Researchers at Neiker-Tecnalia (the Basque Institute for Agricultural Research and Development) have undertaken a study on the epidemiology and diagnosis of infection by visna/maedi virus. This is a virus that affects sheep herds causing chronic interstitial pneumonia, mastitis and neurological disorders. The study confirmed that horizontal transmission (direct contact between infected animals) of the virus is the most likely path of infection, rather than vertical transmission (from infected suckling milk or colostrum). Since there is no current effective treatment against ...

The research team at the Centre for the Studies of Archaeological and Prehistoric Heritage (CEPAP) of Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) have implemented an innovative system to register archaeological artefacts which eliminates problems in manual markings, such as errors in writing or erosion of data. The system, based on direct labelling using bi-dimensional data matrix (DM) codes, has been used by the CEPAP team during two years, in which numerous artefacts and bone remains from sites in Spain and Africa were registered. The marking of archaeological material, ...

Tel Aviv -- Although we're convinced that baby is brilliant when she mutters her first words, cognitive scientists have been conducting a decades-long debate about whether or not human beings actually "learn" language. Most theoretical linguists, including the noted researcher Noam Chomsky, argue that people have little more than a "language organ" -- an inherent capacity for language that's activated during early childhood. On the other hand, researchers like Dr. Roni Katzir of Tel Aviv University's Department of Linguistics insist that what humans can actually learn ...

Associate professor Anne Mangen at the University of Stavanger's Reading Centre asks if something is lost in switching from book to computer screen, and from pen to keyboard. The process of reading and writing involves a number of senses, she explains. When writing by hand, our brain receives feedback from our motor actions, together with the sensation of touching a pencil and paper. These kinds of feedback is significantly different from those we receive when touching and typing on a keyboard. Learning by doing Together with neurophysiologist Jean-Luc Velay at the ...

Malignant gliomas are fast-growing brain tumours with poor prospects of recovery depending on disease stage. Experts hope that the examination of patients by means of positron emission tomography (PET) is more helpful in the choice of the right treatment than other procedures. In a final report the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) has now investigated the benefit of PET in the detection of recurrences. According to this report, no robust conclusions are possible on the advantages or disadvantages of PET. Two research questions investigated The ...

Recent work, in particular the CAMERA study, has used MRI to study the brains of migraine sufferers and has shown that a higher proportion of these patients exhibit lesions of the brain microvessels than the rest of the population. Lesions of the brain microvessels Lesions of the brain microvessels, visible on cerebral MRI images, can be of various kinds: white-matter hyperintensities and, more rarely, silent infarcts leading to loss of white-matter tissue. They result from a deterioration of the small cerebral arteries that supply blood to the brain's white matter, ...

Fairfax, Va., January 18, 2011 – HIV-positive head and neck cancer patients respond well to radiation therapy treatments and experience similar toxicity rates as non-HIV-positive patients, despite prior reports to the contrary, according to a study in the January issue of the International Journal of Radiation Oncology•Biology•Physics, an official journal of the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO). Patients with HIV have a significantly higher risk of developing some types of cancers; however, since the use of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) began ...

In birds as in humans, female fertility declines with age. But some female birds can slow the ticking of their biological clocks by choosing the right mates, according to results of a study published online last week in the journal Oikos. Female birds become progressively less fertile as age takes its toll, says biologist Josh Auld of the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center in Durham, North Carolina, and co-author of the Oikos paper. Older females lay fewer eggs, and they lay them later in the season--at a time when less food is available for their chicks. But ...

DETROIT— The combined results of a genetic blood test and a five-minute functional MRI successfully classified more than three-quarters of healthy older adults, many of whom were destined to develop cognitive decline within 18 months of testing. John Woodard, Ph.D., associate professor of psychology in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and Institute of Gerontology at Wayne State University, is lead author of "Predicting Cognitive Decline in Healthy Older Adults Using fMRI" published in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease (vol. 21, no. 3). "No one had studied ...

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- MIT scientists have discovered that cells lining the blood vessels secrete molecules that suppress tumor growth and keep cancer cells from invading other tissues, a finding that could lead to a new way to treat cancer. Elazer Edelman, professor in the MIT-Harvard Division of Health Sciences and Technology (HST), says that implanting such cells adjacent to a patient's tumor could shrink a tumor or prevent it from growing back or spreading further after surgery or chemotherapy. He has already tested such an implant in mice, and MIT has licensed the technology ...

Baked goods made from hydrolyzed wheat flour are not toxic to celiac disease patients, according to a new study in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, the official journal of the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) Institute. Celiac disease occurs in the digestive system when people cannot tolerate a protein called gluten, which is found primarily in wheat. "This is the first time that a wheat flour-derived product is shown to not be toxic after being given to celiac patients for 60 days," said Luigi Greco, MD, PhD, of the University of Napes, Italy, ...

Montreal, January 19, 2011 – Toddlers who learn a second language from infancy have an edge over their unilingual peers, according to a new study from Concordia University and York University in Canada and the Université de Provence in France. As reported in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, the research team tested the understanding of English and French words among 24-month-olds to see if bilingual toddlers had acquired comparable vocabulary in each language. "By 24 months, we found bilingual children had already acquired a vocabulary in each of their two ...

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – Scientists around the world have been hot on the trail of a genetic mutation closely associated with some brain cancers and leukemia since the mutation's discovery in 2008. The hunt is now yielding fruit. In the Jan. 18, 2011 issue of Cancer Cell, researchers reveal how the mutation contributes to cancer development and suggest potential ways to counter its effects. About 75 percent of people with low-grade brain tumors and 20 percent of people with acute myeloid leukemia have a mutated version of a gene known as IDH. IDH helps cells metabolize, or ...

PITTSBURGH, Jan. 18 – Family caregivers who had not discussed life support measures with critically ill patients took nearly two weeks longer to decide to forego further medical intervention than those who had prior conversations about the issues, according to researchers from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and the Graduate School of Public Health. They share their findings in a poster presentation at the Society of Critical Care Medicine congress this week in San Diego. Also, a patient's loved ones were more confident about acting as surrogate decision-makers ...

Washington, DC, January 19, 2011— Both boys and girls who are victims of bullying, including bullying through e-mail and the internet, are at elevated risk for depression. However, according to a new study, adolescent girls may engage in substance use as a result of bullying-related depression,. As schools reopen following the holidays, the message to parents of adolescent girls is that bullying can have serious consequences:"If your daughter is a victim of bullying, take it seriously, do all possible to prevent recurrence, and attend to possible depression and substance ...

Serious traffic gridlocks, like the jam on Beijing's national expressway a few months ago which brought vehicles to a halt for days, are a real-world issue needing attention. Unfortunately, such standstills are not uncommon in Beijing, or in other cities around the world. Such incidents motivate the analysis of traffic to minimize similar events and provide insight into road design and construction, such as where to install traffic lights and toll booths, how many lanes to build, and where to construct an overpass or a tunnel. The goals of these analyses are to relieve ...

MANHATTAN, Kan. -- The forecast for predicting the next political hotspots could be much more accurate because of a model developed by two Kansas State University professors and a colleague in New York. The model, named the Predictive Societal Indicators of Radicalism Model of Domestic Political Violence Forecast, is currently five for five in predicting which countries will likely experience an escalation in domestic political violence against their governments within the next five years. "So far it's been pretty accurate," said Sam Bell, assistant professor of political ...

TORONTO, Ont., Jan. 19, 2011–Health care systems around the world are failing to use evidence obtained through research when making decisions, causing inefficiencies and reduced quantity and quality of life, according to a leading expert in the field of "knowledge translation." "Failures to use research evidence to inform decision-making are apparent across all key decision-maker groups," said Dr. Sharon Straus, a geriatrician and director of knowledge translation at St. Michael's Hospital. Dr. Straus was the guest editor of the January issue of the Journal of Clinical ...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. —Two aquatic biologists have proven that you don't have to travel to exotic locales to search for unusual new species. They discovered a distinctive species of crayfish in Tennessee and Alabama that is at least twice the size of its competitors. Its closest genetic relative, once thought to be the only species in its genus and discovered in 1884 about 130 miles away in Kentucky, can grow almost as big as a lobster. The researchers found their first specimen under one of the biggest rocks in the deepest part of a creek that has been a (literal) stomping ...

AMES, Iowa -- Parents may have good reason to be concerned about how much time their kids have been spending playing their new video games since the holidays. A new study by an international research team -- including an Iowa State University psychologist -- found further evidence that video game "addiction" exists globally and that greater amounts of gaming, lower social competence and greater impulsivity were risk factors for becoming pathological gamers. The two-year longitudinal study of 3,034 third through eighth grade students in Singapore found approximately nine ...

High school students are more likely to retake the SAT if they score just below a round number, such as 1290, than if they score just above it. That's the conclusion of a study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, which found that round numbers are strong motivators. The work was inspired by a study that found that a car's value drops suddenly when it passes a 10,000 mile mark—so a car that has 70,000 miles is worth markedly less than one with 69,900 miles. "We were talking about that and we started thinking about ...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. – Already under fire for raising taxes on individuals and businesses, the state Legislature missed a major opportunity to update the Illinois tax structure, says a University of Illinois law professor. Richard L. Kaplan, an expert on taxation and retirement issues, says the state of Illinois has a seriously outmoded tax structure that's in dire need of reform. "Tax reform is often very difficult because tax changes necessarily alter the burden of taxation, and some people end up paying more," he said. "That makes legislators hesitant to undertake the ...

A number of states are trying to deal with huge unfunded pension liabilities that threaten to absorb large shares of K-12 education budgets. Because this fiscal crisis may force policymakers to consider teacher retirement benefit system reform, the authors of a newly published journal issue suggest now is the opportune time to examine the consequences of these systems on school staffing and educator quality. Michael Podgursky, a professor of economics in the University of Missouri College of Arts and Science, co-edited, with University of Arkansas Professor Robert Costrell, ...

In the materials science equivalent of a football fan jumping onto the field and scoring a touchdown, scientists are documenting that one fundamental component of computer chips, long regarded as a passive bystander, can actually be made to act like a switch. That potentially allows it to take part in the electronic processes that power cell phones, iPads, computers, and thousands of other products. In a report in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, the scientists document the multiple ways in which silicon dioxide, long regarded simply as an electric insulator, ...

Scientists are reporting development and successful lab tests of "killer paper," a material intended for use as a new food packaging material that helps preserve foods by fighting the bacteria that cause spoilage. The paper, described in ACS' journal, Langmuir, contains a coating of silver nanoparticles, which are powerful anti-bacterial agents. Aharon Gedanken and colleagues note that silver already finds wide use as a bacteria fighter in certain medicinal ointments, kitchen and bathroom surfaces, and even odor-resistant socks. Recently, scientists have been exploring ...