The press release
archive.

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Fat-free see-through brain bares all

VIDEO: CLARITY provided this 3D view showing a thick slice of a mouse brain's memory hub, or hippocampus. It reveals a few different types of cells: Projecting neurons (green), connecting interneurons... Click here for more information. Slicing optional. Scientists can now study the brain's finer workings, while preserving its 3-D structure and integrity of its circuitry and other biological machinery. A breakthrough method, called CLARITY, developed by National Institutes ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Getting CLARITY: Hydrogel process developed at Stanford creates transparent brain

STANFORD, Calif. — Combining neuroscience and chemical engineering, researchers at Stanford University have developed a process that renders a mouse brain transparent. The postmortem brain remains whole — not sliced or sectioned in any way — with its three-dimensional complexity of fine wiring and molecular structures completely intact and able to be measured and probed at will with visible light and chemicals. The process, called CLARITY, ushers in an entirely new era of whole-organ imaging that stands to fundamentally change our scientific understanding of the most-important-but-least-understood ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Stanford study shows different brains have similar responses to music

STANFORD, Calif. — Do the brains of different people listening to the same piece of music actually respond in the same way? An imaging study by Stanford University School of Medicine scientists says the answer is yes, which may in part explain why music plays such a big role in our social existence. The investigators used functional magnetic resonance imaging to identify a distributed network of several brain structures whose activity levels waxed and waned in a strikingly similar pattern among study participants as they listened to classical music they'd never heard ...

Read the release

Earth Science11 Apr 2013

Pottery reveals Ice Age hunter-gatherers' taste for fish

Hunter-gatherers living in glacial conditions produced pots for cooking fish, according to the findings of a pioneering new study led by the University of York which reports the earliest direct evidence for the use of ceramic vessels. Scientists from the UK, the Netherlands, Sweden and Japan carried out chemical analysis of food residues in pottery up to 15,000 years old from the late glacial period, the oldest pottery so far investigated. It is the first study to directly address the often posed question "why humans made pots?" The research is published in Nature. The ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Mining information contained in clinical notes could yield early signs of harmful drug reactions

STANFORD, Calif. — Mining the records of routine interactions between patients and their care providers can detect drug side effects a couple of years before an official alert from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, a Stanford University School of Medicine study has found. The study, led by Nigam Shah, MBBS, PhD, assistant professor of medicine, will be published online April 10 in Nature Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics. This approach is a step forward in mining patient-based information, as opposed to coded insurance reports or drug-specific databases, to ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Half of all patient complaints in Australia are about 3 percent of doctors

Half of all formal patient complaints made in Australia to health ombudsmen concern just 3% of the country's doctors, with 1% accounting for a quarter of all complaints, finds research published online in BMJ Quality & Safety. Doctors complained about more than three times are highly likely to be the subject of a further complaint - and often within a couple of years - the findings show. The problem is unlikely to be confined to Australia, warn commentators, who point out that while regulators often know about these problem doctors, patients usually don't. The researchers ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Rates of childhood squint surgery have plummeted over past 50 years

Rates of surgery to correct childhood squint in England have tumbled over the past 50 years, finds research published online in the British Journal of Ophthalmology. But there's still a fivefold difference between the areas with the lowest and highest rates of the procedure, similar to the wide variations in tonsil removal, and it's not clear why, say the authors. Squint (strabismus) is one of the most common eye problems in children, with a prevalence of between 2% and 5%. Risk factors include family history, low birthweight, premature birth, being born to an older ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

The surprising ability of blood stem cells to respond to emergencies

A research team of Inserm, CNRS and MDC lead by Michael Sieweke of the Centre d'Immunologie de Marseille Luminy (CNRS, INSERM, Aix Marseille Université) and Max Delbrück Centre for Molecular Medicine, Berlin-Buch, today revealed an unexpected role for hematopoietic stem cells: they do not merely ensure the continuous renewal of our blood cells; in emergencies they are capable of producing white blood cells "on demand" that help the body deal with inflammation or infection. This property could be used to protect against infections in patients undergoing bone marrow transplants, ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

First objective measure of pain discovered in brain scan patterns by CU-Boulder study

For the first time, scientists have been able to predict how much pain people are feeling by looking at images of their brains, according to a new study led by the University of Colorado Boulder. The findings, published today in the New England Journal of Medicine, may lead to the development of reliable methods doctors can use to objectively quantify a patient's pain. Currently, pain intensity can only be measured based on a patient's own description, which often includes rating the pain on a scale of one to 10. Objective measures of pain could confirm these pain reports ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

CPAP improves work productivity for sleep apnea patients

The study will be presented today (11 April 2013) at the Sleep and Breathing Conference in Berlin, organised by the European Respiratory Society and the European Sleep Research Society. Previous research has demonstrated that people with sleep apnoea are less productive at work, usually due to excessive daytime sleepiness. This study aimed to assess whether continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) improved productivity at work. The researchers used the Endicott Work Productivity Scale, a questionnaire designed to assess productivity at work, and the Epworth Sleepiness ...

Read the release

Science11 Apr 2013

Great white sharks

MIAMI –April 9, 2013 – Many terrestrial animals are frequently observed scavenging on other animals– whether it is a hyena stealing a lion kill in the Serengeti or a buzzard swooping down on a dead animal. However, documenting this sort of activity in the oceans is especially difficult, and often overlooked in marine food web studies. In a new study published in PLOS ONE titled, "White sharks (Carcharodon carcharias) scavenging on whales and its potential role in further shaping the ecology of an apex predator," Captain Chris Fallows from Apex Expeditions collaborated ...

Read the release

Science11 Apr 2013

Extreme algae blooms: The new normal?

A 2011 record-breaking algae bloom in Lake Erie was triggered by long-term agricultural practices coupled with extreme precipitation, followed by weak lake circulation and warm temperatures, scientists have discovered. The researchers also predict that, unless agricultural policies change, the lake will continue to experience extreme blooms. "The factors that led to this explosion of algal blooms are all related to humans and our interaction with the environment," says Bruce Hamilton, program director at the National Science Foundation (NSF), which funded the research ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Single best practice to prevent DVT reduces hospital costs by more than $1.5 million annually

Chicago (April 10, 2013)—A major challenge facing today's health care community is to find ways to lower costs without compromising clinical quality. Taking that challenge to task, researchers at Medstar Health and Georgetown University School of Medicine, Washington DC, report success in using a concept called "value-based analysis," which simultaneously measures quality and cost and addresses inefficiencies in care. The researchers applied a value-based analysis approach to implementing a single best practice for preventing deep vein thrombosis (DVT) in surgical patients ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Metabolic fingerprinting: Using proteomics to identify proteins in gymnosperm pollination drops

Proteins are vital parts of living organisms, performing a variety of essential functions such as DNA replication, catabolizing reactions, and responding to stimuli. The complete set of proteins expressed in an organism at a given time, under defined conditions, is known as the proteome. While the genome of an organism remains relatively stable, the proteome is remarkably dynamic, varying from cell to cell and even within a single cell and changing rapidly in response to developmental and environmental cues. Proteomics is a powerful technique for examining the structure ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Subconscious mental categories help brain sort through everyday experiences

Your brain knows it's time to cook when the stove is on, and the food and pots are out. When you rush away to calm a crying child, though, cooking is over and it's time to be a parent. Your brain processes and responds to these occurrences as distinct, unrelated events. But it remains unclear exactly how the brain breaks such experiences into "events," or the related groups that help us mentally organize the day's many situations. A dominant concept of event-perception known as prediction error says that our brain draws a line between the end of one event and the start ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Scientists decode genome of painted turtle, revealing clues to extraordinary adaptations

Humans could learn a thing or two from turtles, and scientists who have just sequenced the first turtle genome uncovered clues about how people can benefit from the shelled creatures' remarkable longevity and ability to survive for months without breathing. Understanding the natural mechanisms turtles use to protect their heart and brain from oxygen deprivation may one day improve treatments for heart attack and stroke, the researchers said. UCLA conservation biologist and lead author Brad Shaffer collaborated with the Genome Institute at Washington University in ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

U-M researchers find new way to clear cholesterol from the blood

ANN ARBOR—Researchers at the University of Michigan have identified a new potential therapeutic target for lowering cholesterol that could be an alternative or complementary therapy to statins. Scientists in the lab of David Ginsburg at the Life Sciences Institute inhibited the action of a gene responsible for transporting a protein that interferes with the ability of the liver to remove cholesterol from the blood in mice. Trapping the destructive protein where it couldn't harm receptors responsible for removing cholesterol preserved the liver cells' capacity to clear ...

Read the release

Science11 Apr 2013

In sales, confidence and charisma may not seal the deal

Think of a stereotypical salesperson and you're likely to conjure up someone who's extraverted, gregarious, and assertive. But a new study reveals that "ambiverts," people who are neither introverted nor extraverted but who fall somewhere in between, tend to be the most effective salespeople. The study is published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. Researcher Adam Grant of The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania was driven to explore the relationship between sales and personality traits after realizing there ...

Read the release

Social Science11 Apr 2013

Crime rate calculation method due for overhaul, Wayne State University researchers say

In a study published recently in the Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice, WSU Ph.D. student Zavin Nazaretian and David M. Merolla, Ph.D., assistant professor of sociology in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, found that a method called "capping" — which only allows survey respondents to represent a maximum of three incidents per crime type regardless of how many incidents they report — undercounted violent crime by 87 percent and household crime by 36 percent. Capping is a common methodological practice used in most victimization surveys. The researchers ...

Read the release

Science11 Apr 2013

Scientists use islands to gauge rainfall's effect on landscapes

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- If you've ever stood on a hill during a rainstorm, you've probably witnessed landscape evolution, at least on a small scale: rivulets of water streaming down a slope, cutting deeper trenches in the earth when the rain turns heavier. It's a simple phenomenon that scientists have long believed applies to large-scale landforms as well — that is, rivers cut faster into mountains that receive heavier precipitation. It's thought that if rainfall patterns influence how rivers cut into rock, over time, the cumulative erosion and its effects on rock deformation ...

Read the release

Environment11 Apr 2013

'Sustainable fishing' certification too lenient and discretionary, study finds

The certification of seafood as "sustainable" by the nonprofit Marine Stewardship Council is too lenient and discretionary, a study by a consortium of researchers has found. "When consumers want sustainable fish there are two options to meet the demand: fisheries can become more sustainable or the definition of sustainable can be watered down to be practically meaningless—with MSC seafood, the definition has been repeatedly watered down," said Jennifer Jacquet, a clinical assistant professor in New York University's Environmental Studies Program and one of 11 authors ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Cardiovascular issues up mortality rates in patients with advanced fibrosis

New research reveals that advanced fibrosis is a significant predictor of mortality in patients with nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), largely brought about by cardiovascular causes. NAFLD alone was not associated with increased mortality according to findings published in the April issue of Hepatology, a journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases. With super-sized portions, sugary soft drinks and physical inactivity, obesity is on the rise and showing no sign of slowing. Studies report that the prevalence of obesity has doubled in the ...

Read the release

Medicine11 Apr 2013

Naturally-occurring substance proves effective against deadly skin cancer in laboratory tests

For the first time, scientists have demonstrated the mechanism of action of gossypin, a naturally-occurring substance found in fruits and vegetables, as a treatment for melanoma, which causes the majority of deaths from skin cancer. "We identified gossypin as a novel agent with dual inhibitory activity towards two common mutations that are the ideal targets for melanoma treatment," said Texas Biomed's Hareesh Nair, Ph.D. At the moment, there is no single therapeutic agent or combination regimen available to treat all melanomas, of which about 76,000 new cases are diagnosed ...

Read the release

Science11 Apr 2013

Biofilms help Salmonella survive hostile conditions, Virginia Tech researchers say

Virginia Tech scientists have provided new evidence that biofilms — bacteria that adhere to surfaces and build protective coatings — are at work in the survival of the human pathogen Salmonella. One out of every six Americans becomes ill from eating contaminated food each year, with over a million illnesses caused by Salmonella bacteria, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Finding out what makes Salmonella resistant to antibacterial measures could help curb outbreaks. Researchers affiliated with the Fralin Life Science Institute discovered that ...

Read the release

Science11 Apr 2013

Goosefish capture small puffins over deep water of Northwest Atlantic

A recent study has shown that bottom-dwelling goosefish, also known as monkfish, prey on dovekies, a small Arctic seabird and the smallest member of the puffin family. To understand how this deep-water fish finds a shallow-feeding bird in offshore waters, researchers looked at when, where, and how these animals were most likely to be in the same place at the same time. Remains of fourteen dovekie were recovered from the stomachs of 14 goosefish caught during the winters between 2007 and 2010. The goosefish were captured in gillnets deployed at depths between 275 and 495 ...

Read the release