A research team consisting of a University of Arizona graduate student, about 40 middle school students and a UA research lab has undertaken the first systematic study looking at how much plant leaves shrink when they dry out. The results are published in the November issue of the American Journal of Botany, one of the foremost publication venues in the botanical sciences. "Our simple observation that leaves shrink when they dry out has very important consequences for our understanding how ecosystems work," said Benjamin Blonder, a graduate student in the UA's department ...

VIDEO: This movie shows the formation and propagation of thrombin activity and a fibrin clot in plasma stimulated with immobilized TF (90 pmol/m2). Imaging of thrombin activity in blood plasma from... Click here for more information. New insights into what causes uncontrollable bleeding in hemophilia patients are provided in a study published by Cell Press on November 20th in the Biophysical Journal. By revealing that blood clots spread in traveling waves through vessels, the study ...

New research at King's College London may lead to improved solar cells and LED-displays. Researchers from the Biophysics and Nanotechnology Group at King's, led by Professor Anatoly Zayats in the department of Physics have demonstrated in detail how to separate colours and create 'rainbows' using nanoscale structures on a metal surface. The research is published in Nature's Scientific Reports. More than 150 years ago, the discovery at King's of how to separate and project different colours, paved the way for modern colour televisions and displays. The major challenge ...

Hamilton, ON (November 20, 2012) – Researchers at McMaster University have discovered new genetic evidence about why some people are happier than others. McMaster scientists have uncovered evidence that the gene FTO – the major genetic contributor to obesity – is associated with an eight per cent reduction in the risk of depression. In other words, it's not just an obesity gene but a "happy gene" as well. The research appears in a study published today in the journal Molecular Psychiatry. The paper was produced by senior author David Meyre, associate professor in clinical ...

Hackensack, NJ (November 20, 2012) – Researchers from John Theurer Cancer Center at Hackensack University Medical Center, one of the nation's 50 best cancer centers, played an important role in a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine on October 18 that may change the current blood and marrow transplantation practices. The phase 3, multicenter study compared harvesting stem cells from bone marrow rather than blood and suggests there are benefits to both approaches, but no survival differences between the two methods. Over the past 10 years, 75 percent ...

(Santa Barbara, CA —) Portable, accurate, and highly sensitive devices that sniff out vapors from explosives and other substances could become as commonplace as smoke detectors in public places, thanks to researchers at University of California, Santa Barbara. Researchers at UCSB, led by professors Carl Meinhart of mechanical engineering and Martin Moskovits of chemistry, have designed a detector that uses microfluidic nanotechnology to mimic the biological mechanism behind canine scent receptors. The device is both highly sensitive to trace amounts of certain vapor molecules, ...

In a world-first, researchers from the Australian Centre for Nanomedicine at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney have developed a nanoparticle that could improve the effectiveness of chemotherapy for neuroblastoma by a factor of five. Neuroblastoma is an aggressive childhood cancer that often leaves survivors with lingering health problems due to the high doses of chemotherapy drugs required for treatment. Anything that can potentially reduce these doses is considered an important development. The UNSW researchers developed a non-toxic nanoparticle ...

Rituximab, a drug used to treat cancer and arthritis, may help patients with antiphospholipid antibodies (aPLs) who suffer from aPL-related clinical problems that do not respond to anticoagulation, such as cardiac disease and kidney disease, according to a new study by rheumatology researchers at Hospital for Special Surgery. The study appears online ahead of print, in the journal Arthritis and Rheumatism. "This is the first study to systematically analyze rituximab in aPL-positive patients. Rituximab may have a role in treating a subgroup of aPL patients," said Doruk ...

VTT specialists have assessed Finland's chances of achieving the 80% greenhouse gas emission reduction targets. The EU's goal for 2050 is to reduce emissions by at least 80% from the level of 1990. The goal is a tough one for Finland, but possible to achieve as long as all sectors that produce or consume energy take part. On top of this, all greenhouse gas emissions must be reduced. Finland requires new technological solutions for industrial activity, for the transport of people, goods and services, and for housing and working methods. If clean forms of energy and the ...

A new Marine Board Future Science Brief presents a roadmap for marine biodiversity science in Europe and warns against complacency. The ocean provides 95% of the habitable space on Earth and harbours a vast diversity of life. Biodiversity underpins the health of the oceans and their productive ecosystems which are essential for human well-being and prosperity. But marine life is under significant threat from climate change and from increasing human impacts including pollution, overfishing and ocean acidification. Marine biodiversity research and its role in supporting ...

Gastric bypass patients who attended five follow-up office visits in two years as recommended by their surgeons lost nearly twice as much weight (113 lbs. vs. 57 lbs.) as patients who attended only two follow-up visits, according to a University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing study in Obesity Surgery. The global epidemic of overweight and obese people is estimated to include 1.7 billion individuals, with two-thirds of those living in the U.S. Measurement of body mass index (BMI), a calculation of height and weight, classifies obesity. Patients with severe obesity ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Turns out the same glands that make you sweat are responsible for another job vital to your health: they help heal wounds. Human skin is rich with millions of eccrine sweat glands that help your body cool down after a trip to the gym or on a warm day. These same glands, new University of Michigan Health System research shows, also happen to play a key role in providing cells for recovering skin wounds – such as scrapes, burns and ulcers. The findings were released online ahead of print in the American Journal of Pathology. "Skin ulcers – including ...

A team of experts from King's College London have played a major role in delivering an international conference on food and water security in Qatar this week. The Food Security in Dry Lands (FSDL) conference has been organised in the run up to the forthcoming UN climate meeting (COP18) later this month, where 'climate-smart' agriculture is expected to be a key focus. The King's Water Research Group have contributed to the new Doha Declaration, which states that by 2022, participating countries -Qatar, Kenya, Tanzania, Chad, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Nigeria, ...

The discovery of the molecular pathway that drives the changes seen in the brains of Alzheimer's patients is reported today, revealing new targets for drug discovery that could be exploited to combat the disease. The study gives the most detailed understanding yet of the complex processes leading to Alzheimer's. Alzheimer's disease is associated with plaques made up of deposits of a molecule called amyloid between brain cells, which leads to the formation of tangles of twisted fibres made from a molecule called tau, found inside the brain cells. This causes the death ...

Critique 096: Frequency of alcohol consumption and cardiovascular risk factors: implications for drinking guidelines 20 November 2012 Read the full critique here: http://www.bu.edu/alcohol-forum/critique-096-frequency-of-alcohol-consumption-and-cardiovascular-risk-factors-implications-for-drinking-guidelines-20-november-2012/ The purpose of this paper was to examine whether drinkers who consume lower-risk amounts on more frequent occasions have favourable risk factor profiles compared with those who drink more per occasion but less frequently. The authors also discuss ...

Young girls can dance their way to better mental health. Symptoms like depression, stress, fatigue, and headaches are alleviated with regular dancing. This is shown in a study run by Anna Duberg, a physical therapist at Örebro University Hospital and a doctoral candidate at Örebro University in Sweden. Regular dance training can thereby be regarded as a strategy for preventing and treating low spirits and depression. Dance also brings enhanced self-esteem and a greater capacity to deal with everyday problems. The dance study included 112 Swedish girls 13 to 19 years ...

Scientists at the Mainz University Medical Center have discovered another molecule that plays an important role in regulating myelin formation in the central nervous system. Myelin promotes the conduction of nerve cell impulses by forming a sheath around their projections, the so-called axons, at specific locations – acting like the plastic insulation around a power cord. The research team, led by Dr. Robin White of the Institute of Physiology and Pathophysiology at the University Medical Center of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, recently published their findings in ...

As reported in the journal Science, physicists at the Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM) and the University of Michigan have shown that synthetic membrane channels can be constructed through "DNA nanotechnology." This technique employs DNA molecules as programmable building materials for custom-designed, self-assembling, nanometer-scale structures. The researchers present evidence that their nature-inspired nanostructures may also behave like biological ion channels. Their results could mark a step toward applications of synthetic membrane channels as molecular sensors, ...

As Internet access becomes increasingly widespread, so do related psychopathologies such as Internet addiction and delusions related to the technology and to virtual relationships. Computer communications such as Facebook and chat groups are an important part of this story, says Dr. Uri Nitzan of Tel Aviv University's Sackler Faculty of Medicine and the Shalvata Mental Health Care Center in a new paper published in the Israel Journal of Psychiatry and Related Sciences. In his study, the researcher presented three in-depth case studies linking psychotic episodes to Internet ...

This is the question asked by two of the articles in this week's issue of Deutsches Ärzteblatt International. Dieter Leyk from German Sport University Cologne (Deutsche Sporthochschule Köln) and coauthors investigated the effects of unhealthy lifestyles on young people's fitness, Sabine Stamm-Balderjahn from Berlin's Charité, and her coauthors report a study investigating the effects of a hospital-based intervention program to prevent smoking in school students (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2012; 109(44): 737-45 und Dtsch Arztebl Int 2012; 109(44): 746-52). Leyk et al. collected ...

Chicago --- An international multi-disciplinary research team led by Northwestern Medicine scientists has uncovered a new role for the protein toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4) in the development of tissue fibrosis, or scarring. This finding, recently reported in the American Journal of Pathology, has implications for the treatment of scleroderma, a condition for which there currently is no effective treatment. TLR4 was previously implicated in inflammation, but its role in tissue fibrosis was unknown. Fibrosis is a hallmark of scleroderma and contributes to a range of common ...

WASHINGTON – Teens who participate in after-school arts activities such as music, drama and painting are more likely to report feeling depressed or sad than students who are not involved in these programs, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association. This is the first study to find that young people's casual involvement in the arts could be linked to depressive symptoms, according to the researchers. The article was published online in APA's journal Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts. "This is not to say that depression ...

ESA's Planck space telescope has made the first conclusive detection of a bridge of hot gas connecting a pair of galaxy clusters across 10 million light-years of intergalactic space. Planck's primary task is to capture the most ancient light of the cosmos, the Cosmic Microwave Background, or CMB. As this faint light traverses the Universe, it encounters different types of structure including galaxies and galaxy clusters – assemblies of hundreds to thousands of galaxies bound together by gravity. If the CMB light interacts with the hot gas permeating these huge cosmic ...

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – Nov. 20, 2012 – If you are among the 50 percent of Americans who suffer from insomnia, then you have probably tried everything – from warm milk to melatonin pills or prescription medications to induce sleep – with varying degrees of success and side effects. But what if sleep could be achieved not by a substance, but through 'balancing' brain activity? Researchers at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center have conducted a pilot clinical study to determine whether a non-invasive approach, that uses musical tones to balance brain activity, can 'reset' ...

Millbrook, N.Y. -- In the northern hardwood forest, climate change is poised to reduce the viability of the maple syrup industry, spread wildlife diseases and tree pests, and change timber resources. And, according to a new BioScience paper just released by twenty-one scientists, without long-term studies at the local scale—we will be ill-prepared to predict and manage these effects. Following an exhaustive review of more than fifty years of long term data on environmental conditions at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest, located in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, ...