A new study has found that the use of oral nutritional supplements provided to pediatric patients during hospitalization was associated with a decrease in length of stay of 14.8 percent and a decrease in hospital stay costs of $1,768 per patient. The study, conducted by leading researchers at the University of Southern California, The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, and Precision Health Economics, and supported by Abbott, is being presented this weekend at the 2013 North American Society for Pediatric Gastroenterology, ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. — Writing instruction in U.S. classrooms is "abysmal" and the Common Core State Standards don't go far enough to address glaring gaps for students and teachers, a Michigan State University education scholar argues. In a new study, Gary Troia calls for a fresh approach to professional development for teachers who must help students meet the new writing standards. His research, funded by the U.S. Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences, appears in the journal School Psychology Review. "We need to re-orient the way we think about teacher ...

Arnhem, 11 October 2013- A new study reveals that in the prediction of treatment outcome for castration-resistant prostate cancer, a change in circulating tumour cells detection might be more accurate than the change in prostate-specific antigen levels. The findings of this award-winning study were presented at the recent EAU 13th Central European Meeting in Prague. "The research of the circulating tumour cells (CTC) is of utmost importance, because nowadays there is no reliable marker of both cancer-specific or overall survival in castration-resistant prostate cancer ...

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- The number of patents issued for renewable-energy technologies has risen sharply over the last decade, according to new research from MIT and the Santa Fe Institute (SFI). The study shows that investments in research and development, as well as in the growth of markets for these products, have helped to spur this dramatic growth in innovation. "We were quite surprised," says Jessika Trancik, an assistant professor of engineering systems at MIT and a co-author of the new report, published in the journal PLoS ONE. Trancik -- working with Luís Bettencourt ...

A shrimp from America has been invading Europe's rivers and lakes for several decades, but something seems to be preventing this colonist from becoming numerous and problematic, like so many other invaders - such as the Californian grey squirrel and American crayfish. Could the resident European shrimps have something to do with this? Jaimie Dick and his colleagues mapped the occurrence of the interloper and found it only existed where native shrimps were absent or rare. When native shrimps were common, the American shrimp simply could not establish and it disappeared. ...

When predators lurk nearby, male Bahamas mosquitofish (Gambusia hubbsi) change mating strategies, rejecting elaborate courting rituals for more frequent and sometimes forceful encounters with females. But as a recent North Carolina State University study shows, mating strategies aren't the only things changing for G. hubbsi when predators abound. The shape and size of the male fish's genitalia are also linked to the presence or absence of predators. NC State Ph.D. student Justa Heinen-Kay and assistant professor of biological sciences R. Brian Langerhans show, in ...

VIDEO: A recent study by a University of Missouri researcher shows that resveratrol, a compound found in grape skins and red wine, can make certain tumor cells more susceptible to radiation... Click here for more information. COLUMBIA, Mo. — A recent study by a University of Missouri researcher shows that resveratrol, a compound found in grape skins and red wine, can make certain tumor cells more susceptible to radiation treatment. This research, which studied melanoma cells, ...

When a natural disaster strikes and too many people take to their mobile phones at once, cellular networks easily overload. But a University of British Columbia graduate student has developed a solution to ensure that calls don't get dropped and texts make it to their destination. In a study published in the journal IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, Mai Hassan, a PhD student in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, found a way to opportunistically use television and radio channels to transmit cellular signals when systems are pushed beyond ...

Irvine, Calif., Oct. 11, 2013 — U.S. and German scientists have decoded a key molecular gateway for the toxin that causes botulism, pointing the way to treatments that can keep the food-borne poison out of the bloodstream. Study leaders Rongsheng Jin, associate professor of physiology & biophysics at UC Irvine, and Andreas Rummel of the Institute for Toxicology at Germany's Hannover Medical School created a three-dimensional crystal model of a complex protein compound in the botulinum neurotoxin. This compound binds to the inner lining of the small intestine and allows ...

(SALT LAKE CITY)—University of Utah researchers have found that deficiency of an antioxidant response protein called nuclear erythroid-2 like factor-2 (Nrf2) delays or prevents hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a type of a heart failure in which the heart muscle grows abnormally thick. This new finding, published in the Oct. 1, 2013, issue of Cardiovascular Research, suggests that restoring the normal balance of reduction-oxidation chemical reactions in the body could prevent heart disease and other conditions caused by reductive stress. Nuclear erythroid-2 like factor-2 ...

US research reveals that 4 out of 5 college student drivers have used their cell phones to send or receive text messages while driving despite the majority recognizing that the activity represents a risk. Garold Lantz and Sandra Loeb of the McGowan School of Business, at King's College, in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania, found that male drivers are more likely to engage in texting while driving but consider themselves more proficient drivers than others and so less likely to endanger themselves or others while doing so. Analysis indicates 'texting impulsiveness' is positively ...

Washington, DC (October 10, 2013) — In the United States, Hispanics with kidney failure are less likely than non-Hispanic whites to receive a kidney transplant largely due to their blood type and because of where they live, according to a study appearing in an upcoming issue of the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (CJASN). The findings highlight the need to implement new deceased donor organ allocation policies that distribute organs over wider geographic areas to help reduce barriers to transplantation for Hispanics. Hispanics represent the ...

Washington, DC (October 10, 2013) — Among younger kidney transplant recipients, a disproportionate number of African Americans and individuals with less education receive organs that are of lower quality or are considered marginal, according to a study appearing in an upcoming issue of the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (CJASN). The findings suggest that there are racial and social disparities in the allocation of transplanted organs that need to be addressed. Older kidney disease patients who have a high risk of dying while on dialysis may benefit ...

Astrophysicists have found the first evidence of a water-rich rocky planetary body outside our solar system in its shattered remains orbiting a white dwarf. A new study by scientists at the Universities of Warwick and Cambridge published in the journal Science analysed the dust and debris surrounding the white dwarf star GD61 170 light years away. Using observations obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope and the large Keck telescope on Hawaii, they found an excess of oxygen – a chemical signature that indicates that the debris had once been part of a bigger body originally ...

Astronomers have found the shattered remains of an asteroid that contained huge amounts of water orbiting an exhausted star, or white dwarf. This suggests that the star GD 61 and its planetary system – located about 150 light years away and at the end of its life – had the potential to contain Earth-like exoplanets, they say. This is the first time that both water and a rocky surface - two "key ingredients" for habitable planets - have been found together beyond our solar system. Earth is essentially a 'dry' planet, with only 0.02% of its mass as surface water, so oceans ...

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have identified 13 metabolites – small molecules produced by cellular metabolism – that are significantly different in patients with diabetes and chronic kidney disease compared to healthy controls. Twelve of the 13 metabolites are linked to mitochondrial function, suggesting that suppression of mitochondria – the powerhouses of cells – is a fundamental characteristic of diabetic kidney disease. The findings are published in the November edition of the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. "This ...

RIVERSIDE, Calif. — Scientists have a promising new approach to combating deadly human viruses thanks to an educated hunch by University of California, Riverside microbiology professor Shou-Wei Ding, and his 20 years of research on plants, fruit flies, nematodes and mice to prove his theory true. Researchers led by Ding, who heads a lab in UC Riverside's Institute for Integrative Genome Biology, have discovered that, like plants and invertebrate animals, mammals use the RNA interference (RNAi) process to destroy viruses within their own cells. Their findings will be ...

Ancient DNA recovered from a time series of skeletons in Germany spanning 4,000 years of prehistory has been used to reconstruct the first detailed genetic history of modern-day Europeans. The study, published today in Science, reveals dramatic population changes with waves of prehistoric migration, not only from the accepted path via the Near East, but also from Western and Eastern Europe. The research was a collaboration between the Australian Centre for Ancient DNA (ACAD), at the University of Adelaide, researchers from the University of Mainz, the State Heritage ...

Jülich, 10 October 2013 – The human brain keeps changing throughout a person's lifetime. New connections are continually created while synapses that are no longer in use degenerate. To date, little is known about the mechanisms behind these processes. Jülich neuroinformatician Dr. Markus Butz has now been able to ascribe the formation of new neural networks in the visual cortex to a simple homeostatic rule that is also the basis of many other self-regulating processes in nature. With this explanation, he and his colleague Dr. Arjen van Ooyen from Amsterdam also provide ...

Scientists in Norwich and China have, for the first time, uncovered exactly how an immune receptor mediating plants' natural immunity to bacteria works. The research has important implications for developing broad-spectrum disease resistance in crops. UK researchers at The Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich, in a close collaboration with Chinese scientists at Tsinghua University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing have shared their findings in a paper published this week in Science. TSL senior scientist Prof. Cyril Zipfel said: "Plants, like humans, have an ...

(Boston) -- Researchers from Boston University Schools of Medicine (BUSM) and Public Health (BUSPH) and Boston Medical Center (BMC) have found that high-risk travelers account for nearly 20 percent of patients using the five clinics of the Boston Area Travel Medicine Network (BATMN). The study, which appears online in Mayo Clinic Proceedings, also found that these travelers often visited destinations with malaria and typhoid risk. In 2010, an estimated 935 million travelers crossed international borders, including 28.5 million from the U.S. Certain travelers are at greater ...

The iron in the Earth's inner core weakens dramatically before it melts, explaining the unusual properties that exist in the moon-sized solid centre of our planet that have, up until now, been difficult to understand. Scientists use seismic waves - pulses of energy generated during earthquakes - to measure what is happening in the Earth's inner core, which at 6000 km beneath our feet is completely inaccessible. Problematically for researchers, the results of seismic measurements consistently show that these waves move through the Earth's solid inner core at much slower ...

What's in a kiss? A study by Oxford University researchers suggests kissing helps us size up potential partners and, once in a relationship, may be a way of getting a partner to stick around. 'Kissing in human sexual relationships is incredibly prevalent in various forms across just about every society and culture,' says Rafael Wlodarski, the DPhil student who carried out the research in the Department of Experimental Psychology at Oxford University. 'Kissing is seen in our closest primate relatives, chimps and bonobos, but it is much less intense and less commonly used. ...

Boston, Mass., October 10, 2013 – A research team from Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Cancer and Blood Disorders Center and other institutions has discovered a new genetic target for potential therapy of sickle cell disease (SCD). The target, called an enhancer, controls a molecular switch in red blood cells called BCL11A that, in turn, regulates hemoglobin production. The researchers—led by Daniel Bauer, MD, PhD, and Stuart Orkin, MD, of Dana-Farber/Boston Children's—reported their findings today in Science. Prior work by Orkin and others has shown that when flipped ...

Hunter-gatherers and immigrant farmers lived side-by-side for more than 2,000 years in Central Europe, before the hunter-gatherer communities died out or were absorbed into the farming population. In a paper published today in Science, researchers describe their analysis of DNA and isotopes from human bones found in the 'Blätterhöhle' cave near Hagen in Germany, where both hunter-gatherers and farmers were buried. The team, led by anthropologist Professor Joachim Burger of the Johannes Gutenberg University, Germany, used stable isotopes to determine their diet, DNA ...