LOS ANGELES (EMBARGOED UNTIL 4 PM EST, WEDNESDAY, MARCH 23, 2011) – A new study of coronary artery calcium scanning – a simple, noninvasive test that gives patients baseline information about plaque in their coronary arteries—has shown that the scan helps them make heart-healthy lifestyle changes and lower their heart disease risk factors. The study, the EISNER trial (Early Identification of Subclinical Atherosclerosis by Noninvasive Imaging Research), was headed by researchers at Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute and Cedars-Sinai's S. Mark Taper Foundation Imaging Department ...

Genes make up only a tiny percentage of the human genome. The rest, which has remained measurable but mysterious, may hold vital clues about the genetic origins of disease. Using a new mapping strategy, a collaborative team led by researchers at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), and MIT has begun to assign meaning to the regions beyond our genes and has revealed how minute changes in these regions might be connected to common diseases. The researchers' findings appear in the March 23 advance online issue of Nature. The results ...

A typical city: row upon row of houses built almost on top of each other, with asphalted roads between them and with very few green areas to be found. Urban areas built on this pattern warm up more strongly than their rural surroundings, creating islands of warmth. The waste heat emitted by vehicles and machinery (such as air conditioning equipment) causes yet more heating, and even during the night the city hardly cools down to any noticeable extent. Megacities such as Mexico City and urban conurbations such as Athens are more and more frequently covered by a visible dome ...

Raleigh criminal defense lawyer Patrick Roberts at the Roberts Law Group PLLC used the facts he learned about his client's criminal arrest to negotiate a potential 70 to 80 month prison sentence down to 10 to 12 months. Criminal attorney Patrick Roberts used information that he gleaned in truly getting to know his client in discussions with the Wake County District Attorney's Office. The facts of the case were as follows: Mr. Roberts' client was facing two counts of drug trafficking after police recovered two large quantities of cocaine from a house where his client ...

After many years of gradual increase followed by a three-year levelling off period, sales of addictive anxiolytic and hypnotic drugs decreased by just under two per cent in 2010. This comes from the new report "Drug Consumption in Norway 2006-2010". The statistics include all sales of prescription and OTC drugs in Norway from wholesalers to pharmacies, hospitals / nursing homes and grocery stores. The report also shows that total sales of OTC medicines measured in DDDs declined by six per cent in 2010. This is mainly due to lower sales of OTC packets of paracetamol ...

Lung transplant patients have double the risk of organ rejection and death within five years of the procedure if they live near a main road, indicates research published online in Thorax. The Belgian researchers tracked the health of 281 patients who had undergone a lung transplant or retransplant at the same hospital between 1997 and 2008 until 2009. They took into account how far these patients lived from a main road and therefore a source of airborne road traffic pollution to see if this had any impact on their survival rates, as pollutants are known to trigger inflammation. Around ...

As Iran's nuclear plant attack and Chinese-based hackers attacking Morgan Stanley demonstrate how the Internet can wreak havoc on business and governments, a new paper by a fellow at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy hypothesizes what an all-out cyberwar between the U.S. and China might look like. To date, the cyberattacks in East Asia have been relatively benign, said Christopher Bronk, author of "Blown to Bits: China's War in Cyberspace, August–September 2020," published this month in the U.S. Air Force journal Strategic Studies Quarterly. Bronk is ...

The critical care expertise available before a severely injured person can be admitted to hospital is "incomplete, unpredictable, and inconsistent," shows research published online in Emergency Medicine Journal. Ambulance services are often reliant on volunteer doctors with variable levels of expertise and the availability of specialist doctors is patchy, particularly over evenings or weekends, the study shows. This implies something of a postcode lottery of provision across the UK, and raises questions about the UK's ability to deal effectively with a critical incident ...

Insomnia is common in Spain, and affects one person in every five. This is the conclusion of a study carried out by the Vall d'Hebron University Hospital in Barcelona and the Stanford University School of Medicine (USA), which shows that 40% of survey respondents aged over 65 report interrupted sleep at night being the prime cause of this problem. "Good sleep hygiene is necessary in order to avoid primary insomnia, as well as being aware that the number of hours of sleep needed falls with age, adopting regular times for going to bed and getting up, and stopping having ...

The Tint Guy, a premier Atlanta tinting company, was recently awarded the 2010 Dealer of the Year award for the state of Georgia by 3M Southern Films Distribution (SFD), a regional distributor of 3M Window Films. The Tint Guy has specialized in commercial, residential and automobile Atlanta window tinting since 1986. The Tint Guy is the only full-service 3M window film dealer in Georgia, carrying the complete line of 3M window film products. The Dealer of the Year is a state-wide award that is given each year to 3M dealers who display excellence in sales and customer ...

MANHATTAN, Kan. -- A recently patented adhesive made by Kansas State University researchers could become a staple in every astronaut's toolbox. The patent, "pH dependent adhesive peptides," was issued to the Kansas State University Research Foundation, a nonprofit corporation responsible for managing technology transfer activities of K-State. The patent covers an adhesive made from peptides -- a compound containing two or more amino acids that link together -- that increases in strength as moisture is removed. It was created by John Tomich, professor of biochemistry, ...

Northern Rock plc has launched a new interactive savings website to make it easier for customers to find a Northern Rock savings product from the competitive range available. The new savings website follows the introduction of Northern Rock's award-winning Mortgages website, which was launched in April 2010. The new site offers helpful advice and practical information, as well as full details on Northern Rock's savings products. For those customers thinking about investing their savings, at-a-glance guides are available to help them choose which savings product, ...

This press release is available in French. The human brain loses 5 to 10% of its weight between the ages of 20 and 90 years old. While some cells are lost, the brain is equipped with two compensatory mechanisms: plasticity and redundancy. Based on the results of her most recent clinical study published today in the online version of Brain: A Journal of Neurology, Dr. Sylvie Belleville, PhD in neuropsychology, the principal author of this study and Director of Research at the Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Montréal (IUGM), which is affiliated with the Université ...

A new research report published online in The FASEB Journal (http://www.faseb.org) suggests that pregnant mothers who eat high sugar and high fat diets have babies who are likely to become junk food junkies themselves. According to the report, which used rats, this happens because the high fat and high sugar diet leads to changes in the fetal brain's reward pathway, altering food preferences. Not only does this offer insight into the ever-increasing rate of human obesity, but it may also explain why some people easily resist fatty and sugary foods, while others seem hopelessly ...

AUSTIN, Texas — Bottling up emotions can make people more aggressive, according to new research from The University of Texas at Austin and the University of Minnesota that was funded, in part, by a grant from the U.S. Army. The study, published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science, could have important implications for reducing violence and helping people in professions such as law enforcement and the military better cope with long hours and stressful situations. The psychologists used a pair of classic movie scenes in their research. ...

Thistle Hotels staff from across Scotland recently stepped into the classroom to host a series of 'buddy sessions' where they provided professional advice to those interested in entering the hospitality industry. The sessions headed up by experts from the hospitality industry aimed to describe their own roles and provide advice on the best way of getting in to the industry. In support of Scottish Tourism and Scottish Tourism Careers Week and in association with the charity Springboard Scotland, Thistle organised a week-long agenda across its six hotels in Edinburgh, ...

Tel Aviv — When the Human Genome Project ended a decade ago, scientists thought that they'd closed the lid on all that's to be known about our genes. But what they really did was open a Pandora's Box, says theoretical evolutionary biologist Prof. Eva Jablonka of Tel Aviv University's Cohn Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Ideas. After sifting through hundreds of scientific studies concerned with epigenetics, Prof. Jablonka concludes that some of the effects of stress, cancer, and other chronic diseases we suffer from may be passed on to our offspring ...

New National Trust research* reveals that the number of Brits taking a two-week holiday has decreased by 18% over the past five years with 51% of Brits not planning to take a fortnight's holiday in 2011. The study reveals a new trend for Brits taking multiple single day holidays throughout the year, as opposed to the traditional two-week break their parents worked towards. Over a quarter (27%) of Brits are planning to take at least ten single days holiday - or 'daycations' - this year and a further 36% will take between five and ten. 48% of those polled cited the ...

US citizens who have a high quality of life are more engaged in the direct democracy process, according to Ryan Yonk from Utah State University and Professor Shauna Reilly from Northern Kentucky University in the US. Their study, looking at the effects of quality of life on voter participation in direct democracy elections, demonstrates that quality of life is a strong predictor of voter turnout. However, interestingly, voters with a higher quality of life are less likely to support changes in public policy through direct democracy. They appear satisfied with their current ...

University of Minnesota researchers are a key step closer to making renewable petroleum fuels using bacteria, sunlight and dioxide, a goal funded by a $2.2 million United States Department of Energy grant. Graduate student Janice Frias, who earned her doctorate in January, made the critical step by figuring out how to use a protein to transform fatty acids produced by the bacteria into ketones, which can be cracked to make hydrocarbon fuels. The university is filing patents on the process. The research is published in the April 1 issue of the Journal of Biological Chemistry. ...

The most-visited story on EurekAlert! in 2010 was the discovery of a "golden ratio" in the nanoscale symmetry of solid matter. The finding put forth the new suggestion that matter on the quantum level may possess its own unique, orderly patterns as opposed to chaos. Stories on the health sciences and medicine also drew significant attention from EurekAlert! users in 2010. The most popular topics varied from neurological diseases including Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, to reproductive health, and how proteins and genes influence diabetes and cancer. Website traffic statistics ...

Flower 36.5 is a professional online flower delivery service that has introduced a new service called Buy 1 Give 1. Through this service, the flowers that you want to send for the happy smile of your loved one can also lead to the smile of another person in a different part of the world. The body temperature of humans is 36.5 degrees C, and with the small contribution made through your flower delivery, you can share not only the kindness of your heart but also the opportunity to give happiness. Through an alliance with B1G1 (www.B1G1.com) from Singapore, which introduced ...

OAK RIDGE, Tenn, March, 23, 2011 -- Structural studies of some of nature's most efficient light-harvesting systems are lighting the way for new generations of biologically inspired solar cell devices. Researchers from Washington University in St. Louis and the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory used small-angle neutron scattering to analyze the structure of chlorosomes in green photosynthetic bacteria. Chlorosomes are efficient at collecting sunlight for conversion to energy, even in low-light and extreme environments. "It's one of the most efficient ...

In the first study of its kind, urologists and biostatisticians at Henry Ford Hospital have found that robot-assisted surgery to remove cancerous prostate glands is safe over the long term, with a major complication rate of less than one percent. The findings, published online this month by the journal European Urology, follow an earlier Henry Ford study that found nearly 87 percent of patients whose cancerous prostates were removed by robot-assisted surgery had no recurrence of the disease after five years. "We have always felt that robotic surgery for prostate cancer ...

Arthritis researchers from North America and Europe will convene in Chicago this week to present new osteoarthritis research that could lead to better ways to detect, treat, prevent and cure osteoarthritis (OA), which affects 27 million Americans. Hosted by the Arthritis Foundation, the Segal North American Osteoarthritis Workshop (SNOW) on March 25-27 will focus on specific forms of OA, such as those that follow joint trauma, obesity and the aging process. Arthritis is the leading cause of disability in the United States, affecting 50 million adults. The most common ...