 898 participants with type 2 diabetes enrolled in pharmacies, clinics, ...

Background and Goal: Social determinants of health are the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work, and age. These conditions include income, education, and access to health care. Knowledge of these factors is essential for primary care clinicians to deliver fair and complete care, plan programs and distribute resources effectively. However, this information is rarely captured consistently in clinical settings. This study identified how an Artificial Intelligence (AI) social determinants of health tool can be designed using a collaborative design strategy with input from primary care team members. Study Approach:  ...

Background and Goal: The COVID-19 pandemic likely worsened disparities in access to primary care. The goal of this study was to quantify the nationwide decline in primary care visits and the increase in telehealth utilization and explore whether certain groups of patients were disproportionately impacted. Study Approach: Researchers used primary care electronic health record data from the American Family Cohort— to examine  the percentage change in total visit volume, change in in-person visit volume, and telehealth ...

Background and Goal: The Transforming Clinical Practice Initiative was a four-year nationwide program aimed at improving outpatient health care quality. The initiative, funded by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, also prepared practices for payment systems based on care quality rather than service quantity and included a Change Package to guide practice transformations. This research brief examines whether these transformations were associated with reductions in emergency department visits among both primary and specialty care practices. Study Approach: Researchers analyzed data from 3,773 practices in the Transforming Clinical Practice ...

Person-centered care focuses on treating patients as individuals with unique needs and involving them actively in their care decisions. The Person-Centered Primary Care Measure (PCPCM) is a recently developed, patient-reported survey able to assess person-centeredness. The PCPCM has demonstrated strong validity and reliability. The goal of this study was to translate the original PCPCM survey into Dutch, adapt the survey for people with low literacy, and evaluate its structure, consistency, and accuracy. Study Approach: The survey was translated into Dutch and then back to English to ensure accuracy. The Dutch version was then tested to make sure it worked well for Dutch-speaking ...

Background and Goal: Identity discordance between patients and clinicians is associated with worse self-rated patient experience and less receipt of necessary care. Most prior studies have focused on racial discordance. However, whether these phenomena also apply to sexual and gender minority adults is currently unknown. This study evaluated how prevalent avoidance due to patient-clinician identity discordance is and its potential association with health care discrimination among sexual and gender minority ...

Background and Goal: Longitudinal continuity of care is the repeated contact between an individual and the same general practitioner (GP). This type of continuity of care is widely regarded as a cornerstone of primary care. Higher levels of longitudinal continuity of care are associated with better health outcomes, greater patient satisfaction, and more cost-effective use of health care resources. This study aimed to describe more recent variations between practices in the slopes of longitudinal continuity of care levels across the COVID-19 pandemic. The study also set out to determine if practice-related ...

Original Research Structural Racism and Inconsistent Hospital Policies Result in Health Care Professionals Disproportionately Testing Black Newborns for Prenatal Drug Exposure  Background and Goal: Black birthing parents and their newborns disproportionately experience newborn drug testing for prenatal substance exposure by health care professionals. This practice contributes to Child Protective Services reporting, family separation, and termination of parental rights. This qualitative study, conducted at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, MI, explored knowledge, attitudes, and experiences ...

Integrating driving support into a primary care setting can address a leading cause of family stress as well as teen adolescent morbidity and mortality.  Motor vehicle crashes are a leading cause of death for adolescents, and a leading cause of crashes is driver error. To address this, researchers at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania implemented a 15-minute self-administered virtual driving assessment test in 19 primary care practices.  3,037 adolescents 15 years and older completed the virtual driving ...

One-third of diabetic adults in the U.S. do not receive annual eye exams. Additionally, lack of pupillary dilation before exams is associated with ungradable, or insufficient exams. In September 2022, the OhioHealth Grant Medical Center Family Medicine practice implemented on-site diabetic retinopathy screening using digital fundus photography and automated retinal imaging without dilation. The practice later introduced eye dilation for specific patients. By identifying patients needing screening before appointments and using electronic health record reminders, the clinic increased the rate of interpretable exams from 20% in November 2022 to 35% in May 2023. That same month, the ...

Background and Goal: Black birthing parents and their newborns disproportionately experience newborn drug testing for prenatal substance exposure by health care professionals. This practice contributes to Child Protective Services reporting, family separation, and termination of parental rights. This qualitative study, conducted at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, MI, explored knowledge, attitudes, and experiences of health care professionals and Child Protective Services professionals regarding the influence of structural ...

Background and Goal:  This study marks the 50th anniversary of the North American Primary Care Research Group (NAPCRG)—the premiere primary care research organization, particularly in family medicine—by examining social connections among members. Study Approach: Researchers used social network analysis to characterize individual members and the relational structure among NAPCRG community members. The study invited 5,905 current and past NAPCRG members and participants. The survey, based on the validated Program to Analyze, Record, and Track Networks to Enhance Relationships ...

Experts in fire ecology will converge at the Ecological Society of America’s upcoming Annual Meeting in Long Beach, Calif., Aug. 4–9, presenting the latest research on the causes and consequences of wildland fire in dozens of talks and posters. The growing threat of wildfire makes understanding the past, present and future of fire regimes essential. Fire ecology addresses crucial questions such as how different species and ecosystems respond to burns, which habitats are most vulnerable and how forests recover—or fail to recover—after ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A newly enhanced database is expected to help wildfire managers and scientists better predict where and when wildfires may occur by incorporating hundreds of additional factors that impact the ignition and spread of fire. “There is a tremendous amount of interest in what enables wildfire ignitions and what can be done to prevent them,” said Erica Fleishman, an Oregon State University professor. “This database increases the ability to access relevant information and contribute to wildfire ...

HERSHEY, Pa. — A team of researchers from Penn State College of Medicine found a new target for treating diseases associated with human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 (HTLV-1).  They determined that blocking a class of enzymes called kinases, which regulates cellular functions, leads to cell death caused by the degradation of Tax, a protein essential for viral gene expression, viral transmission and survival of cells infected by HTLV-1. The team published the findings in Nature Communications. HTLV-1 is a retrovirus — a type of virus that hijacks a cell by inserting ...

Researchers have found a link between some of the largest and smallest objects in the cosmos: supermassive black holes and dark matter particles. Their new calculations reveal that pairs of supermassive black holes (SMBHs) can merge into a single larger black hole because of previously overlooked behaviour of dark matter particles, proposing a solution to the longstanding “final parsec problem” in astronomy. The research is described in Self-interacting dark matter solves the final parsec problem of supermassive black hole mergers published this month in the journal Physical Review Letters.  In ...

A migraine is not just a bad headache. It is a much-dreaded part of a neurologic disorder that has an array of possible symptoms, including pulsating cranial pain, waves of queasiness, bouts of vomiting, and hypersensitivity to light and sound. They frequently materialize unannounced and at the most inopportune of moments. Pubescent girls with a family history of migraine headaches are especially vulnerable — yet there remain many unknowns regarding the who, when and why of the disorder. Hadas Nahman-Averbuch, PhD, a scientist at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis with expertise ...

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) — The field of science aims to be objective, repeatable and justified in its choices and methods. These principles are what distinguish accepted scientific findings from pseudo-science. Yet the experience of learning and working in the field of science, including graduate school activities and scientific conferences, might not always follow the same principles. These practices and gatherings of scientists may be just as organic and random as evolution. Have the traditions of science — rituals of poster presentations and tenure positions — evolved by chance? ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Brown University biologists who set out to better understand the effects of climate change on plant species in tropical mountain regions found that even small variations in temperature and moisture can have massive impacts, threatening not only plants that live there, but also the ecosystems they support. Emily Hollenbeck, who conducted the research while earning her Ph.D. in ecology and evolutionary biology from Brown, made the discoveries through a series of laborious yet informative experiments conducted in the Monteverde mountain ...

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Changing standard procedures for evaluating and treating patients with suspected stroke has led to improved access to lifesaving stroke surgery across the state of Delaware and should inform triage and treatment nationwide, according to research released today at the Society of NeuroInterventional Surgery’s (SNIS) 21st Annual Meeting.   In “Direct From the Field Bypass to CSC Improves Timeliness and Likelihood of Thrombectomy for Patients with Emergent Large Vessel Occlusion,” the members of the Delaware Stroke System worked with the state’s emergency medical services (EMS) director ...

EMBARGOED: NOT FOR RELEASE UNTIL 8PM UK TIME (3PM EASTERN TIME) ON 22 JULY 2024 Development of ‘living robots’ needs regulation and public debate Bio-hybrid robotics creates unique ethical challenges, say researchers Researchers are calling for regulation to guide the responsible and ethical development of bio-hybrid robotics – a ground-breaking science which fuses artificial components with living tissue and cells. In a paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences a multidisciplinary ...

Research led by Curtin University reveals that Earth’s largest iron ore deposits – in the Hamersley Province of Western Australia – are about one billion years younger than previously believed, a discovery which could greatly boost the search for more of the resource. Using a new geochronology technique to accurately measure the age of iron oxide minerals, researchers found the Hamersley deposits formed between 1.4 and 1.1 billion years ago, rather than 2.2 billion years ago as previously estimated. Lead author Dr Liam Courtney-Davies, who was a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Curtin University’s John de Laeter ...