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Science3 Jul 2013

Coronal mass ejection headed toward Mercury and Venus

On July 1, 2013, at 6:09 p.m. EDT, the sun erupted with a coronal mass ejection, or CME, a solar phenomenon that can send billions of tons of solar particles into space that can affect electronic systems in satellites. Experimental NASA research models based on NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory show that the CME was not Earth-directed and it left the sun at around 570 miles per second. The CME may, however, pass by NASA's Messenger, Spitzer and STEREO-B satellites, and their mission operators have been notified. There is only very slight particle radiation ...

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Social Science3 Jul 2013

AGI's latest Geoscience Currents examines the community college to university pathway in Texas

Alexandria, VA – Community colleges provide a strong foundation for the nation's graduating STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics) workforce. In its latest Geoscience Currents, the American Geosciences Institute documents the flow of geoscience students from 2–year to 4-year institutions in Texas, adding to an earlier report on similar data from California released in 2012. In 2012, 70 percent of geoscience students in Texas public universities had transferred from Community Colleges. In particular, Texas A&M University admitted students from 32 community ...

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Space3 Jul 2013

Comet ISON brings holiday fireworks

This July Fourth the solar system is showing off some fireworks of its own. Superficially resembling a skyrocket, comet ISON is hurtling toward the sun presently at a whopping 48,000 mph. Its swift motion is captured in this time-lapse movie made from a sequence of pictures taken May 8, 2013, by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. At the time the images were taken, the comet was 403 million miles from Earth, between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The movie shows a sequence of Hubble observations taken over a 43-minute span and compresses this into just five seconds. The ...

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Physics3 Jul 2013

OU physicists develop rationale for the next-generation particle collider

A University of Oklahoma-developed theory provides the rationale for the next-generation particle accelerator—the International Linear Collider. The discovery of the Higgs boson at the CERN Large Hadron Collider in Geneva Switzerland this past year prompted particle physicists to look ahead to the development of the ILC, an electron-positron collider designed to measure in detail all the properties of the newly discovered Higgs particle. Howard Baer, professor in the OU Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and Astronomy, was one of the lead authors of the five-volume ...

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Social Science3 Jul 2013

Higher education may be protective against MS-associated cognitive deficits

Amsterdam, NL, July 2, 2013 – Multiple sclerosis (MS) can lead to severe cognitive impairment as the disease progresses. Researchers in Italy have found that patients with high educational levels show less impairment on a neuropsychological evaluation compared with those with low educational levels. Their results are published in Restorative Neurology and Neuroscience. MS is a progressive immunologic brain disorder with neuropsychological deficits including selective attention, working memory, executive functioning, information processing speed, and long term memory. ...

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Medicine3 Jul 2013

Moms often talk to children about the results of cancer genetic testing

WASHINGTON — Mothers commonly talk to their children about genetic test results even if they test positive for a BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene mutation, which sharply increases a woman's risk of developing breast and ovarian cancer. That is among the findings of a new study from Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, which also suggests mothers who don't discuss their test results are unsatisfied with that decision. "We know from women we've counseled at Georgetown that one of their main considerations of genetic testing for cancer risk is what the results will mean for ...

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Science3 Jul 2013

New knowledge about early galaxies

The early galaxies of the universe were very different from today's galaxies. Using new detailed studies carried out with the ESO Very Large Telescope and the Hubble Space Telescope, researchers, including members from the Niels Bohr Institute, have studied an early galaxy in unprecedented detail and determined a number of important properties such as size, mass, content of elements and have determined how quickly the galaxy forms new stars. The results are published in the scientific journal, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. "Galaxies are deeply fascinating ...

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Energy3 Jul 2013

New Catalyst replaceable platinum for electric-automobiles

Ulsan, S. Korea, July 2, 2013 – Korean researchers from Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST), S. Korea, developed a novel bio-inspired composite electrocatalyst outperforming platinum. This research work was published on June 25, in the journal Nature Communications. (Title: Promotion of Oxygen reduction by a bio-inspired tethered iron phthalocyanine carbon nanotube-based catalyst). The research team from UNIST, S. Korea, developed an inexpensive and scalable bio-inspired composite electrocatalyst, iron phthalocyanine with an axial ligand anchored ...

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Medicine3 Jul 2013

Older women who quit smoking can cut heart disease risk regardless of diabetes status

Postmenopausal women who quit smoking reduced their risk of heart disease, regardless of whether they had diabetes, according to a new study conducted by Juhua Luo, an epidemiologist at the Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington. Her findings, "Smoking Cessation, Weight Change and Coronary Heart Disease Among Postmenopausal Women With and Without Diabetes," were published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Women who gained more than 5 kilograms or 11 pounds after they quit smoking still saw their risk for cardiovascular disease ...

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Medicine3 Jul 2013

Single men, smokers at higher risk for oral human papillomavirus infection, Moffitt study shows

Smokers and single men are more likely to acquire cancer-causing oral human papillomavirus (HPV), according to new results from the HPV Infection in Men (HIM) Study. Researchers from Moffitt Cancer Center, the National Cancer Institute, Mexico and Brazil also report that newly acquired oral HPV infections in healthy men are rare and when present, usually resolve within one year. The study results appeared in the July issue of The Lancet. HPV infection is known to cause virtually all cervical cancers, most anal cancers and some genital cancers. It has recently been established ...

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Science2 Jul 2013

Insecticide causes changes in honeybee genes, research finds

New research by academics at The University of Nottingham has shown that exposure to a neonicotinoid insecticide causes changes to the genes of the honeybee. The study, published in the scientific journal PLOS ONE, supports the recent decision taken by the European Commission to temporarily ban three neonicotinoids amid concerns that they could be linked to bee deaths. There is growing evidence connecting the decline in the honeybee population that pollinates one-third of the food that we eat, and insecticides, but this is the first comprehensive study to look at changes ...

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Science2 Jul 2013

Scientists help explain visual system's remarkable ability to recognize complex objects

LA JOLLA, CA--How is it possible for a human eye to figure out letters that are twisted and looped in crazy directions, like those in the little security test internet users are often given on websites? It seems easy to us--the human brain just does it. But the apparent simplicity of this task is an illusion. The task is actually so complex, no one has been able to write computer code that translates these distorted letters the same way that neural networks can. That's why this test, called a CAPTCHA, is used to distinguish a human response from computer bots that try ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

Listening to blood cells: Simple test could use sound waves for diagnosing blood-related diseases

New research reveals that when red blood cells are hit with laser light, they produce high frequency sound waves that contain a great deal of information. Similar to the way one can hear the voices of different people and identify who they are, investigators reporting in the July 2 issue of Biophysical Journal, published by Cell Press, could analyze the sound waves produced by red blood cells and recognize their shape and size. The information may aid in the development of simple tests for blood-related diseases. "We plan to make specialized devices that will allow the ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

Mental disorders in 13.5 percent of Canadian Forces personnel deployed to Afghanistan

An important minority — 13.5% — of Canadian Forces personnel who served in support of the Afghanistan mission in 2001–08 have been found to have a mental health disorder related to their deployment, according to a study published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). Since 2001, more than 40 000 Canadian Forces personnel have been deployed in support of the Afghanistan mission. Although studies from other countries have shown mental health problems in personnel returning from missions in Southwest Asia, there are important differences between nations in areas ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

Non-invasive brain stimulation helps stroke patients gain prolonged language recovery

VIDEO: The article as it appears in JoVE. Click here for more information. On July 2nd, JoVE will publish a video article showing the details of a technique developed by researchers to improve language function in stroke patients with chronic speech-language impairment. Strokes occur when a brain clot blocks blood flow in parts of the brain, essentially starving groups of neurons of oxygen, which is necessary for normal function. Nearly 130,000 of the 795,000 strokes ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

Breakthrough: Sensors monitor cells at work

Stanford, CA—Transport proteins are responsible for moving materials such as nutrients and metabolic products through a cell's outer membrane, which seals and protects all living cells, to the cell's interior. These transported molecules include sugars, which can be used to fuel growth or to respond to chemical signals of activity or stress outside of the cell. Measuring the activity of transporter proteins in a living organism has been a challenge for scientists, because the methods are difficult, often require the use of radioactive tracers, and are difficult to use in ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

Drug improves cognitive function in mouse model of Down syndrome, Stanford study says

STANFORD, Calif. —An existing FDA-approved drug improves cognitive function in a mouse model of Down syndrome, according to a new study by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine. The drug, an asthma medication called formoterol, strengthened nerve connections in the hippocampus, a brain center used for spatial navigation, paying attention and forming new memories, the study said. It also improved contextual learning, in which the brain integrates spatial and sensory information. Both hippocampal function and contextual learning, which are impaired ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

Brown fat responsible for from heart disease-related deaths in winter

More people die from heart-disease during the winter months, and according to a new study published in the journal Cell Metabolism, the increase in mortality is possibly due to the accelerated growth of atherosclerotic plaque in the blood vessels caused by the activation of brown fat by the cold. It has long been known that the number of deaths from cardiovascular diseases increases during the winter. It has been speculated that this might be the result of over-exertion while shovelling snow and a general decrease in physical activity, although the underlying mechanisms ...

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Space2 Jul 2013

Cluster spacecraft detects elusive space wind

VIDEO: This animation shows the Earth's plasmasphere -- the innermost part of our planet's magnetosphere -- and the plasmaspheric wind, an outward flow of charged particles. The doughnut-shaped plasmasphere is centred... Click here for more information. A new study provides the first conclusive proof of the existence of a space wind first proposed theoretically over 20 years ago. By analysing data from the European Space Agency's Cluster spacecraft, researcher Iannis Dandouras ...

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Physics2 Jul 2013

Solving electron transfer

Electron transfer is a process by which an atom donates an electron to another atom. It is the foundation of all chemical reactions, and is of intense research because of the implications it has for chemistry and biology. When two molecules interact, electron transfer takes place in a few quadrillionths (10-15¬) of a second, or femtoseconds (fsec), meaning that studying this event requires very time-sensitive techniques like ultrafast spectroscopy. However, the transfer itself is often influenced by the solution in which the molecules are studied (e.g. water), and this ...

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Science2 Jul 2013

Irreversible tissue loss seen within 40 days of spinal cord injury

A spinal cord injury changes the functional state and structure of the spinal cord and the brain. For example, the patients' ability to walk or move their hands can become restricted. How quickly such degenerative changes develop, however, has remained a mystery until now. The assumption was that it took years for patients with a spinal cord injury to also display anatomical changes in the spinal cord and brain above the injury site. For the first time, researchers from the University of Zurich and the Uniklinik Balgrist, along with English colleagues from University College ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

A potentially life-saving protein takes shape

COLLEGE PARK, MD - A tiny protein called ubiquitin – so named because it is present in every cell of living things as dissimilar as hollyhocks and humans - may hold the key to treatment for a variety of diseases from Parkinson's to diabetes. The protein, found in all eukaryotes (organisms with membranous cells), was considered unimportant when it was described in 1975. But scientists now know ubiquitin takes many different forms and is important in basic cellular processes, from controlling cells' circadian clocks to clearing away the harmful build-up of cells found in ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

UNC researchers discover a gene's key role in building the developing brain's scaffolding

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- Researchers have pinpointed the role of a gene known as Arl13b in guiding the formation and proper placement of neurons in the early stages of brain development. Mutations in the gene could help explain brain malformations often seen in neurodevelopmental disorders. The research, led by a team at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, was published June 30 in the journal Nature Neuroscience. "We wanted to get a better sense of how the cerebral cortex is constructed," said senior study author Eva Anton, PhD, a professor in the Department ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

Gene therapy cures a severe paediatric neurodegenerative disease in animal models

Sanfilippo Syndrome type A, or Mucopolysaccharidosis type IIIA (MPSIIIA), is a neurodegenerative disease caused by mutations in the gene that encodes the enzyme sulfamidase. Mutations in this gene lead to deficiencies in the production of the enzyme, which is essential for the breakdown of substances known as glycosaminoglicans. If these substances are not broken down, they accumulate in the cells and cause neuroinflammation and organ dysfunction, mainly in the brain, but also in other parts of the body. Children born with this mutation are diagnosed from the age of 4 or ...

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Medicine2 Jul 2013

GIS scientists discover molecular communication network in human stem cells

Scientists at A*STAR's Genome Institute of Singapore (GIS) and the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics (MPIMG) in Berlin (Germany) have discovered a molecular network in human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) that integrates cell communication signals to keep the cell in its stem cell state. These findings were reported in the June 2013 issue of Molecular Cell. Human embryonic stem cells have the remarkable property that they can form all human cell types. Scientists around the world study these cells to be able to use them for medical applications in the future. ...

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