WASHINGTON, DC—Earth's most eminent emissary to Mars has just proven that those rare Martian visitors that sometimes drop in on Earth — a.k.a. Martian meteorites — really are from the Red Planet. A key new measurement of Mars' atmosphere by NASA's Curiosity rover provides the most definitive evidence yet of the origins of Mars meteorites while at the same time providing a way to rule out Martian origins of other meteorites. The new measurement is a high-precision count of two forms of argon gas—Argon-36 and Argon-38–accomplished by the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument ...

This news release is available in French. Montreal, 16 October 2013 — If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands! That's easy enough for children to figure out because the emotion matches the movement. But when feelings and reactions don't align, can kids tell there's something wrong? New research from Concordia University proves that they can — as early as 18 months. In a study recently published in Infancy: The Official Journal of the International Society on Infant Studies, psychology researchers Sabrina Chiarella and Diane Poulin-Dubois demonstrate that ...

PITTSBURGH, Oct. 16, 2013 – Nearly nine out of 10 nursing home physicians said that using their mobile devices to look up prescription drug information prevented at least one adverse drug event in the previous month, according to a University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine Department of Biomedical Informatics study published last week in the Journal of the American Medical Directors Association. Adverse drug events are associated with an estimated 93,000 deaths and $4 billion in excess health care costs in nursing homes each year, said lead investigator Steven M. Handler, ...

VIDEO: This video shows the extent to which the land acted as a source of carbon in the atmosphere (brown areas), or a carbon "sink " (green areas) that absorbed carbon from... Click here for more information. Enhanced growth of Earth's leafy greens during the 20th century has significantly slowed the planet's transition to being red-hot, according to the first study to specify the extent to which plants have prevented climate change since pre-industrial times. Researchers ...

Cambridge, Mass. – October 16, 2013 – It's easy to spot a "bad" data visualization—one packed with too much text, excessive ornamentation, gaudy colors, and clip art. Design guru Edward Tufte derided such decorations as redundant at best, useless at worst, labeling them "chart junk." Yet a debate still rages among visualization experts: Can these reviled extra elements serve a purpose? Taking a scientific approach to design, researchers from Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology are offering a new take on that debate. The same design elements that ...

Philadelphia, Pa. (October 16, 2013) – The upcoming expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) won't lead physicians to reduce the number of new Medicaid patients they accept, suggests a study in the November issue of Medical Care, published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health. However, doctors may be less likely to accept those patients who remain uninsured, according to an analysis of historical data by Lindsay M. Sabik, PhD, and Sabina Ohri Gandhi, PhD, of Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond. They write, "Our results ...

As we learn and develop, our neurons change. They make new pathways and connections as our brain processes new information. In order to do this, individual neurons use an internal gauge to maintain a delicate balance that keeps our brains from becoming too excitable. Scientists have long theorized a larger internal system monitors these individual gauges, like a neural thermostat, regulating average firing rates across the whole brain. Without this thermostat, they reasoned, our flexible neurons would fire out of control, making bad connections or none at all. The result ...

Oct. 16, 2013—Researchers at the University of Maryland and Columbia University have developed a new soil testing kit designed to help farmers in third world countries. On-the-spot soil testing could have major impact in improving crop yields due to poor soils. The kit contains battery-operated instruments and safe materials for agricultural extension agents to handle in the field. They can test for the availability of nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur, and potassium, as well as active organic matter, and certain soil physical limitations. The raw results of the tests are sent ...

MADISON – When it comes to economic growth and environmental impacts, it can seem like Newton's third law of motion is the rule — for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction — and that in most cases, the economy prospers and the environment suffers. A team of UW-Madison researchers is hoping to help change that narrative and add a little ecology to economic decision making by forecasting how future policies regarding urban development and agricultural cultivation may impact aquatic ecosystems, which harbor astounding amounts of biodiversity and provide ...

A Johns Hopkins-led analysis of data previously gathered on more than 3,000 elderly Americans strongly suggests that taking certain blood pressure medications to control blood pressure may reduce the risk of dementia due to Alzheimer's disease (AD). In a report published in a recent edition of the journal Neurology, a team of researchers found that people over the age of 75 with normal cognition who used diuretics, angiotensin-1 receptor blockers (ARBs) and angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors showed a reduced risk of AD dementia by at least 50 percent. In addition, ...

TORONTO, Oct. 16, 2013--Babies born to teen mothers have less developed speaking skills at age five than children of older mothers, a new study has found. "We don't believe that having a baby in your teens is the cause of underdeveloped speaking skills," said Dr. Julia Morinis, the lead author and researcher in the Centre for Research on Inner City Health of St. Michael's Hospital. "It's likely that being a teen mother is a risk factor that indicates poorer circumstance for development opportunities in some cases." Dr. Morinis points to teen mothers' limited opportunities ...

Cincinnati, OH, October 17, 2013 -- Medical technology has improved the survival rates of premature infants, but adverse developmental outcomes are a continuing problem. Researchers have turned their attention to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), where premature infants spend their first few weeks or months, for potential answers. In a new study scheduled for publication in The Journal of Pediatrics, researchers studied the relationship between different room types in the NICU and the developmental outcomes of the children at 2 years of age. Research has suggested ...

Treating premature infants with probiotics, the dietary supplements containing live bacteria that many adults take to help maintain their natural intestinal balance, may be effective for preventing a common and life-threatening bowel disease among premature infants, researchers at UC Davis Children's Hospital have found. The study, "A comparison of two probiotic strains of bifidobacteria in premature infants," recently was published online in the Journal of Pediatrics. The bowel disease, necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), is the second most common cause of death among ...

Modest increases in marketing and outreach to local communities can increase the amount of physical activity that occurs in parks, providing a cost-effective way to potentially improve a community's health, according to a new RAND Corporation study. The project, which examined 50 parks across Los Angeles, found that simple interventions such as increased signage boosted physical activity by 7 to 12 percent over the study period in relation to parks that did not make changes. The findings are published online by the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. "The study ...

[EMARGOED UNTIL THURSDAY, OCT. 17] A new study suggests a growing number of U.S. adolescents lack antibodies that may help protect them later in life against an increasingly important cause of genital herpes. Published in The Journal of Infectious Diseases and available online, the findings show that fewer of today's teens have been exposed in their childhood to herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1), a common cause of cold sores, than U.S. adolescents in previous years. Without these antibodies, today's teens may be more susceptible—when they become sexually active—to genital ...

Montreal − You know the saying: an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. When it comes to cardiac rehabilitation, a study presented today at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress has the numbers to prove it. "We found that cardiac rehabilitation programs have a financial 'return on investment' of about seven per cent," says author Dr. Dennis Humen, a professor of medicine at Western University. "Not only is cardiac rehab the pillar of preventing a second cardiac event; it also makes good business sense." The study also revealed that, for patients, the 'return ...

Montreal − What leads to high cholesterol? Your genes and lifestyle factors may not explain it all. A study presented today at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress has connected some of the risk for high cholesterol in adults to their mother's cholesterol levels before she even became pregnant. The key finding: if a mother had high LDL ("bad") cholesterol prior to a pregnancy, her children are almost five times as likely to also have high LDL cholesterol as adults. "Maternal health and exposures in the womb may be important in modifying cardiovascular disease ...

Montreal − A team of researchers from Montreal has found that stroke patients living with Locked-In Syndrome (LIS) who cannot move, swallow or even breathe on their own, can regain a remarkable level of independence with technological help. The team's findings, to be presented at the Canadian Stroke Congress, stem from a 20-year study that followed the rehabilitation of 25 LIS patients, people who are aware and awake but cannot move or communicate verbally due to complete paralysis of nearly all voluntary muscles. "These patients can achieve a remarkable level ...

CHICAGO --- Doctors who make a lot of eye contact are viewed as more likable and empathetic by patients, according to a new Northwestern Medicine® study. Patients also gave doctors higher empathy scores when their total visit length was longer and when doctors engaged in a few "social touches" such as a handshake or pat on the back. However, more than three social touches in one visit decreased empathy scores. The researchers said it's possible that too many social touches from a doctor may seem forced and not genuine to a patient. The study, published in the Journal ...

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– The human mind is not only capable of cognition and registering experiences but also of being introspectively aware of these processes. Until now, scientists have not known if such introspection was a single skill or dependent on the object of reflection. Also unclear was whether the brain housed a single system for reflecting on experience or required multiple systems to support different types of introspection. A new study by UC Santa Barbara graduate student Benjamin Baird and colleagues suggest that the ability to accurately reflect on perceptual ...

LOS ANGELES (Oct. 15, 2013) – For the first time, a simple blood test may be the best way to determine if a patient is suffering from Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), or another serious condition such as Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD,) according to Cedars-Sinai physician researcher Mark Pimentel, MD, lead author of a multicenter clinical trial. Researchers conclusively identified a test for antibodies that form against a particular protein, vinculin, found in the guts of patients, many of whom suffered acute gastroenteritis at some point. "This is a major breakthrough. ...

Researchers have discovered how the most common genetic abnormality in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal dementia (FTD) kills neurons and have successfully developed a therapeutic strategy to block this neurodegeneration in neurons made from the skin cells of ALS patients. The findings, which are published online in the October 16th issue of the Cell Press journal Neuron, have important implications for treating patients with these debilitating, currently incurable neurodegenerative diseases. The most common genetic mutation in ALS and FTD is an abnormal ...

DURHAM, N.C. – Though worlds apart, four unrelated families have been united in a medical mystery over the source of a rare inherited disorder that results in their children being born with abnormal brain growth and severe functional impairments. An international team of scientists, led by genetic researchers at Duke Medicine, has solved the case by identifying a recessive gene mutation that reduces the abundance of a certain protein that previously had not been known to affect brain development. The gene mutation causes a defect in the body's synthesis of a nutrient ...

Johns Hopkins scientists have developed new drugs that — at least in a laboratory dish — appear to halt the brain-destroying impact of a genetic mutation at work in some forms of two incurable diseases, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and dementia. They made the finding by using neurons they created from stem cells known as induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells), which are derived from the skin of people with ALS who have a gene mutation that interferes with the process of making proteins needed for normal neuron function. "Efforts to treat neurodegenerative ...

Researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center have discovered a new mechanism by which the deadly Staphylococcus aureus bacteria attack and kill off immune cells. Their findings, published today in the journal Cell Host & Microbe, explain a critical survival tactic of a pathogen that causes more skin and heart infections than any other microbe, and kills more than 100,000 Americans every year. "What we've found is that Staph unleashes a multi-purpose toxin capable of killing different types of immune cells by selectively binding to surface receptors," says Victor J. Torres, ...