Interleukin-18 promoter gene polymorphisms may be associated with ischemic stroke pathogenesis, and the –607C allele increases ischemic stroke risk in the Han Chinese population. The frequency distribution of genetic polymorphisms varies among different populations, races, and living environments. A recent study by Haiping Wang and colleagues from Qingdao University Medical College demonstrates that the –13T/C (rs11024595) polymorphism, in the 5′-flanking region of the serum amyloid A gene, shows no correlation with ischemic cerebrovascular disease. However, the C ...

Previous studies have demonstrated that ethanol influences the secretion of neurotrophins, promotes oxidative stress, reduces the absorption of nutritive substances, and thereby induces neuronal damage. Numerous recent in vitro and in vivo studies provide evidence showing that ethanol can directly induce apoptotic cell death of the neurons. Chronic alcohol use is accompanied by volume reductions of gray and white matter, microstructural disruption of various white matter tracts, and enlargement of cerebral ventricles and sulci, thereby causing brain dysfunctions, such as ...

The actual standing of speakers within a society's power structure determines how their statements are perceived. This is the conclusion reached in a joint study undertaken by neurolinguist Professor Ina Bornkessel-Schlesewsky of the University of Marburg and linguist Professor Matthias Schlesewsky of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) with the support of Sylvia Krauspsenhaar, who participated in the study as a member of the Neurotypology research group at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig. The results were recently published ...

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is a cancer of the blood and bone marrow that most often affects older adults. CLL responds to bone marrow stem cell transplantation (allo-HSCT); however, the rate of relapse for CLL remains relatively high. A benefit of allo-HSCT is that treatment can result in the development of an anti-tumor response produced by the grafted cells and is associated with a low risk of cancer relapse. In this issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Catherine Wu and colleagues at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston report the results of ...

VIDEO: This is a demonstration of the system, setup, and first question. Top left: system as viewed from the outside, the user watches a computer screen, which is visible at the... Click here for more information. Patients who are otherwise completely unable to communicate can answer yes or no questions within seconds with the help of a simple system—consisting of just a laptop and camera—that measures nothing but the size of their pupils. The tool, described and demonstrated ...

Chronic harvesting of a tropical tree that many local communities in Western Africa depend on can alter the tree's reproduction and drastically curtail fruit and seed yields over the tree's lifetime, according to a new study. The study, which appears today in the Journal of Ecology, is the first of its kind to use what's called "age-from-stage" mathematical modeling, a way of estimating plant age from its size, to investigate how harvesting affects a plant's life expectancy and other life history traits, such as age at maturity. In this case, the tree Khaya senegalensis, ...

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Researchers at Mayo Clinic in Florida have revealed the process by which chronic inflammation of the pancreas, pancreatitis, morphs into pancreatic cancer. They say their findings point to ways to identify pancreatitis patients at risk of pancreatic cancer and to potential drug therapies that might reverse the process. The study, published online today in The Journal of Cell Biology, maps how inflammation pushes acinar cells in the pancreas -- those that produce digestive enzymes -- to transform into duct-like cells. As these cells change, they can ...

White Americans who are obese are twice as likely as black Americans to have surgery to tackle the problem, a study has found. Bariatric surgery is now recognised as a successful treatment for preventing serious complications of obesity such as diabetes and high blood pressure. The new study is one of the first to look at whether people who need surgery most are actually receiving it. Researchers at the Medical University of South Carolina and Imperial College London studied rates of bariatric surgery in the US from 1999 to 2010. Twenty-two per cent of black women ...

FROSTBURG, MD (August 5, 2013)—Climate changes how species interact with one another—and not just today. Scientists are studying trends from fossil records to understand how climate change impacted the world in the ancient past and to identify ways to predict how things may change in the future, according to a new study published in the August 2 issue of Science. Climate change has occurred repeatedly throughout Earth's history, but the recent rate of global warming far exceeds that of any previous episode in the past 10,000 years or longer. Knowing how climate change ...

In a study carried out at the University of Eastern Finland, bone histomorphometry and infrared spectroscopy revealed abnormal bone properties in children with vertebral fractures and in children after solid organ transplantation. Bone compositional changes in children with vertebral fractures and after different types of organ transplantation have not been reported previously. Bone samples were investigated using bone histomorphometry, a microscopic method that provides information about bone metabolism and remodelling. In children with vertebral fractures, there were ...

The report, newly published in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, suggests that the link may be to do with certain biological effects of breastfeeding. For example, breastfeeding restores insulin tolerance which is significantly reduced during pregnancy, and Alzheimer's is characterised by insulin resistance in the brain. Although they used data gathered from a very small group of just 81 British women, the researchers observed a highly significant and consistent correlation between breastfeeding and Alzheimer's risk. They argue that this was so strong that any potential ...

Building structures by mixing lego bricks of two different sizes is child's play. However, studying polymers endowed with an alternating nanostructure made of heterogeneous blocks is anything but straightforward. Theoretical physicist Mark Matsen, based at the University of Reading, UK, studies polymer mixes consisting of two-fold (AB) and three-fold (BAB) combinations of two types of nanoscale blocks. He has shown, in a study published in EPJ E, that the underlying heterogeneity of the blocks can cause polymers to switch to different nanoscale patterns and therefore display ...

Online game companies need to be more socially responsible for over-addictive use of their products to avoid government intervention, according to a new study by Cardiff, Derby and Nottingham Trent universities. The study, in the journal Addiction Research and Theory, was led by Dr Shumaila Yousafzai of Cardiff Business School with psychologists Dr Zaheer Hussain and Professor Mark Griffiths from the University of Derby and Nottingham Trent University respectively. While conventional videogames have an ending, or may become boring and repetitive, Massively Multiplayer ...

Researchers from North Carolina State University and the University of Texas have revealed more about graphene's mechanical properties and demonstrated a technique to improve the stretchability of graphene – developments that should help engineers and designers come up with new technologies that make use of the material. Graphene is a promising material that is used in technologies such as transparent, flexible electrodes and nanocomposites. And while engineers think graphene holds promise for additional applications, they must first have a better understanding of its ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — A small new study suggests that pregnant smokers with low scores on a scale that rates emotional attachment to their fetuses may be inclined to smoke more than pregnant smokers who feel more attached to their future babies. "It would make sense psychologically that women who feel less attached to their fetus are going to smoke more, because they aren't necessarily thinking about the repercussions," said Dr. Susanna Magee, lead author of the study published online July 28 in the Maternal and Child Health Journal. Magee is an assistant ...

This news release is available in German and German. Quantum computation, quantum communication and quantum cryptography often require entanglement. For many of these upcoming quantum technologies, entanglement – this hard to grasp, counter-intuitive aspect in the quantum world – is a key ingredient. Therefore, experimental physicists often need to verify entanglement in their systems. "Two years ago, we managed to verify entanglement between up to 14 ions", explains Thomas Monz. He works in the group of Rainer Blatt at the Institute for Experimental Physics, ...

Amsterdam, NL, August 2, 2013 – Investigators have linked aluminum accumulation in the brain as a possible contributing factor to neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer's disease. A new study published in Restorative Neurology and Neuroscience sheds light on the mechanism underlying aluminum-induced neuronal cell death and identifies necrostatin-1 as a substance which counteracts several of aluminum's neurotoxic effects. Researchers have long focused on why neurons die in degenerative diseases. One process is apoptosis, a form of gene-directed programmed cell death ...

Neuropathic pain — pain that results from a malfunction in the nervous system — is a daily reality for millions of Americans. Unlike normal pain, it doesn't go away after the stimulus that provoked it ends, and it also behaves in a variety of other unusual and disturbing ways. Someone suffering from neuropathic pain might experience intense discomfort from a light touch, for example, or feel as though he or she were freezing in response to a slight change in temperature. A major part of the answer to the problem of neuropathic pain, scientists believe, is found in spinal ...

Researchers at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) have developed a way for photographers and microscopists to create a 3D image through a single lens, without moving the camera. Published in the journal Optics Letters, this improbable-sounding technology relies only on computation and mathematics—no unusual hardware or fancy lenses. The effect is the equivalent of seeing a stereo image with one eye closed. That's easier said than done, as principal investigator Kenneth B. Crozier, John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Natural Sciences, explains. "If ...

Chronic stress can lead to depression and anxiety in humans. Scientists working with Herwig Baier, Director at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology in Martinsried, recently discovered a very similar correlation in fish. Normally, the stress hormone cortisol helps fish, as in humans, to regulate stress. Fish that lack the receptor for cortisol as a result of a genetic mutation exhibited a consistently high level of stress. They were unable to become accustomed to a new and unfamiliar situation. The fishes' behaviour returned to normal when an antidepressant was added ...

Employment gaps may promote but also reduce cognitive function in older age, as new research from the University of Luxembourg has shown. In particular, some of the findings suggest that leaves reported as unemployment and sickness are associated with higher risk of cognitive impairment indicating that these kinds of employment gaps may decrease cognitive reserve in the long run. Strongest evidence was found for training and maternity spells being related to slower cognitive decline, suggesting beneficial associations of these kinds of leaves on cognitive function. In ...

LOS ANGELES – (August 5, 2013) – With some 300 million people around the world living with asthma, a study by Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center (LA BioMed) researchers that was released ahead-of- print found for the first time that maternal smoking can cause the third generation of offspring to suffer from the chronic lung disease. The study, published online by the American Journal of Physiology - Lung Cellular and Molecular Physiology, reported that maternal nicotine exposure during pregnancy is linked to asthma in the third generation ...

Whether you hope to lose weight or just stay healthy, what you eat is a crucial factor. The right nutrients can not only trim your waistline, but also provide energy, improve your mood, and stave off disease. Now a Tel Aviv University researcher has found that it's not just what you eat — but when. Metabolism is impacted by the body's circadian rhythm – the biological process that the body follows over a 24 hour cycle. So the time of day we eat can have a big impact on the way our bodies process food, says Prof. Daniela Jakubowicz of TAU's Sackler Faculty of Medicine ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – The strikingly high prevalence of Type 2 diabetes in the American South can be partially traced to rapid economic growth between 1950 and 1980, new research suggests. The study tests the "thrifty phenotype" hypothesis, which suggests that if economic conditions present during fetal development improve dramatically during a person's childhood, the prospects of poor health in adulthood increase. According to the hypothesis, children whose parents endured being poor were unprepared biologically to manage the riches of processed foods and the more sedentary ...

A team of scientists, led by Napoleone Ferrara, MD, has shown for the first time that a signaling protein involved in inflammation also promotes tumor resistance to anti-angiogenic therapy. The findings by Ferrara – professor of pathology at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and senior deputy director for basic science at the UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center – and colleagues at Genentech, a biotechnology firm based in South San Francisco, are published in the August 4 Advance Online Publication of the journal Nature Medicine. Angiogenesis is ...