ITHACA, N.Y. -- By studying individuals who spontaneously clear hepatitis C infections, a team of researchers has identified viable vaccine targets for a disease that infects 70 million worldwide with case numbers increasing every year. It turns out that a quarter of people who become infected with the hepatitis C virus clear the infection on their own without treatment, while the remaining three-quarters of people develop chronic infections that can last for years. The blood-borne disease – which causes liver cirrhosis, liver ...

For centuries, the Cerne Giant, a figure carved into a hillside in Dorset depicting a nude man carrying a club and stretching some 180 feet high, has fascinated locals and visitors to the area. The history of the giant, however, and in particular, its age, has long been a mystery. A new paper in Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies proposes that the Cerne Giant can in fact be dated to the early Middle Ages, and, as a result, its cultural context and significance more clearly understood.   “The Cerne Giant in its Early Medieval Context,” by authors Thomas Morcom and Helen Gittos, acknowledges that previous attempts to date the giant placed ...

25 March 2024: RCSI research has found that venetoclax, a medication currently approved for leukaemia, has benefits for patients with multiple myeloma when used in combination with another drug. This discovery offers a new avenue of treatment options for the currently incurable disease.  Multiple myeloma (MM) is a type of blood cancer that is newly diagnosed in around 400 people in Ireland each year. Despite treatment advances in recent years, it remains incurable. The search for innovative treatment strategies is crucial, particularly for patients whose cancer is resistant to standard care.  In the new study published in Haematologica, researchers at the RCSI Department of ...

Philadelphia, March 25, 2024 – Food insecurity among college students is associated with negative physical and mental health and lower academic performance and graduation rates. A recent research study in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, published by Elsevier, investigates why over half of college students eligible for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)—the nation’s largest food assistance program—do not apply. Lead study author Suzanna M. Martinez, PhD, MS, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of California San Francisco, explained, “In California, ...

Professor Jinyang Liang’s team is advancing in imaging speed with a new ultrafast camera system. Pushing for a higher speed isn’t just for athletes. Researchers, too, can achieve such feats with their discoveries. This is the case for Jinyang Liang, Professor at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS), and his team, whose research results have recently been published in Nature Communications. The group based at INRS’ Énergie Matériaux Télécommunications Research Centre has developed a new ultrafast camera system that can capture up to 156.3 trillion ...

New research has found no evidence of a difference between recovery time and complications when comparing standard and keyhole surgical incisions for the treatment of oesophageal cancer (cancer of the gullet).  The study, led by the University of Bristol Medical School and published in the British Journal of Surgery, showed surgeons treating patients with oesophageal cancer do not need to change their practice if they have a strong preference for either procedure type. Oesophageal cancer is the tenth most common cancer globally. It causes one in 18 cancer-related deaths. ...

Key Takeaways  In a retrospective analysis of 105,517 patients with colorectal cancer, researchers found that colorectal cancer surgical cases fell by 17.3% during the first year of the pandemic.  Patients who underwent surgery for colorectal cancer in 2020 displayed more advanced stages of cancer compared to those treated in 2019.  The authors attribute these findings to multiple factors, including delays in screening, fear of COVID-19 exposure that may have prevented some people from seeking care, and disparities in cancer care that were likely exacerbated during the pandemic.  CHICAGO: While the COVID-19 pandemic is no longer considered a public ...

In nanomaterials, shape is destiny. That is, the geometry of the particle in the material defines the physical characteristics of the resulting material. “A crystal made of nano-ball bearings will arrange themselves differently than a crystal made of nano-dice and these arrangements will produce very different physical properties,” said Wendy Gu, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at Stanford University, introducing her latest paper which appears in the journal Nature Communications. “We’ve used a 3D nanoprinting technique to produce one of the most promising ...

Scientists have discovered how honeybees can decipher dances by their hive mates that relay directions to food. The findings reveal how, in the complete darkness of the hive, each bee uses its antennae to help interpret the information communicated through the dances. It has been known for decades that honeybees do so-called waggle dances, in which their movements and orientation on the honeycomb signal the direction and distance to food outside the hive. However, until now, it was unclear how the bees gathered around a waggle dancer make sense of the information. Gaining greater insights into how bees communicate could help scientists to better understand the effects of ...

Nucleus Genomics, the next-generation genetic testing and analysis company, today announced the launch of its DNA analysis product to bring the benefits of personalized medicine to everyone. DNA and health are inextricably linked, but profound insights into how DNA can shape health are missing from healthcare. Customers who’ve previously done microarray genetic testing with older testing companies can upload their DNA data onto Nucleus’ platform to receive greater insights into their genetic risk for diseases like type 2 diabetes, breast cancer, and many more. Nucleus further personalizes these risk assessments by integrating personal ...

Physicists are also interested in fish – above all when they are researching the formation of structures. A research team from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) and the University of Bristol (United Kingdom) has examined the schooling behaviour of zebra danio (Danio rerio, also known as “zebrafish”) using methods from the field of multi-particle physics. In the scientific journal Nature Communications, they explain that groups of just three fish already move in a similar way to large schools while, by contrast, two fish display completely ...

About The Study: Provision of medications for self-managed abortions increased in the six months following the Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision. Results suggest that a substantial number of abortion seekers accessed services despite the implementation of state-level bans and restrictions.  Authors: Abigail R. A. Aiken, Ph.D., of the University of Texas at Austin, is the corresponding author. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi:10.1001/jama.2024.4266) Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, ...

CLEVELAND—A team of researchers from the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine has provided fresh insight into the dangers some common household chemicals pose to brain health. They suggest that chemicals found in a wide range of items, from furniture to hair products, may be linked to neurological diseases like multiple sclerosis and autism spectrum disorders. Neurological problems impact millions of people, but only a fraction of cases can be attributed to genetics alone, indicating that unknown environmental factors are important contributors to neurological disease. The new study ...

Imagine a world where complex calculations that currently take months for our best supercomputers to crack could be performed in a matter of minutes. Quantum computing is revolutionizing our digital world. In a research article published Feb. 19 in Intelligent Computing, researchers unveiled an automated protocol-design approach that could unlock the computational power of quantum devices sooner than we imagined. Quantum computational advantage represents a critical milestone in the development of quantum technologies. It signifies the ability of quantum computers to outperform classical supercomputers in certain tasks. Achieving ...

PITTSBURGH – The University of Pittsburgh has received a pair of two-year grants from the National Institutes of Health to support studies on the health effects of environmental contamination resulting from the train derailment that spilled hazardous materials into the local communities in East Palestine, Ohio, in February 2023. The grants, totaling nearly $1 million, were awarded through a National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences ...

Scientists have found a “tipping point” in the evolution of fungi that throttles their growth and sculpts their shapes. The findings, published in the journal Cell Reports, demonstrate how small changes in environmental factors can lead to huge changes in evolutionary outcomes. Fungi are nature’s great composters. They wait within the forest floor to feed on fallen trees and autumn leaves, releasing essential nutrients from these plants back into the Earth.   Although fungi often ...

About The Study: The cumulative incidence of heart offer acceptance by a transplant center team was consistently lower for Black candidates than for white candidates of the same gender and higher for women than for men in this study. These disparities persisted after adjusting for candidate-, donor-, and offer-level variables, possibly suggesting racial and gender bias in the decision-making process. Further investigation of site-level decision-making may reveal strategies for equitable donor heart acceptance.  Authors: Khadijah Breathett, M.D., M.S., of Indiana University in Indianapolis, ...

About The Study: In this study of 18,000 adults who were employed, greater job flexibility was significantly associated with reduced odds of experiencing serious psychological distress and experiencing anxiety. Greater job security was significantly associated with reduced odds of experiencing serious psychological distress and experiencing anxiety.  Authors: Monica L. Wang, Sc.D., M.S., of the Boston University School of Public Health, is the corresponding author.  To access ...

About The Study: Inappropriate diagnosis of community-acquired pneumonia was common, particularly among older adults, those with dementia, and those presenting with altered mental status in this study of 17,000 hospitalized adults treated for pneumonia in 48 Michigan hospitals. Full-course antibiotic treatment of those inappropriately diagnosed with community-acquired pneumonia may be harmful.  Authors: Ashwin B. Gupta, M.D., of the VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System in Ann Arbor, Michigan, is the corresponding author. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website ...

About The Study: The findings of this observational study of 20,000 adults suggest that a measure of follow-up colonoscopy within defined periods after an abnormal result of a stool-based screening test for colorectal cancer is warranted based on low current performance rates and would be feasible to collect by health systems and produce valid, reliable results.  Authors: Elizabeth L. Ciemins, Ph.D., M.P.H., M.A., of the American Medical Group Association in Alexandria, Virginia, is the corresponding author.  To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media ...

Coastal seas form a complex transition zone between the two largest CO2 sinks in the global carbon cycle: land and ocean. Ocean researchers have now succeeded for the first time in investigating the role of the coastal ocean in a seamless model representation. The team led by Dr. Moritz Mathis from the Cluster of Excellence for Climate Research CLICCS at Universität Hamburg and the Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon was able to show: The intensity of CO2 uptake is higher in coastal seas than in the open ocean. This is evidenced by a study published in the journal Nature Climate Change. To ...

Thanks to diligent observers, seahorses, those enigmatic and charismatic fish, are not only being discovered in new habitats and expanded geographic ranges, they are also being found at new ocean depths. While their capacity for male pregnancy has long fascinated people, new information on sex ratio and pregnancy seasonality has been discovered by, well, you. Researchers from Project Seahorse – a marine conservation team based at the University of British Columbia (UBC) and the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) – identified and reviewed new findings related to 35 of the 46 seahorse species found around the globe, ...

Next-generation advanced high/pulsed power capacitors urgently require dielectric materials with outstanding energy storage performance. (Bi0.5Na0.5)TiO3-based material, a typical lead-free ferroelectrics, has the characteristics of high polarization strength and excellent component compatibility, making it emerge as a potential candidate for energy storage applications.   Researchers have made an interesting breakthrough in the modification of the BNT-based ferroelectrics, an effective method for various properties such ...

University of Virginia researchers are developing a flexible online tool for navigating information used in the fight to save children from deadly diarrheal diseases by identifying transmission hotspots and accelerating the deployment of treatments and new vaccines. Diarrhea not only kills hundreds of thousands of children around the world every year, it contributes to malnutrition that can prevent kids from growing and developing to their full potential both physically and mentally, trapping them in poverty. While significant progress has been made against the disease in recent years, the UVA researchers say that ...

For researchers studying the acoustic behavior of whales, distinguishing which animal is vocalizing is like a teacher trying to figure out which student responded first when the entire class is calling out the answer. This is because many of the techniques used to capture audio record a large sample size of sounds. A major example of this is passive acoustic monitoring (PAM), which records audio via a microphone in one location, usually a stationary or moving platform in the ocean. While this method allows researchers to gather acoustic data over a long time period, it ...